Bancroft Project Breaks Ground

Rendering for the Bancroft School in Kansas City, Missouri. Part of a revitalization effort by the community of Manheim Park, the Foundation, and BINM Architects. Photo © BNIM Architecture + Planning

When we introduced you to the Bancroft School in September, the topic of one of the ’s awesome mini-documentaries, or SEEDocs, the revitalization project was still in development. However, this Saturday’s ground-breaking ceremony means that this innovative community complex will soon be a reality.

The building, which was an elementary school from 1904 until it fell into disrepair and closed in 1999, is located in one of Kansas City’s most neglected, lower income neighborhoods: Manheim Park.  However, thanks to the joint-efforts of the Make It Right Foundation, BNIM Architects (the AIA’s 2011 Firm of the Year), and the Historic Manheim Park Neighborhood Association, the once asbestos-ridden school will soon be the center of a revitalization project to transform the urban landscape.

More on the Bancroft Project, after the break…

SEEDocs: Bancroft School Revitalization

Design Corps and SEED (Social Economic Environmental Design) have released the latest installment of SEEDocs, their series of awesome, mini-documentaries that highlight inspirational stories of award-winning public interest design projects.

While June’s doc featured an incredible community garden in New Orleans, designed/built with help from the Tulane School of Architecture’s Tulane City Center, this month focuses on the revitalization of an abandoned, abestos-ridden school in Manheim Park, a low-income, neglected neighborhood in Kansas City, Missouri.

Check out more images and info about this empowering project, after the break…

School of Nursing and Student Community Center at the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston / Lake|Flato Architects and BNIM Architects

© Hester + Hardaway

Architect: BNIM Architects, Lake|Flato Architects
Location: Houston, Texas,
Project Team: Steve McDowell, FAIA; Kimberly Hickson, AIA; Chris Koon, AIA; David Immenschuh; David Lake, FAIA; Greg Papay, AIA; Kenny Brown
Consultants:  BNIM Architects, Jaster Quintanilla & Associates, Carter Burgess, Inc., Ferguson Consulting, Inc., Supersymmetry, Clanton Associates, Epsilon Engineering, Walter P. Moore, Coleman & Associates, Apex Busby, Rolf Jenson & Associates, Philo & Wilke Architects, Arup, Pelton Marsh Kinsella, Worrell Design Group, Lerch Bates & Associates, Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems, Rocky Mountain Institute, Elements
Contractor: Jacobs/VaughnGreg Papay, FAIA
Project Area: 18,023 sqm
Project Year:  2004
Photographs: Hester + Hardaway