The Walton Family Foundation of Bentonville announced two new projects for its Design Excellence program, an organization that funds and promotes design in the development of public buildings and spaces in Benton and Washington counties.
The first project will build high-quality and affordable housing for the downtown Bentonville workforce, the nonprofit said in a news release. The units will fill a gap in locally available “missing middle” housing, a term the foundation defines as the range of housing types that fit between single-family detached homes and mid-to-high-rise apartment buildings.
The project will test a replicable model for more well-designed and affordable housing on infill lots near workplaces, schools and cultural amenities. The project will be designed through Sanders Pace Architecture.
The second project will expand Bentonville City Hall into a campus that will provide opportunities for public gatherings. The city will use its Design Excellence grant to search for a firm to conduct stakeholder engagement, a feasibility study and conceptualize a master plan.
The foundation also announced the appointment of Ellen Dunham-Jones, co-author of the “Retrofitting Suburbia” book series and director of the master’s in urban design degree at Georgia Tech University, to the Design Excellence selection committee. The committee chooses architects and designers to complete the pool of projects the committee selects each year through an annual search.
Dunham-Jones joins Toshiko Mori, founding principal of Toshiko Mori Architect PLLC; Peter MacKeith, dean and professor at Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design at the University of Arkansas; and Mia Lehrer, founder of Studio-MLA.
Recent projects from the Design Excellence program include the Railyard Park in downtown Rogers, the Thaden School in downtown Bentonville and the Springdale Municipal Complex.
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