Charlottesville, Virginia

ELEVEN:30 is a mixed-use condominium on a constricted site a short walk from Charlottesville’s popular downtown mall. To create a sense of privacy on a busy urban corridor, the project features ten residential lofts facing a landscaped court, and two office buildings facing East High Street.

The residences were designed to accommodate modern live/work living, and feature contemporary design, 10ft ceilings and abundant natural light. Many feature single-floor living. Commercial buildings feature flexible, contemporary office space, and can be easily subdivided for a subtenant.

Dearborn, Michigan

Once an icon of America’s industrial might, the Ford Motor Company’s Rouge Complex had in recent years become a symbol of industrial pollution and rust belt manufacturing when Ford Motor Company began a process to modernize the facilities and restore the degraded environment.

Richard Price, while Director of Community Design for William McDonough + Partners, led a multi-disciplinary team in the creation of a master plan for the environmental restoration of the complex. The plan is a comprehensive framework for 21st century manufacturing. It includes strategies for closed-loop manufacturing, renewable energy systems, ecosystem restoration and integrated storm water management.

The project includes a soil bioremediation program on the site of the abandoned coke ovens to detoxify and restore organic balance to the soil. Storm water is filtered and conveyed in a series of vegetated ‘hedgerows’, pervious pavement areas and a 10-acre vegetated roof. The Rouge River, channelized to control flooding, was redesigned as wetland habitat. The plan also highlights the history of the complex through conservation of historic structures and the creation of new employee facilities on the site of significant events from the history of the labor movement.

Awards

2003 ASLA Michigan Honor Award

Lynchburg, Virginia

Liberty University is in the midst of a tremendous building campaign and campus transformation valued at over $500 million that includes the construction of numerous new academic, athletic, performance, and residential buildings as well as site infrastructure such as bridges, tunnels, amphitheaters and transportation patterns. An estimated 75% of the core campus is being entirely redesigned. 

KWLS is integrally involved in the redesign effort. As the master plan landscape architect KWLS has been collaborating with VMDO Architects on a new master plan for Liberty University that will guide the campus reorganization. This involves a complete redesign of the Liberty campus, including vehicular and pedestrian circulation, sustainable storm water management and plantings, and the establishment of a cohesive identity throughout the campus landscape.

Charlottesville, Virginia

Riverbluff and RiversEdge are two small, award-winning new communities overlooking the Rivanna River in the Woolen Mills neighborhood of Charlottesville.  The projects include Low-Impact Development techniques, including a series of bioswales to retain and clean storm water, an extensive landscape restoration program and native plant landscaping. The houses are designed to demonstrate appropriate green building techniques in a range of house sizes and styles. Houses exceed Energy Star standards, and include state-of-the-art heating and cooling systems, energy recovery ventilators and solar hot water. The houses also feature vegetated roofs, rainwater harvesting and intimate native plant gardens.