The Douglas
Seattle, Washington
2008-2011 | with HEWITT
The Douglas is conceived as a student residential community organized around shared amenity space, light, and connection to the central courtyard. The project extends beyond the building to form a continuous public realm—linking courtyard, woonerf, and park into a unified, pedestrian-focused landscape.
Developed in partnership with Seattle University, the project brings together housing, common areas, and retail within a clear and legible framework centered on a primary courtyard. This space acts as the social core of the building—an external room that supports daily life, informal gathering, and larger community events.
At the ground level, a student commons opens directly to the courtyard through a tall, curved window wall, establishing a continuous relationship between interior and exterior space. This threshold blurs the boundary between building and landscape, allowing activity to extend outward and reinforcing the collective nature of student life.
The courtyard is further connected to a series of adjacent public spaces, including a woonerf and a small city park. Together, these elements form a network of pedestrian-oriented environments that expand the project beyond its footprint and contribute to the surrounding neighborhood.
Landscape and infrastructure are integrated into the architecture. A rain garden, distributed across the courtyard and right-of-way, manages the majority of the site’s stormwater while shaping the character of the open space. Planting, paving, and topography are used to define zones of use without relying on hard boundaries.
The project is guided by clarity and restraint—organizing a dense program into a cohesive whole while creating a durable and generous environment for student life. The result is both a place of residence and an urban refuge, where architecture and landscape work together to support community.
Role: Project Architect, Project Manager, all phases.
Images courtesy of Hewitt.
The Douglas reflects an approach focused on clarity, material, and connection to place.
If you are considering a similar project, feel free to get in touch.