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Wheeler Kearns Architects Nonprofit + Community
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Firm Overview
Lakeview Pantry
Lakeview Pantry Hub Inspiration Kitchens Care for Real
When a space we design resonates with your deepest intention, it has a lasting and powerful impact. As we work with you, we devote all our energies to understanding your core purpose, the transformation you seek, your mission.
We want to see your challenge through your eyes. Doing this guides us to what we call the “emotional center,” the heart around which your entire project revolves. We return to that central idea as we craft concepts, help you make decisions, and refine our responses to those choices. Everything from the big-picture view to the design of a door handle evolves from that emotional center.
The result is a space that responds uniquely to your mission, even as you balance aspiration with budget. As an example, for a food pantry in Lakeview, this meant stretching the use of humble materials to create a place that was infused with a sense of dignity, home and respect.
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Wheeler Kearns is a collective practice of architects.
We work with people who seek to enrich their lives in spaces that embody their purpose, energy and vision.
Lakeview Pantry
Year Completed 2016 Location 3945 N. Sheridan Chicago, IL 60613 Size 7,500 sf Photography Tom Harris
Lakeview Pantry has transformed a dilapidated pet daycare into their first permanent home, and in the process, reinvented a program typology that often carries a stigma into one that has a positive impact on the community it serves and its neighbors.
The program includes a waiting area, distribution counter, walk-in freezer/cooler, dry storage, sorting room, private huddle rooms, conference/seminar room, staff offices, volunteer storage and shared lunch room/café.
The design is informed by hours of observation and strives to increase efficiency and bring joy to its clients. Large, colorful graphics and signage help communicate functionality and locations of foods in both verbal and non-verbal ways, making it easier to understand how to navigate the space, while adding some levity to what is a serious and sometimes overwhelming experience.
The goal of the design is to create a space that provides dignity to those in time of need, furthers the Pantry’s mission and raises awareness about hunger and poverty. The project uses humble materials in imaginative ways to create a simple, welcoming and safe environment for all.
A dedicated desk at the entrance allows a volunteer to greet each guest as they enter and the bright white distribution counter running through the space facilitates an organized flow of food distribution as volunteers help clients select fresh produce, meats, dairy, and staples. At check-out, the flower display leaves clients smiling as they choose a fresh bouquet to bring home.
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7 Conference Room Private Office Restroom Huddle Room Open Office Copy Room Volunteer Storage Staff & Volunteer Cafe 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Second Floor Plan 2’ 5’ 10’ 2’ 5’ 10’ DOWN OPEN TO BELOW DOWN 1 2 3 4 7 8 6 5 2 2 4 3 Greeter/Weekly Intake Waiting Area Distribution Monthly Intake Restroom Walk-in Freezer/Cooler Dry Storage Glean/Sort Trash/Loading 1 2 3 4 5 First Floor Plan Conference Private Office Restroom Huddle Room Open Office Copy Room Volunteer Storage Staff & Volunteer Cafe 1 2 3 4 Second Floor Plan 6 7 8 9 5 6 7 8 UP UP 2’ 5’ 10’ 1 2 3 7 8 6 5 4 9 5 6
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Year Completed 2019 Location 5151 N Ravenswood Ave Chicago, IL 60640 Size 10,000 sf Photography Tom Harris
Lakeview Pantry Hub
Lakeview Pantry is a highly-regarded food pantry and social service organization that has made a powerful impact on Chicago hunger relief, with every aspect of the design and service model aiming to uplift their client’s lives.
The Hub is created to serve as the organization’s primary large-scale intake warehouse, expanding its capacity to store sizable donations and help even more Chicagoans who are facing difficulty. The new facility also includes social support services and Chicago’s first food pantry onlineordering and pick-up service.
electrical service, mechanical and structural upgrades, and a ramp to make the space fully accessible to all.
The DNA of their flagship market weaves through the Hub; bright colors and large food graphics re-appear on the windows, a light-filled waiting area welcomes clients with flowers, and a greeter personally checks-in each individual. A bright blue painted core volume houses the online market pick-up center, private huddle rooms, and a staff/ volunteer kitchen.
The Hub adapts an existing 10,000-sf 1960’s masonry building with code-required upgrades, including new water service, sprinkler system,
Lakeview Pantry has created a physical and spiritual hub for dignified, uplifting experiences for its growing community of staff, volunteers, and clientele.
