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Wheeler Kearns Architects Nonprofit + Community
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Contents
Wheeler Kearns Architects Introduction
Broadway Youth Center
North Lawndale Employment Network
The Night Ministry
Founded in 1987, we have over thirty years of experience with visioning and master-planning, renovation, adaptive reuse, and new construction projects for residential, institutional, commercial, and community-driven organizations. Our work spans from alternative affordable housing models to multi-family mid-rise structures; from community food pantries to innovative visual and performing arts venues. We are drawn to complex design problems and constraints that challenge us to create unique, responsive, and inspiring solutions.
In our practice, every architect proactively trains across multiple project types ensuring that the breadth of experience and institutional knowledge built over time enriches each project. We build our teams to include individuals with a range of experiences and knowledge to avoid any preconceived notions about your project and ensure fresh ideas and continuous innovation.
We are a diverse group of thinkers and designers who equally share in the roles of designer, technician and manager. Each project architect is fully immersed in your project, from the very first conversation through move-in and evaluating the success of your space after it is occupied. We have been fortunate to cultivate long-lasting relationships with many of our clients.
Through office-wide studio pin-ups and internal reviews, all staff members contribute ideas and feedback to every project to provide the best ideas and highest quality work. This philosophy offers a wider spectrum of possibility and has led to unanticipated solutions, like transforming a shuttered lumberyard into an innovative 21st-century school. Or discovering that the 70-foot tower of an abandoned food-manufacturing plant can be a viable and exciting gallery and performance space. Our approach ensures that the best ideas will be explored for each unique project.
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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.
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.
The result is a space that responds uniquely to your mission. For example, we know we’ve gotten it right when we can balance aspiration with budget to ensure that a food pantry is infused with a sense of dignity, home, and respect.
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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.
Wheeler Kearns Architects was named AIA Chicago Firm of the Year in 1996 and 2016. Our office is located in the Fisher Building at 343 S. Dearborn St., Suite 200, Chicago, IL 60604.
Year Completed 2021 Location 1053 W. Irving Park Rd
Size 17,780 sf
Photography Kendall McCaugherty, Hall + Merrick
Broadway Youth Center
The new five-story facility for Howard Brown Health’s Broadway Youth Center (BYC) provides a home for Chicago’s young LGBTQ+ community to access comprehensive social and medical services in spaces that are liberating and dignified.
At the outermost layer, the building celebrates unique voices coming together in the spirit of community. The façade is composed of a patchwork of large masonry panels with varying shades of brick color and coursing that wrap around and knit the building together like a quilt. Inside, the new facility acknowledges that each person who enters is on a unique journey and supports them with an environment where they can experience joy, love, and acceptance. Spaces are designed to be warm, welcoming, and safe for young people to express themselves.
Upon entry, visitors are immediately greeted by smiling faces to help them navigate to their destination—whether that is the café, clinic services, pharmacy, classrooms, or daily drop-in center on the top levels. Accent colors and murals on each floor—coupled with warm maple wood doors and millwork, airy spaces, and comfortable furnishings—bring the artistic, youthful, and energetic spirit of the community into peaceful and therapeutic spaces.
BYC’s new home is a resource for acceptance, affirmation, and empowerment. The building celebrates the diversity of our community with a building that is flexible, welcoming, and vibrant: one that speaks with one voice in many languages.
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Road
Pharmacy Waiting Client Store Kitchen Lobby Cafe Clinic Clinic Waiting Staff Office Floor Drop-in
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Lobby Cafe Clinic Clinic Waiting Staff Office Floor Drop In Education Meeting Room Dance & Movement Room TGNC Conference
Irving Park
Sheridan Red Line
Education Meeting Room Dance & Movement Room TGNC Conference
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Year Completed 2021 Location 1111 S Homan Ave Chicago, IL 60624 Size 20,000 sf Photography Tom Harris Architectural Photography
North Lawndale Employment Network
The North Lawndale Employment Network supports residents returning from incarceration and others who face the day-to-day financial hardships of poverty with pathways to economic prosperity. When a former bank building in the Lawndale neighborhood became available, the nonprofit organization seized the opportunity to relocate all of their programs under one roof and become a place of gathering and growth for the community.
