Today we're taking you down to the heart of Minneapolis, not into downtown, but south of it, where there's a cross section that is a definition of America. 

On Minneapolis's Lake Street, you'll find a vibrant and eclectic mix of locally owned businesses, from clothing stores to restaurants to grocery stores. They are owned by people dreaming of something bigger and better. They are Black, Central American, Mexican, Southeast Asian, and Indian people/business owners, as well as people/business owners from the various First Nations indigenous to Minnesota and the Upper Midwest. To be clear, it's a  neighborhood that sees challenges, one often defined by housing for those with low incomes, absentee landlords, and lack of investment. Drugs and sex trafficking have also plagued the neighborhood. And then last year, the area was set on fire, literally, in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. 

A mile and a half away from George Floyd Square, though, rises a shining new light on the corner of Bloomington Avenue and Lake Street. The colorful multi-million dollar building sits as a beacon of hope and aspiration for the community, with windows to the street that will allow traffic for both those in cars and on foot to see positive energy and transformation. It's an investment in the lives of people, who, to be frank, many of us look past; an investment coming from a 142-year-old non-profit. Today, we're taking you inside the new center, soon to be opened by The Family Partnership. 

Molly Greenman, President and CEO, gives us a tour of the new facility. With its preschool classrooms, therapy rooms, counseling rooms, playground, and laundry facilities, the center brings hope and dignity to individuals and families who have found the world to be less than hospitable. In her own words, Greenman sheds light on what this modern, warm, welcoming building means to the organization, to this community rising from years of disinvestment, and to people struggling through deep poverty and trauma. Welcome to The Family Partnership.

Hosted by James Lockwood

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For more than 60 percent of our population, living a healthy life can be a challenge.

Communities bounded by interstates, located near industrial areas releasing toxic particulates, and ground water infiltrated by pollution such as lead have shown higher rates of asthma, cancer, seizures, and learning disabilities. Add to that a missing urban forest canopy and lack of green space in many of these communities that contribute to the heat-island affect, and the stress of living day-to-day can take years off of one’s life. 

In both urban and rural communities like these there are zip codes where the life expectancy is years lower than those in zip codes with more green space and better zoning separating residential areas from sources of pollution. People living in these areas, on average, are heavily people of color and systemically have little political clout. 

All of this is despite a two-decade movement to focus on sustainability aimed at reducing our impact on the environment and improving our air and water quality. 

Like all systems in America, the sustainability movement has often overlooked how equitably it’s focused, and this past year demonstrated why a broader lens is needed. In those communities where pollution is so prevalent, COVID-19 infection rates are 40 percent higher than in other communities and mortality rates are 19 percent higher. 

In this episode, BWBR’s James Nutt, AIA, LEED AP, and Sara Goenner Curlee, AIA, LEED AP, join Stephanie Leonard from the U.S. Green Building Council to discuss sustainability through the lens of equity: how should we own our oversights in the past, and what does this journey look like that can put us on the right path towards benefitting all through better design…all forms of design? 

Hosted by James Lockwood

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Thursday, April 22, is the 51st anniversary of Earth Day.  When Earth Day was created, the global economy was releasing just short of 15 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. By 2019, we were producing north of 35 billion metric tons. 

The facts are straight forward. Buildings generate 40 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, with the urban built environment accounting for 75 percent of emissions. By 2060, it’s predicted we’ll add another 2.5 trillion square feet of global building stock to accommodate a population of 10 billion people. 

All of this is at a time when NASA reported 2020 tying 2016 as the warmest year on modern record and close to 2 degrees warmer than the baseline mean from 1951-1980.

To say there’s an impetus to improve building performance in order to mitigate the impacts of global warming is a massive understatement. 

In this episode, BWBR’s Jesse Turck and Tom Hanley, both architects, LEED accredited professionals, and leading advocates in sustainable design, discuss this performance imperative and how raising the sustainability baseline for building design can positively impact both the organizations who operate these facilities and the communities that are home to these spaces. 

James Lockwood hosts.

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It goes without saying the past year has been traumatic, whether we’ve known someone die from COVID or not.  For those who work in health care, the pandemic has pushed many of them to the point of exhaustion, both mentally and physically. It is reflected in the rising rates of suicide, depression, and anxiety that staff report they are experiencing. 

The problem is that these feelings are not new. In physician ranks, the issue of burnout is amplified by the suicide rate, which is more than double the general population at 300-400 deaths a year before the pandemic.

In this episode, we discuss is how we can do a better job supporting the health and wellness of our care providers, especially at a time it is most needed. To the point, can we do a better job supporting the resiliency of care staff that can help individuals avoid these feelings of depression, exhaustion, and, in some cases, isolation?

Devan Swiontkowski, a medical planner and health care designer, and Dani Ostertag, a senior interior designer, discuss the issue of staff resiliency and how small steps can be large leaps to supporting those charged with taking care of us. 

James Lockwood hosts.

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Today, we’re talking about offices and the workplace. 
For many organizations, this month marks a full year since they closed traditional offices in response to the pandemic. 

While technological advances have always presented a looming promise of work-from-anywhere, the actual practice this past year has shown that working from home non-stop can be isolating and lonely, draining with non-stop video calls and emails, and a true pain-in-the-neck…as well as back and hips, without the proper desk set-up.

