Urban Ministry Center

The Urban Min­istry pro­vides lunch to the home­less pop­u­la­tion of Char­lotte, NC 365 days a year, as well as a myr­i­ad of ser­vices includ­ing coun­sel­ing, laun­dry, show­ers, mail, art and sports pro­grams. Their oper­a­tion had out­grown the old train sta­tion from which it had been based for the last 20 years and need­ed to build a new facil­i­ty on the adja­cent prop­er­ty.

The site required a two-sto­ry build­ing with the var­i­ous pro­grams housed in the facil­i­ty stacked between the two floors. The main dai­ly event, food prepa­ra­tion and lunch, along with the cen­tral check in, toi­lets and laun­dry are posi­tioned on the low­er lev­el and coun­sel­ing and sup­port ser­vices are locat­ed on the sec­ond lev­el. All func­tions are con­nect­ed by a grand stair in the recep­tion lob­by. Long canopies with red ver­ti­cal ele­ments sig­ni­fy­ing the entry points keep the clients out of the sun and rain as they wait in line for food and ser­vices. The curved pri­ma­ry façade ori­ents back to the city sky­line cre­at­ing a wel­com­ing ges­ture to down­town. The two-sto­ry bay win­dow space con­tains a din­ing room with inte­ri­or win­dows look­ing down from the cor­ri­dor above. Large pro­ject­ing win­dows iden­ti­fy meet­ing spaces and con­fer­ence rooms. Util­i­tar­i­an, low main­te­nance mate­ri­als were used for the exte­ri­or to keep the over­all build­ing cost low.