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Sometimes mixing it up can be challenging –too much can be overwhelming, and too little doesn’t have enough impact. DCVL Design enjoyed working this out with the owners of a late Queen-Anne wood-frame home; from the very first site-visit, DCVL Principals Amy Van Lauwe & David De Celis realized the home’s period details and the clients’ contemporary aesthetics made an interesting pairing. There was room for celebrating both the modern and historic within the original structure, along with a desire for select-demolition to open and brighten-up spaces. The design process selections of new windows, furniture and lighting reinforced contrasts in scale, color, and textures. Lighting: Modern half-globe dining pendant, WAC Lighting; Kitchen-Island “soft-fog” pendants, Jamie Young Company. Cabinetry Consultant: Carole Kitchen Design of Wakefield, MA.  A Melrose, MA renovation project is nearing completion! By opening up space between very segmented spaces in a historic Queen Anne, introducing additional daylighting with expansive windows and doors, and upgrading insulation the client now has inviting and more efficient spaces to enjoy.  We’re NOT talking Autumn foliage; we’re talking re-thinking formally drab circulation space. “Happy & Bright Blocks of Color” was the driving idea for this Cambridge charter school where DCVL Design worked closely with the GC’s sub to compose blocks of paint —incorporating the school’s logo-colors— at stair landings to enliven the existing building’s primary vertical circulation. The landings metaphorically become bookends, and the wall spaces between those bookend-landings will incorporate student artwork. What was a grey and dull space now takes better advantage of abundant natural light to highlight student work. Best of all, it was a low-cost solution. School colors are a major source of pride; and here those colors frame the students’ accomplishments and welcome the community —students, faculty/staff, and visitors— each and every day.  Given the recent extreme-heat waves and other climate related issues, we wanted to share a glimmer of hope, as we use our design talents to help make our home a better place. Amy and David of DCVL Design along with Fatema Maswood (Associate Professor at Rhode Island School of Design) have been chosen as one of six artist/designer teams to represent the City of Cambridge for their Shade is Social Justice initiative! Please see the Cambridge Arts announcement for more information: www.cambridgema.gov/Departments/artsandculturalplanning/shadeissocialjustice  Past projects by (clockwise from top left) Carolina Aragon; DCVL+Maswood team; Gabriel Cira and Matthew Okazaki; Alejandro Saldarriaga; the MIRROR team; and Calvin Zhong and Justin Brazier. A wonderful evening watching my Boston Architectural College Degree Project Studio students present their year-long projects. They designed some imaginative, responsible and sustainable buildings. All their hard work is inspiring and keeps me on my toes! So excited to hear that our Wilton Zero Energy Residence has won a U.S. Department of Energy Zero Energy Ready 2021 Housing Innovation Award in the Custom Under 2500SF category! This was a great collaboration with John Slater of Energy Vision Homes.  We are so excited to share that DCVL’s design is up-&-running just in time for PHA’s 25th Anniversary! We couldn't have done it without the dedication of such an amazing team. Thank you GBI, Knoll, ORI, Room & Board, and everyone at Prospect Hill Academy Charter School!  Photos courtesy of Narin Oun Photography & David De Celis Excited to be part of the minority business community--our SDO MBE (minority business enterprise) certification was renewed. We are 100% minority-owned (Latin-X and female-owned) and proud of it! Also excited to now be a member of the National Organization of Minority Architects (NOMA). https://www.noma.net/