A new entrance plaza, converted from a former parking lot, is populated with native plantings and ample seating, and offers much-needed community green space.
Originally built in 1983, the bank structure was designed for security, with thick walls, few windows, and perimeter fencing. Now, new windows, a one-story glass addition, and multiple green spaces transform the opaque façade and infuse the site with a sense of transparency and welcome.
Inside, the program includes a café, administrative offices, training rooms, a computer lab, a local bank, and a community event space with a private peace garden. At the heart of the building, the organization celebrates its most important asset, its clients. The production space for Sweet Beginnings, an urban apiary enterprise, radiates from the center—with peek-through windows that display the work taking place, and prove that the opportunity to change is not only possible, it is already happening and worth the investment.
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BANK TENANT
Local Bank branch with working drive through with direct access to the Beelove Cafe and adjacent financial Opportunity Center
SWEET BEGINNINGS PRODUCTION SPACE
A celebration of the most important people in NLEN’s organization, their clients.
A central gold wall highlights where their honey is processed and packaged on-site
PEACE GARDEN
Place of respite from the surrounding urbanscape
INCREASING TRANSPARENCY
Each public entry has full glass doors and aligns with the punched openings of the central production space
THE BEELOVE CAFE
The Cafe connects all the programs on the first floor to one another.
The glass addition provides both abundant daylight and additional seating
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The Night Ministry
Year Completed 2020 Location 1735 N Ashland Ave Chicago, IL 60622 Size 21,000 sf Photography Kendall McCaugherty
Designed for refuge and recovery, The Night Ministry’s new home provides an oasis for security, independence, and safety for young adults facing adversity. The new headquarters is located in the “Mural Building” – a prominent manufacturing building known for its large murals that cover the North, East, and South elevations along a busy Chicago expressway. Three floors of the 1910 heavytimber building are renovated for The Night Ministry’s new headquarters which includes: “The Crib” – an overnight shelter for young adults ages 18-24, a serving kitchen and dining space, administrative offices, meeting rooms, and multipurpose programming space for social services, job assistance, and social activities.
A new private entrance has been established for The Crib, reinforcing its mission of security, inclusion, and safety. Located on the North side of the building, a former loading dock with a large awning above is transformed into an accessible entrance, sheltered, and protected from the street. Here and throughout, glass doors and windows are used as critical elements to build trust, allowing guests to glimpse inside before entering, and further alleviating any feelings of stress or helplessness that they may be experiencing.
Throughout the organization’s interior spaces, painted murals complement the building’s exterior signage. These feature walls, commissioned by local Chicago art students, will eventually fill each floor with richness and color, conveying the organization’s values of refuge, safety, and healing.
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Crib Reception Building Entry Elevator
Crib Sleeping Room Restroom Shower Room Sink Room Crib Lounge Laundry Storage Office Crib Kitchen Multipurpose/Dining Meeting Room Lounge Open Office Convenience Stair Print Room Staff Kitchen Work/Huddle Room Conference Reception Wellness Room Phone Booth
Crib Reception Building Entry New Elevator Crib Sleeping Room Restroom Shower Room Sink Room Crib Lounge Laundry Storage Office Crib Kitchen Multipurpose/Dining Meeting Room
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First Floor Plan
Key
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Meeting
Reception Open
Convenience Print Room Staff Kitchen Work/Huddle Conference Reception Wellness Room Phone Booth 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 Third Floor Plan UP UP DN 16 15 3 17 5 10 18 5 5 8 24 16 21 20 16 10 20 24 24 10 10 16 15 3 17 5 10 18 5 5 8 16 21 20 16 10 20 24 10 10 24 24 Second Floor Plan Third Floor Plan
Reception Building Entry Elevator Crib Sleeping Restroom Shower Room Sink Room Crib Lounge Laundry Storage Office Crib Kitchen Multipurpose/Dining
Room
Office
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Awards:
The Night Ministry
2021 BD+C Reconstruction Award, Honorable Mention
2021 AIA Chicago Interior Architecture Award, Special Recognition
2021 AIA Illinois Honor Awards: Excellence in Interiors Award for Projects 5,000 sf and above
2021 IIDA Illinois RED Awards, Philanthropic Winner
2021 Architizer A+ Awards, Special Mention, Architecture + For Good
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