Culture & Education
Site: 1338 Emerson St Retail Restaurant
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Grocery 7 Min Walk
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Walkable Community
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Skipping parking reduces embodied carbon by reducing the use of concrete and steel, aligning with sustainable construction practices. Instead, the building offers a bike parking room at the entrance and is within a 15-minute walk of multiple groceries, schools, restaurants, and bus transit.
The building takes the average United States developer approach and maximizes the Floor Area Ratio (FAR) of the site to maximize the potential density, which includes ignoring existing zoning setback laws and instead following the minimum setbacks required by fire code for allowable openings. This was seen as a challenge to design something thoughtful, given how often the average urban lot has little to no space available for nature and open space. The building rises six stories to maximize housing, as social housing is largely affordable. This approach has led to 14 units on a 5,566 sqft site, or in density terms, 110 units per acre, a highly efficient use of space, a necessity in urban areas to keep housing affordable.
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Designing without vehicle parking supports financial, environmental, and sustainable living goals. Building a 14-stall garage given the current site constraints would cost approximately $700,000. Based on a 30-year amortized loan, this would add about $138 per month to each unit’s rent, whether residents drive or not.
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Denver, Colorado, USA
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Inspired by Vienna’s inclusive housing strategies, the design allocates units to income tiers to promote affordability and diversity. Eliminating parking reduces costs and carbon impact, supporting sustainability with bike storage and walkable access to amenities. Joyful architectural features—half-moon windows in kitchens, projecting balconies, circular windows, curved stair landings, and textured materials—blend classic and modern forms, creating a sense of wonder and interaction. These details ground the design in Denver’s history while pointing toward a sustainable and inclusive future.
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Brick & Timber
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The proposed 14 units of Passive House-certified social housing at 1338 Emerson St, in Denver blends the city’s architectural heritage with sustainable design, combining durable, fire-resistant red brick with a mass timber structure to honor history while embracing modernity. The building’s simple massing helps keep costs down, while brick details, such as arched windows and cornices, evoke timeless craftsmanship. Perforated balconies and linear and angled brick patterns add contemporary character. Mass timber provides environmental benefits, including carbon sequestration, and complements the building’s compact shape. Thoughtful elements, such as natural light in the curved stairwell and native-only vegetation, enhance residents experience, while the brick’s thermal mass improves energy efficiency and comfort while being a familiar material to locals. The single staircase is a showcase of building efficiency while ensuring safety, with the stair, elevator, and corridor enclosed in concrete, a highly fire-resistant material.
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The neighborhood showcases diverse architecture with extensive brick use, with a variety of colors. Adjacent are two simple 2-story brick buildings, while an ornate brick apartment nearby helped inspire the project’s ornamentation. Brick is also featured in the nearby middle school, new apartments, and townhomes. Such extensive brick use made the choice for brick easy, and the red color was chosen for it’s familiarity and warmth.
Structural System
The building uses mass timber for its environmental, economic, and logistical benefits. At six stories, Type 5 construction alone wasn’t viable, and a concrete podium was considered an unncessary cost. Mass timber sequesters carbon, offering a sustainable alternative to an all concrete or steel building, both of which emit significant CO2 during production.
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Concrete Foundation 6” Concrete Slab Concrete Circulation Core 10” x 14” Glulam Columns 5 1/2” x 16” Glulam Beams
West Elevation
There is a large balcony on the 2nd floor, balconies for all 2 bedroom units, bay windows on the top 3 floors. The stair is visible through the half moon windows, which gives eyes on the street & entrance.
4’ Wide 5 Ply CLT Floor Panels 4’ Wide 3 Ply CLT Wall Panels 6” Mineral Wool Insulation 2 5/8” Thick Brick
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80%+ AMI (1) 3 BR (1) 2 BR (1) 1 BR
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30-50% AMI (1) 3 BR (2) 2 BR (3) 1 BR (1) Studio
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50-80% AMI (1) 3 BR (2) 2 BR (1) 1 BR
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Prefabricated timber components simplify construction by eliminating the need for staging, arriving ready to be craned into place. Mass timber offers modularity’s advantages without the space constraints of fully modular buildings, ideal for tight urban sites. Its lightweight nature reduces foundation size and costs, while exposed finishes enhance interiors. The concrete core, chosen for strength and fire safety, provides a refuge during emergencies like fires or tornadoes. The cantilevered balconies & bay windows are constructed of prefab steel components. The 3 bedrooms and 1 bedrooms alternate between floors to showcase the flexibility of the structural system, allowing the building owner to mix and match unit types. The design also remains flexible for future alterations.
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Stair Entry Vestibule
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Single Stair Circulation 9
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South Elevation
The Living Room and bike room are highlighted with circle windows with mullions that are influenced by the windows at the middle school across the street. Every kitchen gets a half moon window, and the facades are a maximum 25% openings for fire code and Passive House standards. The double doors on the lower right are to the electrical room, close to the transformer to keep conduit cost to a minimum.
Fire sprinklers and improved construction methods have made residential buildings safer than ever before, therefore justifying eliminating one of the two typically code required staircases for residential buildings over 3 stories. This has enabled 14 apartments on a small lot at only six stories. A landscaped path provides a calming transition home to the building entry, located adjacent to the core to minimize internal circulation. The gurney-sized elevator ensures accessibility, while the small corridor on each floor includes a half-moon window for natural light. The curved stair landing creates an experience, encouraging residents to use. Two exits are at the ground floor, one to Emerson Street and the other to the alley.
East Elevation
This elevation has stacked balconies with perforated brick railings. The lower-left double doors access the refuse room for alley pickup, with the transformer nearby for electrical service from the alley.
