CU Denver Freedom by Design

Please support FBD, BUILD by Radian, Colorado Village Collaborative, and your Denver community by registering for the open house tomorrow, Wednesday March 29th. Visit eventbrite.com and search for “AIAS CU Denver Freedom by Design”

https://www.westword.com/news/homeless-denver-safe-camping-tents-housing-student-design-13674074

Fabrication Friday! Ingredients, 14 sheets of plywood, 8 board 2x6, a few pounds of screws, a couple gallons of glue, and a team of awesome people. Now it can be put together. Assembly Saturday tomorrow, March 5th 9:00-3:00 (hopefully just until noon), at 1250 14th street (CU Denver College of Architecture and Planning, and the Annex fabrication shop). Great work today George, Maslin, Kevin, Sean, Joe, Colin, Matt, Ethan, Andrea. A special thanks to Jasmine for being CNC shop manager extraordinaire.

The Colorado Village Collaborative - conestoga inspired - shelter mock-up is feeling solid (for being only 1/3 of the structure). Maslin, George, Ethan, and Richard were figuring out stronger and more user friendly connections on this iteration. Next Friday is the full fabrication day, and next Saturday (rain, sun, snow, or cold) is assembly day. Visit aiasdenver.org/freedombydesign for more information about the project or to get involved. It’s an open invitation for everyone to help fabricate and assemble, just let us know.

Next Wednesday (11/17) at 5:30pm AIAS will host the last scheduled Freedom by Design development presentation meeting, fourth floor room 470. This meeting is open to everybody whether you have already been involved, you want to participate in the fabrication, you are interested in documenting the projects, or you just want to see the amazing stuff we have been working on. Everybody is welcome to attend, this is not limited to AIAS members, FBD participants, or CU students. To be very blunt, FBD wants everybody to get involved and help with some awesome work. Check out aiasdenver.org for more information.

Freedom by Design is the community service and engagement program of The American Institute of Architecture Students (AIAS), and AIAS CU Denver is working to build a stronger relationship with Colorado AIA (the Colorado chapter of The American Institute of Architects). Industry professionals and AIA members will attend the presentation review (11/17) to support teams with development, but they are also helping to bridge the education-profession gap by working closely with students and the community. AIAS encourages all students to attend the meeting to help build professional networks on top of supporting the development and delivery of some really cool projects.

This coming Wednesday (10/27) at 5:30pm AIAS has the next Freedom by Design presentation meeting, second floor room 2005. This meeting is open to everybody whether you have already been involved, you want to participate in the fabrication, you are interested in documenting the projects, or you just want to see what we have been working on. Everybody is welcome to attend, this is not limited to AIAS members, FBD participants, or CU students. To be very blunt, FBD wants everybody to get involved and help with some awesome work.

Freedom by Design is the community service and engagement program of The American Institute of Architecture Students (AIAS), and AIAS CU Denver is working to build a stronger relationship with Colorado AIA (the Colorado chapter of The American Institute of Architects). Industry professionals and AIA members will attend the mock-up (10/27/2021) and final review (11/17/2021) presentations to support the teams with the development process, but also to make connections and bridge the educational-professional gap. AIAS encourages your engagement at these meetings to build professional networks on top of helping to support the development and delivery of some really cool projects.

FBD's first-draft presentations from this week.

In 2020 Denver approved sanctioned camps known as “safe outdoor spaces” (SOS) to be an option to help
bridge the gap between living on the street and permanent housing. Since 2020 the Denver non‐profit
organization Colorado Village Collaborative (CVC) has setup and managed several safe outdoor spaces to provide housing for more than 50 people at a given time. The CU Denver AIAS Freedom by Design project for 2021-2022 is focused on socioeconomic barriers related to housing and people experiencing homelessness. CU Denver AIAS FBD has partnered with CVC to improve the quality of life for people living in Denver’s sanctioned camps.

FBD participants will design and construct three specific elements: heated hand sinks that do not freeze, water protection for tents to prevent water intrusion (or new shelters to meet city code requirements),
and a smoking shelter to mitigate second‐hand smoke. Between September 2021 and November 2021 the FBD teams will prepare design proposals and construct mock‐ups to present to the CVC team and residents, then by the end of January 2022 the three teams will deliver or install the physical elements for use on an active SOS site. The goal of this project is to provide a healthier, safer, and more elegant environment for the people living in the SOS because FBD believes that everybody has the right to safe and decent housing.

Everybody is welcome and invited to participate with this project. Please visit aiasdenver.org for more information and to connect with the team.