With life so up in the air we are happy, and feel incredibly blessed, that many of our projects are moving ahead as planned. Here are a few updates.

Duke Catholic Student Center

One of our new projects is a large addition to the Duke Catholic Student Center at the corner of Buchanan and Trinity Streets in Durham. It borders East Campus and Trinity Park. We have completed schematic design and are moving on to the details. It is a fabulous project for a great client which will really give the students more space to worship, study, dine and sing! It will also make the building universally accessible with new entrances and an elevator. We hope to break ground this fall.

Leskin Renovation

Megan did a bang-up job for Shannon and Will Leskin. We opened up their kitchen into the dining area letting all of the morning sunshine in, created a small powder room, and enlarged their master bathroom. Notice the super sweet sliding mirror/window covering in the master bathroom. Kudos to Architrave Construction for a job well done.

NorthStar Church of the Arts

I hope that some of you have gotten to experience the NorthStar Church of the Arts. It has become a true gem in our community and we are so proud of this renovation. We wanted to give it a good polishing and honor its original bones. Many thanks to Gateway Building Company.

Five Projects in Process

We are happy that construction, at least as of this writing, is still progressing, albeit at a slower pace. We will have more on all of these projects in upcoming newsletters.

Matthews

We designed a guest apartment, carport, and porch which creates a lovely entry courtyard. This is actually our second project after the addition of a master suite and the best screened porch in Durham which we completed last year.

Williamson Renovation

This is a complete transformation inside and out.

Before

In process

Before

In process - yes, we blew away the walls & ceilings

Plum Restaurant

Located in the old Durham city garage built in 1926 we are transforming it into a fabulous new restaurant.

618 Ramseur Street

We designed the transformation of the shell of the old Custom Stone and Marble building into the new home of Gateway Building company and added a stunning roof deck over a future restaurant space.

Durham Food Hall

So close we can almost taste it.

In the news


NCSU summer design build studio

Many of you have been following the Design Build studio that I have co-taught with the good folks at BuildSense, Randall Lanou, Erik Mehlman, and Ryan Stamey. Mark Storch was our able TA. You can read about this past year's project in the NC State Alumni magazine. Thanks to Bill Krueger (writer) and Justin Cook (photographer). Also a big shout out to Kofi Boone, Andy Fox, David Hill and the Princeville community.

Cassilhaus

Speaking of alumni magazines, Duke Magazine published a fabulous article on what Frank and Ellen are doing at Cassilhaus. Thanks to Scott Huler (writer) and Chris Hildreth (photographer). Article starts on page 40.

We are also proud to be mentioned in Mike Welton's article The Carolina School: Distinct Modern Architecture in the Triangle in Walter Magazine 



The COVID-19 virus is effecting all of us in so many ways. My sincere hope is that on the other side of this we are more appreciative of the entire medical community, postal workers, school teachers, restaurant staff, grocery store employees, delivery people, farm workers, community organizers and so many more. We know that many are suffering and some folks are wanting to assist so we have compiled a list of our favorite groups.

To support both local Durham restaurants and local medical workers Feed the Fight is a great group as are the Inter-Faith Food Shuttle and the Durham Public School Foundation.

With both the virus and financial insecurities so prevalent the community is sorely stressed and groups like El Futuro are really helping to give stability and calm fears.

Since the Durham Farmers' Market is officially closed we are letting a few farmers vend from our parking lot - with the requisite 6 foot spacing.

Stay safe everyone,
Meredith, Megan, Pamela, and Ellen

Credits:
Opening photograph of Hellebores in Clarksville, VA. by Frank Konhaus
Duke catholic student center renderings by Meredith Smith.
Leskin and North Star Church of the Arts photographs by Lissa Gottwals
All projects in process by Ellen, Meredith and Megan