North Elevation
Why Social Housing?
The 14 units of social housing follows models like in Vienna, Austria, ensuring affordability, preventing speculation, and fostering mixed-income communities. It reduces homelessness, stabilizes neighborhoods, and promotes inclusivity. The building has a mix of units for the community, including (1) studio, (5) 1 bedrooms, (5) 2 bedrooms, and (3) 3 bedroom units. The 50:30:20 rule allocates 50% of units (7) to households earning 30-50% Area Median Income (AMI), 30% (4 units) to those earning 50-80% AMI, and 20% (3 units) to those above 80% AMI. Rent is capped at 30% of income and adjusts for salary reductions, maintaining affordability during financial strain. These strategies promote stability, diversity, & upward mobility.
Giving a half moon window to every kitchen has created a dance of windows on this facade. The stack of half moon windows in the center gives light access to the corridor on each floor, with a door on the ground floor that gives residents access to the refuse room at the alley. The door on the lower right accesses the bike room so residents can come and go without tracking dirt into the lobby.
Elev.
Roof Deck
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Solar Panels
Stair
Views and Veggies
3 Bedroom Unit, 6th Floor
Perched on the west side of the building, the roof deck offers a shared space for residents to relax and connect. Rows of planters grow vegetables, herbs, and flowers, while a larger planter wraps around a communal table. The brick mountain motif on the back wall adds character, a compliment to the horizon.
A family of five lives in this unit; two parents and three kids. The dad works from home while managing family needs. The twins bike to a nearby elementary school, and their older child walks to the middle school across the street. They enjoy visiting Congress Park on weekends for soccer games and trips to the Botanical Gardens.
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Three people live in this unit; a couple in the larger bedroom and their friend in the smaller one, sharing costs while maintaining a close-knit home. The couple enjoys cooking dinner and relaxing in the living room, while their friend often joins for movie nights or weekend hikes.
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Community Room
This family is a retired couple living in a spacious 1-bedroom unit. They enjoy hosting gatherings with neighbors and grandchildren who live nearby. Choosing a car-free lifestyle in urban Denver, they appreciate walking to parks, restaurants, and family activities, embracing convenience and independence.
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Community Room, 1st Floor
Just off the entrance, the community room provides a warm, casual space for conversations, reading, or resident gatherings. Its location offers views of the entry court and street, enhancing safety and connection.
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Entry Court
1 Bedroom Unit, 5th Floor
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5th Floor
Emerson Street
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Corridor
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Alleyway (Refuse & Electrical Access)
2 Bedroom Unit, 6th Floor
Refuse
Stair Transformer
1st Floor
Half Moons
Every kitchen in the project comes equipped with a large half moon window to bring in ample natural light and to bring a sense of joy into the kitchen, a space that is naturally the heart and center of a home. If a bathroom abuts an exterior wall, it also gets a small half moon hopper window.
a Water Recycling The yearly rainfall in Denver on a small roof could never catch enough water to meet the needs of the 14 units, however, it is more than enough water for the native plants around the perimeter. c Energy Recycling An energy recovery ventilator (ERV) is equipped in every unit in the building, located in the bathroom. ERVs improve indoor air quality by exchanging stale indoor air with fresh outdoor air while transferring heat and moisture between the two streams, reducing energy demands for heating and cooling.
b Solar Power Over half of the roof is being utilized with solar panels, and while the energy is not enough to cover the energy needs of residents, it can still help cover house loads such as site lighting and elevator.
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4 Pedestal Paver System 5 6” Min Rigid Mineral
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Wool Insulation, Slope to Drain
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7 Mechanical Fasteners 8 5 1/2” x 16” Glulam Beam
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Wool Insulation
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Floor/Wall Intersection 13
11 2 5/8” Deep, 2 1/4” Tall, 8” Wide Brick
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The assembly includes a 1-hour fire-rated brick layer and mineral wool, protecting the 3-Ply CLT from exterior fire. Inside, 1-hour rated gypsum board protects the CLT, which is 1-hour rated itself, creating a 2-hour fireresistant assembly measured from both interior & exterior.
14 3 Ply CLT Panel
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15 3/4” Acoustical Mat
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16 2” Polished Concrete
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Transformer
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Composite Window
Electrical
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Brick Craftsmanship
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Parcel Locker
Main Entry
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g Refuse & Recycling Trash chutes are not Passive House friendly because they are essentially giant holes in your building, requiring extra insulation. They use a lot of space on a small lot, so the solution was a single refuse room adjacent to the alley, to make pickup easy.
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Typical Exterior Wall Assembly
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The building features a centralized heat pump water heating system with three units for redundancy. In multifamily buildings, centralized systems improve load management, reduce energy waste, and minimize maintenance. They also improve airtightness by reducing building penetrations compared to individual heat pump water heaters, supporting Passive House standards.
Steel Planter Wall
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Typical Floor Assembly
Central Water Heating
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The assembly begins with 5-Ply CLT panel, exposed on the underside. Above it is an acoustical mat, topped by 2 inches of polished concrete, giving a 2-hour fire-resistant assembly with a 58 STC rating. Vinyl flooring was avoided due to it’s limited recyclability & short lifespan.
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A & B Detail Callouts
The project celebrates brick by incorporating ornamentation throughout the facade. The building’s simple massing provides an ideal canvas for the brickwork to take center stage, adding texture, depth, and a sense of movement without altering the massing. Each floor features a horizontal brick datum that wraps around the windows, contrasted by a vertically oriented brick datum thoughtfully interrupted by the windows. The cornice features a repeated inverted pyramid shape, a classic seen all over Denver.
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Half Moon Window
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