Lumen Senior Housing

Location: Anchorage, Alaska
Year: 2011
Team: Ron Bateman, Petra Sattler-Smith

This senior project has two noteworthy programmatic concepts.  The first is to build senior housing as a component of a larger residential development in a setting that promotes activity within the larger community.  The larger development will have protected interior pedestrian routes for exercise with easy access to nearby retail, banking, and health services.  The second concept is to plan the building and related services in a way that allows seniors to ‘age in place’.

To provide Alaskan seniors with a rich and dignified living experience, 20 accessible or accessible-ready units face east or west along a north-south axis, ensuring all units have access to sun for part of the day all year.  Units are equipped with cable TV and internet as well as a full kitchen and dryer hookups.  Through generous windows, residents view the Chugach Mountains to the east or Cook Inlet to the west.  An elevator and day-lit stair connect dwelling units to common indoor spaces and a shared roof terrace, while carefully selected wall and floor assemblies ensure acoustical privacy inside each unit.