Design for the Commons
We live in extraordinarily prosperous and perilous times. We’re more connected and disconnected than we’ve ever been, more aware of how profoundly our individual and collective actions affect others. As architects of communal space, we feel these dichotomies acutely. They imbue our work with an existential urgency. They inspire us to create environments that encourage meaningful connection. We humans are social beings that rely on cooperation to survive and thrive. Public architecture is a response to this imperative, one we embrace with all we are and everything we have.
To Design for the Commons is to appreciate the intricacies of how we got here, consider the motivations behind our desires, and imagine a future in which everyone feels accepted.
It’s All About Belonging
TO THE CRAFT
When we design, we imagine an absence of walls. Of course, they’re there when they need to be, but only when they support and inspire a sense of connection, acceptance, safety, and significance. We create spaces in and around which people feel comfortable and free to engage with others as equals in a shared human experience.
TO THE RELATIONSHIP
We endeavor to create a similar relationship with our clients, whom we prefer to call partners. In our bones we feel like each project we undertake is a collaboration with teams, individuals, and organizations that are likewise inspired to make lasting, inspiring, conscientious impacts on their communities. Our process is rigorously inclusive from the earliest planning stages all the way to opening day and beyond. Every day, we strive to put our vision into practice with our partners.
Supporting Architectures of Care and Belonging
Integrus is committed to eliminating embedded biases that continue to generate societal inequalities and inequitable design concepts. We engage in positive, goal-oriented, measurable actions at work, in our work, and in our daily lives.
- Integrate our Equity Action Plan of inclusive activities throughout the practice, our work, and our communities
- Participate in the Just label program from the International Living Future Institute, a nutrition-style label presenting a transparent view of operational metrics demonstrating our company commitment to social justice and equity
- Incorporate DEI-inspired best practices into our hiring processes, leadership representation, and training programs
- Commit to design for universal access, design justice, and trauma-informed and healing-centered design
- Implement equitable specifications initiative to minimize use of products with negative impacts on human and labor rights and social justice, while adding products from minority- and woman-owned businesses and marginalized entrepreneurs
- Equip DBE-certified consultants and contractors with the knowledge and preparation to provide quality work
- Contract with minority- and women-owned third-party DEI consulting firms to work with entire staff on acknowledging institutional racism and prejudices
Sustaining Environments of Stewardship and Innovation
Integrus creates spaces that enhance and celebrate our connections to the natural world. We approach placemaking as an opportunity to regenerate the health and vitality of the natural systems upon which all life depends.
We prioritize the following four principles of sustainable design:
- Decarbonization – Seek lower embodied carbon outcomes. Integrus is a signatory to the AIA 2030 Commitment, Structural Engineering 2050 Commitment, and the AIA Materials Pledge. Office Operational Carbon Policy includes annual carbon footprint audit and carbon offset goals toward 100% net zero.
- Wellness – Prioritize physical and psychological health of building occupants through Healthy Product Declarations emphasizing indoor air quality, healthy acoustics, ample daylighting, and spaces designed for user comfort.
- Place – Pursue healthy reciprocity between the natural and built environment.
- Equity – Serve individuals and communities that have shouldered an unequal burden of climate and environmental impacts, and strive for our work to promote justice, equity, and stewardship in the communities we work in.
Shaping Spaces of Community and Resilience
Our commitment to advancing the common good is well served by a firm-wide coordinated effort to encourage direct participation in our own communities and the communities we serve.
- Support employees contributing to the community through volunteer service days (including Spokane SNAP Pajama Party, Seattle Food LifeLine, Our Streets PDX, Project Color Corps, SEI, Eco-School Network, PCC Urban Farm, and DePave)
- Support United Way through employee contributions and firm-wide events including silent/live auctions
- Volunteer time to foster more diversity and inclusivity in the profession (AFO Architecture in Schools, NOMA Project Pipeline, and HipHop Architecture Camp)
- Provide low- or no-cost design services to community organizations (SEI, Reach CDC, Tiny House Village, Lower Columbia Gardens, and small business owners)
- Provide employee mentoring program and support for licensure and continuing education
Our Expertise
We specialize in designing beautiful, functional spaces that positively impact people’s lives. From schools and government buildings to civic centers and more, we transform public spaces into vibrant and inspiring places. Learn how we approach each area of expertise to create exceptional spaces that foster community, promote wellbeing, and elevate the human experience.
Our work engages in a meaningful way with its surroundings, improves human experience, embraces the craft of building, fosters innovative thinking, and leaves a gentle imprint on the face of the planet. By creating buildings that add significant value to the communities in which they’re situated, we at Integrus endeavor to make the world a better place—for everyone—to live, work, and learn.
STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING informs the ways in which a structure can—and should—be built.
As structural designers, we appreciate the intrinsic elegance and simple beauty in the direct expression of carefully crafted structures. Supporting communities with secure and resilient buildings, we strive to enhance architectural endeavors through thoughtful structural articulation and collaborative attention to detail. A research-tested and design-forward approach to structural innovation boldly carries building engineering forward, while tirelessly keeping watch on stewardship of material resources and structural design’s impact on a sustainable future.
INTERIOR DESIGN ensures that the built environment not only is functional, efficient, and safe, but also enhances the quality of the environment itself.
The Integrus interior design team is deeply integrated in the process of crafting environments that engage, inspire and support their communities and organizations. Through a process of curiosity, creativity, and analysis our team thoughtfully knits together our client’s vision and goals for space with the context of the building, systems and site in which they reside. We feel the best spaces are those that celebrate the diversity and unique personalities of the people that bring them to life.
Because it defines a set of very specific needs, education facility planning must also be tailored to the needs, desires, and visions of the community that school facility serves. We therefore begin working with school district and community representatives early in the design process—to take into account programmatic objectives, schedule, and budget, and, ultimately, to create a space for teaching, learning, and student development.
EXPERIENTIAL DESIGN is the orchestration of typography, color, imagery, form, technology, and, especially, content to create environments that communicate.
It embraces a wide range of disciplines, going beyond architecture to include graphic, interior, and landscape design. Integrus employs experiential design to promote more intuitive wayfinding, to create places that reflect the values of those who inhabit them, to make information more accessible and easily understood, and to engage and inspire users. Experiential design isn’t about adding scope to the project; it’s about being more thoughtful and intentional within the existing scope.
