Expanding the livable extent of the Bellevue core. One of the first projects to enact the new Bellevue zoning code, Surrey on Main occupies an important corner of the downtown boundary. The project provides a graceful transition from the higher density of the city landscape to the less-concentrated living quarters of the surrounding neighborhood.
Parkside community takes root. Nestled against the edge of Marymoor, King County’s most popular park, the development introduces residential apartments to an area traditionally home to warehouses and converted retail spaces. Two distinct buildings – each designed with its own architectural approach and unique materials – respond to the City of Redmond’s vision to create a vibrant community that will in turn become the catalyst for further residential growth nearby.
A partnership for safety and shelter. The 2020 Point in Time Count documents 995 individuals experiencing homelessness in Thurston County, which is a 24% increase over 2019. Encore and our team are humbled to bring much needed beds and affordable apartments to the community through our work on Unity Commons. The project will offer both temporary shelter and permanent supportive housing through the partnering of two important community organizations.
We aim for a flexible and responsive process, and we avoid any prescribed aesthetic outcomes. Sensitivity to each project’s context and goals is what makes our projects successful – for our client-partners, for the community, and for us internally. We structure our project teams to support this by keeping them small and cooperative, assuring that our teams are nimble, stay on the same page, and propagate positive relationships with our client-partners. We believe that the integrity of this social fabric is relevant to the quality of our work.
We’re employee-owned, with over half of our staff owning a stake in the firm. All of our shareholders are licensed in-house architects; we want the decision-making in our business to be rooted in on-the-ground thinking. This un-siloed approach to individual ownership results in stronger client relationships, better documentation, and a firm-wide ethos of long-term thinking.