We are happy to announce completion of a new Faculty & Staff collaborative space for Prospect Hill Academy Charter School (PHACS) in Somerville, MA. We so enjoyed working with PHACS leadership & technology groups to make their new administrative space a place to “…engage, inspire, & succeed.” The project team also included GC Gloucester Builders, and furniture purveyors Knoll, Inc. + Room and Board, Inc.  David is honored to work with RISD’s INTAR students as they consider MFSpaces for promoting understanding, pluralism, more inclusiveness, and the health & well-being of our campuses and communities. This hybrid-modality advanced studio (½ in-person & ½ remote) will is guided by the following key questions: How can designers of MFSpaces make Architecture and Urban-Landscape more welcoming …more flexible, receptive &/or relevant …more accessible, inclusive and supportive of overall health & well-being?  Wow--it's been an eventful several weeks for us at DCVL! Our NH project is officially Zero Energy! In fact, we ended up with a -25 HERS score, the lowest our Energy Rater has seen! Our homeowner now gets the benefit of a substantial rebate as well as some long-term energy credits. Many thanks to our contractor and energy consultant Energy Vision Homes who helped make this happen. https://www.energyvisionhomes.com/  David published in the latest issue of Interiority! To read the article and see the latest issue, go to: https://interiority.eng.ui.ac.id/index.php/journal/issue/view/6 The July 2020 peer-review journal’s issue is dedicated to design-thinking in the age of COVID, and the call for papers asked: How does COVID-19 impact the way we consider the architecture of interior space? What are the opportunities this pandemic affords us, as designers and creative-thinkers? David considers these questions by looking at history of domestic-space in N America and sharing his own family’s adaptation of their 1886 Queen Anne home in Cambridge, MA. Enjoy the article... be well/ safe!  Amy has been chosen by ACSA (Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture) to present at their 2020 Annual Meeting and have her paper published by them. She cites her BAC students as a constant source of inspiration and a driving force in her development of her paper "Celebrating the Inclusivity of Film" that looks at using film as a design pedagogy for both students and instructors.
Amy's session at the ACSA 2020 Virtual Meeting, will be located in the Teaching & Cultural Context division on Wednesday, June 17 at 3:00 pm EDT. You can view some of her BAC students' amazing films from her Film, Space & Perception class on her YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCr1bAvV7o1hoMXHxuE0z0wg?view_as=subscriber During a time when so many projects have halted, it is heartening to see progress on our zero energy house! Siding almost done and interiors taking shape...  After an exciting couple of weeks with lifts and cranes, the walls and roof are up on our zero-energy project! Next: installation of the beautiful triple-paned windows, passive house doors and standing-seam metal roof...   Snow and cold weather notwithstanding, framing is ongoing for our zero-energy/passive project!  Frost wing perimeter laid out--so excited to see the beginning of our first Zero Energy/Passive project!  We are excited to say that earlier this Summer, David was granted reciprocity, and is now licensed, in the state of New Hampshire. David is also back in Rhode Island, excited to be teaching an Advanced Studio in RISD's department of Interior Architecture. The Studio will focus on spaces for the practice/production/promotion of the visual & performing arts.  One of the most rewarding experiences as an educator is to see the amazing work your students create, and my Film, Space & Perception course was no exception this semester! These talented and expressive students spent the semester researching, writing, filming and editing a wide variety of topics dealing with how we perceive and represent the world around us. Their end results were a collection of compelling films thoughtfully presented. So proud of this crew! Take a look at their work on my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCr1bAvV7o1hoMXHxuE0z0wg  Loved "Dig It!" ...another great fundraiser/cause! Congrats to CitySprouts Exec. Dir. Jane Hirschi, her Staff, and ALL the sponsors. Thank You for teaching Boston/Cambridge kids stewardship of the land and the good food it produces. PIC: Emily Mueller De Celis, Board Member & Associate Principal, MVVA, Inc. David De Celis, Principal, DCVL Design.  Join David De Celis for a fun ART + Public Space Collaboration, this Monday night at the Dance Complex in Central Square, Cambridge. See details/links below for more information, and tickets. Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/543496532815727/ Dance ComplexWebsite: http://www.dancecomplex.org/event/facilitating-movement-in-public-space Direct registration / tix Link available here: https://facilitatingmovementinpublicspaces.eventbrite.com Hope you can join me!  Work is progressing on an addition that will allow the owners more kitchen/dining space as well as providing new views to the adjacent Sewall Woods preserve.
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