Nike School Chicago


Location: River North, Chicago
Scope: Architecture (Interiors)
Progress/Year: Completed, 2022
Builder: Chicago Scenic
Photography: Dan Kelleghan Photography

This project is the design of a “Student Union” for Nike School Chicago. Nike School: Chicago is a community of creators: teachers that have charted their own successful paths in creative industries, and students who are just starting theirs. Open to the public and located on the 5th floor of Nike's Michigan Ave. store, this space serves multiple purposes: an informal area for study hall, student meet-ups, programming, and retail. A large projection allows for the screening of Nike School Chicago’s digital learning content. For the design, Future Firm used "collegiate gothic"-style elements, such as vaulted arches, reading room lamps, and bookshelves and transformed them through materiality and light. The new space features a trompe l’oeil-style illusion in its plan organization, and features neon, perforated steel, and chrome elements. This project builds on Future Firm’s 2019 experience with NikeLab c/o Virgil Abloh. 


Mark

Bronzeville Winery


Location: Bronzeville, Chicago
Client: Eric Williams & Cecilia Cuff
Scope: Architecture (Interiors)
Progress/Year: Completed, 2022
Photography: Daniel Kelleghan

Bronzeville Winery is the buildout of a new restaurant on Chicago’s South side with a focus on wine, art, and music. The design of the project features a display wall highlighting rotating exhibitions by local artists, spices, and wines. The architecture also creates space to share the restaurant’s local ties and featured offerings, including greens from community gardens and featured wines from Black-owned wineries. A special chef’s table creates an opportunity for diners to engage directly with the culinary team. Throughout the restaurant, unique recycled materials are foregrounded to create a warm and welcoming aesthetic. These include reclaimed Chicago common brick; synthetic stone from recycled glass; and lighting pendants assembled from scrap steel. Furniture and fixtures reflect the restaurant’s mission to feature local artists and diverse voices. Chairs and tables are designed and built by Titobi Studios (Max Design & Norman Teague Design Studios).



Mark

Indo-American Center


Location: West Ridge, Chicago
Client: Indo-American Center
Scope: Architecture, Programming
Progress/Year: 2023–Ongoing

The Indo-American Center is a community-based 501c3 organization founded in 1990. What initially began as a one-room office providing citizenship application assistance to the West Ridge community, has now become a comprehensive multi-service agency serving immigrant clients from over 30 nations with three main pillars of service: Immigration, Public Health, and Education. IAC is deeply rooted and connected to the community it serves, located at the heart of “Little India” along Devon Avenue in Chicago’s West Ridge neighborhood—the “port of entry” neighborhood for immigrants and refugees from South Asia.

The project goals include improving and updating existing spaces to create a more welcoming, functional, and efficient building. Another project goal is to create a shared community hub which will be a continued resource for both IAC’s social service activities but also for the activities of peer non-profit organizations. The design was inspired by an effort to celebrate South Asian Culture with a building that represents the community’s collective identity. Lastly, the design anticipates future growth and change by creating adaptable and multi-purpose spaces that allow the organization’s program to flex as needed based on the requirements of the community.



Mark

Revolution Workshop


Location: Garfield Park, Chicago
Client: Revolution Workshop
Scope: Architecture
Progress/Year: 2022–Ongoing


This project is the renovation of Revolution Workshop’s current warehouse building to better meet current and future needs of this revolutionary organization. The project combines the existing 7,000 sf the organization is already occupying with an adjacent recently vacated adjacent space of approximately 5,000 sf, in two long span bow-truss buildings formerly used as a soda factory. The design aims to create a flagship location: an iconic headquarters for Revolution Workshop that is a hub for the organization’s activities which showcases the breadth and impact of the RW’s work.

The design focuses on creating urgently needed spaces for the Revolution Community: highly functional and flexible shop space, engineered for the future of construction; welcoming and contemporary office space, to support staff and social services; and bold, collaborative environments for trainees to learn, build, and come together. All of these spaces are designed with RW’s preference for functional, welcoming aesthetics in mind: industrial materials mix with pops of color to create a unique palette. By re-organizing the building’s floor plan and organization to run east-west, the main shop becomes larger and more flexible, as well as with direct access to sidewalk dock doors. New openings in the building’s exterior west wall and skylights allow for natural light in the building. New mezzanines take advantage of the building’s height and spacious structure, as well as create unique overlooks for trainee community-building and office break-outs. Most importantly, the project design aims to maintain and cultivate the vibrant culture of Revolution Workshop, creating spaces that foregrounds building trust and collaboration within its community and in the construction industry at large.



Mark

Hem House

Location: East Garfield Park, Chicago
Client: Hem Development
Scope: Architecture (New construction)
Progress/Year: Completed, 2021 
Photography: Daniel Kelleghan Photography

Hem House sits in the middle of a residential street in East Garfield Park, within walking distance of the local public park and public transportation. In scale, the structure adheres to its context, while in plan and materiality, it stands out from the typical brick and stone townhouses and two-flats that surround it. The project reorients the typical Chicago 25 x 125-foot residential lot by creating a narrower, 16-foot-wide home with a 6-foot setback, allowing for an ample side garden, central entrance, and windows lining the long facade. In this way, Hem House offers an easily replicable model for a spacious, two-bedroom home that fits seamlessly on the majority of Chicago’s many vacant residential lots.


Mark