Posted in Adaptive Reuse, AIA, Assembly, Commercial, Downtown Norfolk, General, Hampton Roads, Norfolk, Renovation, Virginia, WPA
CBS’s America ByDesign spent a day inside Assembly, the historic downtown Norfolk department store we reimagined and co-designed with Campfire & Co. as a creative hub and the location for our own studio. The segment walked floor by floor through the building, talking with the people behind the project along the way.
Assembly’s founder Drew Ungvarsky kicked things off in the heart of the building — the living room — by laying out the vision for the space: “The idea was to bring together creatives and technologists all under one roof and help them thrive together and grow community together.”
From there, WPA senior architect Robert Crawshaw took host Andrés Lamos up Assembly’s central stair.
“Part of the brief was to bring technology companies together, and in so doing, we wanted to encourage stair use to allow for accidental conversations to happen at each floor level,” Robert explained. “We’ve given a little bit of extra breathing room so that conversation can peel off.”
WPA senior interior designer Ali Allred led the crew through our third floor studio.
“When people come into our space, we hope that you make yourself at home here,” she said. “That might mean you come in the front door and head right into the Framery pod and finish up that phone call you’re on, or come into our living room before we get together for a session of collaboration.”
Ali highlighted the furniture strategy that keeps the space flexible: “We’ve created space in the office that has dynamic furniture, and that has a lot to do with our partner at MOI. They helped us work through all the dynamic options.”
The segment closes with a community rooftop party where WPA co-founder and CEO Mel Price explained, “Assembly is so much more than just a building. It’s the nucleus for the creative community of innovators here in Norfolk. It serves as a connector at a city level, connecting people, connecting neighborhoods, and connecting communities.”
Drew also looked ahead to the future: “We’ve got a Phase 2 coming up — two old Sears and Roebuck buildings — where we’re going to do a mixed-use expansion on the project and really fulfill the vision of the project.”
Watch the segment above or the full episode on YouTube.