Design For Affordable Housing Project Beats Out Luxury Condos

"Judges for the American Institute of Architects looked past the preening high-rise peacocks and last month awarded Philadelphia's top design prize to a modest cluster of townhouses for low-income families in North Philadelphia."

"Like the best of Philadelphia's new infill housing, the proposal offers a fresh take on the traditional rowhouse. Instead of rectangular boxes marching in single file, [Interface Studio] designer Brian Phillips laid out the 13 homes on Sheridan Street, between Berks and Montgomery, as an interlocking puzzle of L-shaped twins."

"The unconventional site plan is just a starting point, however. In a city where it is still considered innovative to dress up public housing with peaked gables and bay windows, Interface's design looks as if it were spawned in the hipster enclave of Northern Liberties. Windows blip asymmetrically across the screen of its facades like the random lights of a video game. There isn't a red brick in sight."