Yet, at the same time, we’ve proved we can be productive, maybe even more so, with the freedoms afforded by this arrangement and the lack of commutes. 

With vaccines rolling out, there is a rising expectation offices will re-open. 

As they do, the big question is, what will they look like? To quote Chuck Runyon, co-founder of Anytime Fitness and CEO of Self-Esteem Brands, we weren’t really that healthy before the pandemic. We can’t go back to what we were.

So, does this present an opportunity for a great reset? Will we see workplaces as more than a destination to work at our desks? 

With us today are two people who bring a unique view to the world of workplace design.

Jennifer Stukenberg is a principal at BWBR and a workplace strategist who has spent a significant portion of her career working on designs for healthcare. An interior designer, she has bridged the gap between workplace and healthcare design to find the influences in each that can benefit the other.  She is also an accredited professional through the International WELL Building Institute that advocates for approaches to buildings, organizations, and communities to promote the health and well-being of people. 

Tina Fisher is both a certified interior designer and a LEED accredited professional in interior design and construction.  A design leader at BWBR, like Jennifer, her background spans both health care and workplace environments, studying the complex needs of organizations and their stakeholders to shape environments that are energizing and engaging as well as efficient. 

Hosted by James Lockwood.

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Today, we’re talking about Human-Centered Safety®: Seeing Mental Health through a Different Lens.

Mental health has been a vexing problem in America, for many reason but not the least of which has been the stigma surrounding it. The good news is there’s progress, but more than increasing access to treatment, there’s the challenge of providing the proper space for treatment. It’s not just a safety issue for patients. It’s a safety issue for staff. Studies have shown that up to half of care staff experience some form of aggression from patients, which takes a toll.

While efforts focus on making spaces safe from patients doing harm to themselves, only in the past few years has research shifted to look at how evidence-grounded stress-reducing features could possibly reduce incidents of aggression overall in psychiatric facilities.

At the forefront of some of this work are two people at BWBR. 

Scott Holmes is a medical planner and architect who has been involved in the design of mental health projects ranging from inpatient to residential to pediatric/adolescent care. Melanie Baumhover is also an architect and principal who has focused on projects that have a dramatic impact on the health and wellbeing of individuals. Together, they've honed BWBR’s process around Human-Centered Safety®, an approach to design that looks at safety through the lenses of dignity, hope, and personal control. It's an approach that is showing positive results for patients and the people caring for them.  

Hosted by James Lockwood.

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In this episode, we’re talking about the Next Evolution: Scenario Planning.

Why an evolution?

The pandemic exposed gaps to the way our industry planned campuses and facilities, from hospitals to academic centers. 

Traditionally, a master planning process guided project developments, driven by both vision and an assumption that the future would reflect more of a normal operational environment. 

The pandemic upended any sort of normality, but it also showed where that traditional master planning process failed to help organizations navigate through deviations from normality.

Scenario Planning evolves that approach, looking at an organization’s operations through various lenses to create options that promote resiliency through various scenarios.

Talking about Scenario Planning, what it is and how it can be applied to organizations, especially those in health care, are three people who bring unique lenses to the subject.

Sophia Skemp is a medical planner and architect who has provided planning and programming services for regional and critical access hospitals and ambulatory centers across the Plains and Upper Midwest. She has a master’s degree in architecture, with her studies crossing the boundaries between design research and health care architecture. 

Mike Boldenow is a principal at BWBR with more than three decades of work with health care organizations and corporations creating campuses and facilities that elevate operations and help organizations effectively serve their stakeholders.

David Voller is senior operational planner who brings experience as a facilitator and operations leader with a demonstrated history working inside health systems evaluating operations, revenue, strategic goals and building cultures.

Hosted by James Lockwood.

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In the first episode of Side of Design, we’re talking about Design in the Age of Upheaval.

The pandemic coupled with the social justice revolution sparked by George Floyd’s murder has disrupted lives and routines on an unprecedented scale. 

It’s also revealed massive gaps that we often ignored in the past. 

But, it’s also presenting new opportunities to rethink how we work, learn, and access services for our health and wellness. 

Joining in this conversation are three people who bring a spectrum of insight into this topic.

 Pete Smith, the president and CEO of BWBR, who is also a member of the College of Fellows with the American Institute of Architects. As an architect, he has spent a career applying design to environments from health care to education and workplaces.

Nan Langevin is a head of interior design at BWBR. While working with health care organizations to create spaces that promote healing and resilience, she also leads internal discussions at the firm examining the issues of gender and racial equity. She brings a unique perspective to design, having worked in social services in a previous career.

And Craig Peterson, a principal and design leader at BWBR. In addition to partnering with Nan on equity issues and how the design profession needs to respond, Craig’s work spans building types that tend to carry a similar theme of bringing people together, be those hospitals, churches, residential halls, or athletic facilities.

Hosted by James Lockwood.

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Welcome to Side of Design presented by BWBR. 
We'll be bringing you episodes twice a month with various hosts, on multiple topics. 
Coming to your favorite platforms, soon. 
See you on the other side!

If you like what we are doing with our podcasts please subscribe and leave us a review!
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