In May 2022, Storefront for Community Design announced a bold, new vision and a three-year strategic plan. We will firmly focus on transforming our low-cost design and planning assistance programs and expanding our design education programs to inspire community-driven design in the built environment.
This is a living, breathing plan that we will continue revisiting over the months and years ahead. Since kickstarting our plan in July, we've been building an intentional roadmap that prioritizes actions and creates measurable goals. We are excited to share it and begin collaborating with you as we continue to realize our vision.
Each year, Valentine’s Day reminds us to purposefully demonstrate love, care, and support for our families, friends, and communities. This year’s holiday also marks Storefront for Community Design’s 10th anniversary and we want to shout a huge THANK YOU for your support in making our first ten years a success.
Since the beginning, we set out to make design accessible to all “for the love of our city.” Through partnerships and community collaborations, we continue to discover new ways of seeking Richmond's physical and social transformation through design and community voice. After an incredible ten years, we remain humble, yet excited for the possibilities that lie ahead for our organization, partners, and neighbors.
Our Board of Directors, staff, and partners are excited to celebrate this milestone anniversary throughout the year, so stay tuned for ways to get involved. To kickstart our celebration, here’s a few ways you can show your support today.
Donate to Storefront to support our next ten years
Volunteer as a Session Designer
Share our story with your network
Whether you’ve been with Storefront from the beginning or just a short time, we wanted to celebrate our anniversary with a look back over the last ten years. Enjoy the memories and accomplishments of our community and we look forward to making many more with you in the coming years. Now, it’s time to celebrate!
Storefront for Community Design is excited to announce the selection of Shawn Balon as its new Executive Director.
Shawn brings a wealth of experience in design, non-profit, and educational environments with expanded knowledge of organizational management and strategic planning. He has the strategic vision necessary to elevate Storefront for Community Design and its programs in the years to come and will bring a creative, innovative, and collaborative approach when working with staff, board members, donors, partners, volunteers, and the community-at-large.
“I appreciate the board’s confidence in me, and I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to lead such a great organization. It will take innovative and purposeful solutions to create a path for Storefront for Community Design to continue addressing the challenges in our communities, and I look forward to advancing my efforts to focus on the importance of participatory design to honor differences, challenge injustices, and create vibrant neighborhoods,” said Balon.
We recently got to share a few projects at mOb studio + Storefront for Community Design with Richmond Magazine and how it all got started. Read the full interview by Taylor Peterson published on Feb 7, 2020.
“Design provides a vision rather than a … volatile position.” —Camden Whitehead, co-founder, Mob Studio
Make sure you submit your application in to the Golden Hammer Awards this Sunday before midnight!
If you don't have a project to submit, join us for the awards on Thursday, November 2nd, 2017 and the After Party hosted by Storefront at the Valentine. More details to come!
Friends of Forest Hill Park
Forest Hill Park contains a couple historic buildings in need of roof repairs. These are the Old Stone House and stables in the the park. Storefront will help direct the conversation within the community to make sure that all facets of these historic sites are told.
The Old Stone House in Forest Hill Park.
If you think you might be interested in these projects, give us a shout at hello@storefrontrichmond.org
mObians have already ventured out to several corners of Richmond and the surrounding areas to tackle projects that range from mental health awareness on VCU's campus to Monument Avenue, from City Hall to the combined sewage overflow systems in Richmond.
Check out the mOb projects that launched earlier this month here.
Shown below, undergraduate mOb students are working on sketches of monuments that they would like to see in Richmond. What might you make a monument to in this city?
Firstly, what are the Golden Hammer Awards?
The Golden Hammer Awards were started in 2000 with a goal of honoring excellence in neighborhood revitalization projects throughout the Greater-Richmond Area. Storefront for Community Design and Historic Richmond are partnering together to host the awards with support from the Better Housing Coalition. Read more here.
Do you know a project that is deserving of the Golden Hammer Award?
Nominate a project or apply through our application page. Projects must have been complete after January 1, 2016. Four awards will be given out and applicants will be considered for the categories: Best Restoration, Best Adaptive Reuse Project, Best New Construction, and Best Placemaking Project.