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Floor 6 9
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Entry Client Intake Online Market + Distribution Conference Room Workroom Huddle Room Volunteer Storage Mechanical Staff and Volunteer Cafe Cooler Freezer Dry Food Storage Glean/Sort Loading 1 2 3 4 5
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Floor Plan 8’
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12 13 14 1 2 3 4 5 6 9 12 11 6 10 14 7 8 8 13 Entry Client intake Online market + distribution Conference room Workroom Huddle Room Volunteer storage Mechanical Staff and Volunteer storage Cooler Freezer Dry food storage Glean/Sort Loading 1 2 3 4 5 First Floor Plan 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
Entry Client Intake Online Market Conference Workroom Huddle Room Volunteer Storage Mechanical Staff and Volunteer Cooler Freezer Dry Food Storage Glean/Sort Loading
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Inspiration Kitchens
Year Completed 2011 Location 3504 W Lake St Chicago, IL 60624 Size 7,800 sf
The project involved the adaptive reuse of an uninhabited 1906 single story masonry building and the improvement of three vacant untended lots located along an under-developed stretch of west Lake Street in the East Garfield Park neighborhood of Chicago Illinois.
The garden in the west lot provides supplementary vegetables and herbs for the meals prepared in the restaurant and also serves as an educational resource for students and the community.
Photography Steve Hall - Hedrich Blessing
The renovated facility responds to the Inspiration Kitchens mission. An eighty seat restaurant serves subsidized meals to working poor families and market rate meals to the general public. A combination service, catering and training kitchen hosts a thirteen week food service training program. A conference room and administrative offices support the organization’s community outreach programs including case management services to students.
Neighboring Garfield Park and the Garfield Park Conservatory, the users’ experience begins with the large window openings on the street front which provide a visual connection to the surrounding park and neighborhood. Both diner and student enter the facility past the western garden and trellised court into the enjoyable social atmosphere of the dining room and are directed either to a table in the dining room or towards the privacy of the social services offices in the rear of the building. The public dining room and kitchen are used to filter and protect the private social services component offered by the facility.
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LEED LEED Gold
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23 UP 2’ 5’ 10’ UP DN DN 8 15 11 14 10 2 1 F2 F1F1 6 7 7 7 7 10 9 11 4 5 7 3 12 13 Entry Main Dining Room Family Dining Room Service Kitchen Catering Kitchen Classroom/Meeting Room Offices Computer alcove Locker room Mechanical room Storage room Delivery entry Staff/Trainee entry Electrical room Multipurpose room 1 2 3 4 5 First Floor Plan 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Partial Upper Floor (F2) Partial Basement Plan (F1)
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Care for Real
Year Completed 2019 Location 5339 N Sheridan Rd Chicago, IL 60640
Size 2,530 sf renovated (4,615 sf total)
Photography Tom Harris
Care for Real (CFR), established in 1970, provides food, clothing and counseling services to Chicago’s Edgewater’s community. In 2016, the organization aspired to improve the quality of service to their clients by revamping their space.
The improved design relocates all public and client spaces to the light-filled storefront, and a former private staff entry is repurposed into a threshold for everyone. Clients are now greeted on entry by a volunteer, issued a number and are directed to a waiting area. An arrangement of loose chairs in the center and birch plywood benches around the perimeter increase seating capacity from 40 to 60. Additionally, clients now have the option to store shopping carts in a dedicated ‘parking area,’ and thereby open up the circulation in the waiting area.
A new receptionist desk anchors the space and welcomes visitors immediately on entry. Administrative offices are centralized, around which clients move through the existing food distribution to the north and the new clothing distribution space to the south. The enlarged clothing closet is outfitted with hanging and shelves on both sides of a center aisle, permitting efficiencies in display and retrieval of goods. This improved organization ensures clients have a positive and dignified shopping experience.
The new Care for Real now embodies its name. Using daylight, openness, and paint - a material that cannot be value engineered out – Care for Real provides a dignified place for the business of uplifting lives, spirits.
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Entry Vestibule Waiting Room Check-in Counter Interview Room
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1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 3’ 6’ 9’ 1 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 2 3 11 12 13 14 15 EXIT ENTRY Floor Plan Before Renovation
area Floor Plan After Renovation
Operation’s Office Director’s Office Administration Sorting Room Closet Sorting Expansion Restroom Cart Alcove Food Distribution Counter Food Storage Exit Vestibule
(above) Former waiting
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Awards:
Lakeview Pantry
2018 Illinois Green Alliance Emerald Award for Community Impact
2018 International Lighting Design Award of Excellence (Lux Populi)
2017 The Architect’s Newspaper Best of Design Awards, Honorable Mention
2017 AIA Chicago Distinguished Building Award, Citation of Merit
2017 Contract Magazine Inspiration Awards, Grand Prize
2017 The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Award for Architectural Excellence in Community Design, 1st Place
Inspiration Kitchens
2013 AIA San Francisco Social Impact Design Award, Honor Award 2013 Rudy Bruner Award, Gold
2013 AIA Illinois Honor Awards, Citation of Merit
2012 AIA Chicago SustainABILITY Leadership Award, Citation of Merit, Non-Profit Winner
2012 USGBC Illinois Chapter Emerald Award, Building Renovations
2011 Richard Driehaus Foundation Award for Architectural Excellence, Second Place
2011 Good Neighbor Award, Chicago Association of Realtors
2011 SEED’s Structures for Inclusion Award, Regional Winner
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