About

Mission and Programs

Design Corps' mission is to create positive change in communities by providing architecture and planning services. Our vision is realized when people are involved in the decisions that shape their lives, including the built environment.

Design Corps was founded in 1991 and became a 501-c-3 in1996.

Design Corps' community service program that is ten years old and has a proven record of success. It brings the skills of recent architecture and planning graduates who provide technical assistance to communities in need. We primarily serve small rural communities composed of low-income families who do not have access to the technical services needed to shape their physical needs. The design and planning expertise provided by these interns allows communities to shape their physical environment and create positive change. Design Corps' community service program offers technical assistance in planning, design, and grant writing. Known as Community Design Fellows, they bring their technical educations and experiences to bear at each local site where they are placed and are supported by trained professionals. Once at the site, Fellows work to identify challenges and pool needed resources through community involvement and participation to ensure that the community shares in identifying challenges, creating a vision, and implementing design responses.

Fellows participate in all aspects of projects, including architectural services and the successful application for over $6.1 million in project support through federal, state, and private funds. These sources include the National Endowment for the Arts, Rural Development and HUD. In recent examples, Fellows have: Developed a model migrant housing design and program for Florida and North Carolina; Started a Self-help housing program to build twenty energy-efficient affordable homes through a $325,000 grant from USDA Rural Development; received a $90,000 grant to design and build a community garden and flea market through the USDA Community Food Project; Coordinated the participatory design process and construction of a $400,000 job-training center.

The work of Design Corps has Design Corps was featured in the Smithsonian's Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum exhibit National Design Triennial: Design Culture Now . also been featured in The New York Times, Newsweek, Architecture, Metropolis, Readymade, Dwell Magazine, and Architectural Record .

The Founder and Executive Director, Bryan Bell, is the editor of Good Deeds, Good Design: Community Service through Architecture, published by Princeton Architectural Press. He received a 2007 National Honor Award for Collaborative Practice from the American Institute of Architects. Design Corps co-hosts an annual conference that addresses design for the underserved called Structures for Inclusion.