We are enthused to present this year's awards alongside the folks at Historic Richmond. The ceremony will be held on November 2nd, 2017 at Monumental Church. Join us for our panel discussion titled The History, Development and Revitalization of Northside Streetcar Suburbs. Following the lecture, we will present the 2017 Golden Hammer Awards. This year's award has been designed and produced by students from the mOb Studio.
If you have further questions about the application process, the event, project eligibility, or sponsorship, email goldenhammer@storefrontrichmond.org.
We want to give a huge thank you to everyone who came out to the Grand Opening of the Six Points Innovation Center! This is an exciting time for the Highland Park neighborhood and for all of us, so it was great to share that with so many warm, smiling faces!
Here's just a sampling of what's happening over the summer:
Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design Training
Empowered for Life Class- 4 Day job readiness program
Gender Neutral Bathroom Mosaic Curated by I Am My Life
Green Team Energy Audit -Assessment to create 6PIC sustainability plan
Changemakers Mural Project
Urban Agriculture Corps Various Site Projects
Groundwork RVA/ Bus Rapid Transit - Teaching young people to ride bus rapid transit!
On Saturday April 29th, Highland Park residents joined us for the Highland Park Spring Break Event. The event featured 8 different non-profit organizations working within the community. The goal was to engage with community members about how they might envision the growth of their neighborhood, to describe the resources these organizations offered, and most importantly to eat, dance, and perform in the talent show.
At least 100 people showed up to dance, hear about the Storefront for Community Design, Groundwork RVA, Saving Our Youth, the CPDC, LISC, and Tricycle Gardens. On display in the 6PIC space were plans for architectural plans for local business improvements that community members voted on. The day was unusually hot but that didn't stop the talent show from continuing!
Join us for the final First Friday exhibition of the semester at mOb this Friday, May 5th, from 6:30--8:30. Students will be showing off their final outcomes from projects including a new design plan for the south side of the T. Pott Memorial Bridge, some swag for the Richmond Volleyball Club, and some fantastic graphics from the newly formed mOb Press Club.
What has been going on at mOb recently? Read on for a quick rundown of the activity at the studio this semester.
We started off the semester with a quick design competition amongst the students to redesign the Golden Hammer Award. The Golden Hammer Awards are a recognition of excellence in neighborhood revitalization projects in the Greater Richmond Area. Learn more about the awards next week.
The students then began working in teams on 11 projects throughout the semester.
Last Saturday, students headed to Greensville County to clean up the site of an old Rosenwald School, the Greensville County Training School. The interdisciplinary team of students has been working on an identity for the new space, a plan for its repurposing, and a series of brochures and on site graphics to raise awareness.
Another team of students is working with the Richmond Volleyball Club to make their graphics speak to a new, younger demographics.
The Minority AIDS Support Services group is working to create a comfortable, discrete space in their offices in Hampton, VA, where community members can get tested for HIV and feel supported and comfortable around other clients the non-profit serves. They are exploring interior design solutions for a shared waiting room space.
A team of students is working for another semester with Brooks Diner in Northside to redesign their exterior sign and offer solutions for a patio while yet another group of students is helping to redesign the look of the Afrikana Film Festival. A smaller, yet fastidious nonetheless, student team is working with the VCU Police downtown to design spatial solutions to make the entrance to new offices on Broad St more abiding and in turn, help them fulfill their mission of becoming better neighbors in downtown Richmond.
Stay tuned for final solutions and mark your calendars for our First Friday opening next month!
Join us on Friday, February 3rd (6:30p to 8:30p) to check out our student designers' prototypes for the Golden Hammer Awards. The past two weeks, mOb students have been tasked with redesigning the award given out at the Golden Hammer Awards, hosted this year by Historic Richmond and Storefront. See you there!
Storefront is seeking volunteers to propose a redesign the storefront of Miracles store in Church Hill. Do you have an idea for new signage, a color scheme or something to make this shop stand out?
Contact Adele (adele@storefrontrichmond.org) if you are a designer interested in this storefront improvement project.
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Note: to sign up to volunteer, follow this link to complete the form.
