Recenter is a five-story, multi-use structure, designed for the nonprofit Hope Harbor in the Midtown district of Houston, Texas. Situated on Main Street along the light rail line, Hope Harbor’s mission provides rehabilitation services to Houston’s homeless population, including educational initiatives in addition to housing and addiction services. The new building replaces a small complex of structures that were woefully inadequate for the scale of impact necessary.
The first and second levels house administration, resident lounges, a garden terrace, and a dining facility for both residents and non-residents. Levels 3 through 5 contain the single-room-occupancy residential spaces. Each of these residential floors includes one dayroom that provides access to a shared resident space and laundry facilities. Each residential floor utilizes a different color to define the spaces and create a less institutional environment. The three dayrooms puncture the main Street facade offering a glimpse to the colorful organization within.
The bottom two floors used conventional steel construction methods while the top three residential levels are comprised of a digitally fabricated cold-formed steel panelized system factory-made off-site. This process translated the architectural BIM file into a fabrication model that was then manufactured and shipped to the construction site. Once on-site, the top three floors were installed in 14 days significantly reducing the on-site construction schedule.
Darker metallic and natural wood materials on Levels 1 and 2 emphasize the monolithic and lighter-colored composite panel pre-fabricated system on the residential floors. Level 2's terrace is a shared resident-only space with moveable garden cubes for vegetables and a large covered exterior space. This space is both the heart of recenter overlooking Main Street while also being an elevated and quiet area of respite.
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