Zion Manor Senior Housing

Zion Manor Senior Housing is a tax-credit elderly housing project in downtown Louisville, Kentucky.

• 34 units Elderly Housing
• Construction Cost: $ 3 million
• Building Area: 35,356 s.f. total for 3 floors
• Site Area: 0.83 acres
• Unit Mix:
     12 one bedroom
       @ 603 s.f. gross;
     8 larger one bedroom
       @ 608 s.f. gross;
     10 two bedroom
       @ 803 s.f. gross;
     4 handicapped one bedroom (1st Fl)
       @ 680 s.f. gross.
• Completion: 2006

The Zion Manor Senior Housing involved construction of an elderly housing facility at 22^nd & M. Ali Blvd, Louisville, on land owned by the Zion Baptist Church.  This facility provides one and two bedroom apartment units, all handicapped accessible, at below market rate rents.

The project site is adjacent Zion Baptist Church, in an established residential neighborhood of western Louisville.

Prepared by Watrous Associates Architects, the three story design is intended to harmonize with the architectural appearance of surrounding buildings including the adjacent historical Zion Baptist Church.

A committee of the Zion Baptist Church was very involved in development of the project and is committed to providing extensive supportive services for the elderly.

The Housing Partnership Inc. and Zion Community Development Corp. were the developers of the project.

St. Benedict Center

Watrous Associates Architects was hired to design a new building for the St. Benedict Center For Early Childhood Inc., serving Louisville’s African-American community. The 11,000 s.f. structure is the first super-insulated, passive-solar childcare center in the region.

Desiged in coordination with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory it uses about half as much energy for heating, cooling, and lighting as a conventional building the same size. Abundant natural lighting provides a cheerful interior while cutting electric lighting and cooling bills.

This million dollar project incorporates the theme “Living Lightly on Planet Earth”. With vegetable and flower gardens outside and also indoors in the Atrium/Sunspace, the building itself will function as part of the package of teaching tools for a new environmental curriculum specifically designed for very young children.

Solar heat is stored in the floor using a patented Airfloor system. When heated air is directed through it, a pleasant radiant floor is created. This system is ideal for small children who spend much of their time on or near the floor. The Airfloor thus serves as a giant “heat battery” to store and use solar heat in winter. For nighttime and cloudy days, it can function as regular ductwork to direct electrically heated or cooled air to all rooms. Roof overhangs on the south side shield windows from direct sun in the summer, thus lowering air-conditioning bills.

New Goshen Presbyterian Church

• New floor area totals 9,000 s.f.; existing building was 8,000 s.f.
• Total cost of the project was $ 500,000 in 1994
• At $55/s.f., the unit construction cost was well below average for our region.
• Annual heating and cooling bills for the building are 13¢/s.f. typically.
• The congregation enjoyed a 6-year payback on their $30,000 investment in additional glass and insulation.

Watrous Associates was especially excited about this project because our specialty in passive solar design is a perfect match for churches. Our challenge was to incorporate a large new sanctuary and classroom addition with the existing facilities of the New Goshen Presbyterian Church in Prospect, Kentucky. Construction was complete in 1994.

After several years of use, the building is the proving its worth. The interior in summer is seldom warmer than 80°F (without air conditioning) and in the winter seldom below 60°F (without heating). So the building only needs 10° of heating or cooling year-round — resulting in obvious energy savings. Super-insulated passive solar design gives church congregations the opportunity to save energy, save money, and be good stewards of the Earth at the same time.

Hurstbourne Forum Office

This project entailed the design of four similar office building each 64,000 sf. The floor plan of each building features a central Atrium space housing front and rear entries as well as toilet and vending machine facilities.

The focal point of each building is the two-story Atrium Space.  This central space with its ample natural light, plants and waterfalls, functions as a pleasant “Garden Oasis” for employees taking breaks throughout the day.  To either side of this Atrium space are two stories of office space which was leased and built-out by each tenant.  The design has been extremely successful and has remained fully leased over the years.

Harrods Creek Fire Department

Front (East) View “After”

This project entailed a one-million dollar Addition to the Harrods Creek Fire Department in Prospect, Kentucky.

The existing building was renovated to provide new Office and Administration Space.  The Addition was designed to provide new Training Rooms, Conference Room, Kitchen/Dining Room, New Repair Garage (three bays), Shower and Toilet Facilities, Exercise/Weight Room, and unfinished shell space (Future Dormitory Space).

Our architectural approach was to provide an Addition that looked like it was constructed at the same time as the original building and designed by the same architect.  To this end we have matched the new brick to the existing brick and provided a fire-engine red banding theme to roof caps to visually unite new and old parts of the building complex.  This theme was carried over to the inside where linear elements such as base boards and door frames were colored bright red.

Front View “Before”

Lobby

North & East View

Multi-Purpose Room

Plan

Christ The King Senior Housing

• A tax-credit elderly housing project in downtown Louisville, Kentucky
• 24 units Elderly Housing
• Construction Cost: $1.5 million
• Building Area: 20,149 s.f. total
• Site Area: 0.60 acres
• Unit Mix: 13 one bedroom @ 517 s.f. gross; 4 larger one bedroom @ 587 s.f. gross; 4 two bedroom @ 689 s.f. gross; 3 handicapped one bedroom (1st Fl) @ 585 s.f. gross.
• Completion: December 2002

The Christ the King Senior Housing project involved construction of an elderly housing facility at 44th and Broadway, on land owned by the Archdiocese of Louisville. This facility provides 24 one-bedroom apartment units, all handicapped accessible.

The project site is adjacent Christ the King Catholic Church, in an established residential neighbor-hood.

Prepared by the team of Watrous Associates Architects, and Arrasmith, Judd, Rapp, Inc. the three story design is intended to harmonize with the architectural appearance of surrounding buildings of the neighborhood and the Christ The King campus.

A committee of the Christ the King Parish was very involved in development of the project, and the parish has committed to providing extensive supportive services for the elderly.

The Housing Partnership Inc. and Catholic Charities of Louisville, Inc. were the developers of the project.