DREAM Collaborative: Year In Review & Looking Ahead to 2025
2024 served as yet another dynamic year for DREAM Collaborative. Our team has been honing in on what we do best: creating beautiful, authentic places and enabling better outcomes for all stakeholders through inclusive practices. Through architecture, urban design and planning, and development, DREAM has supported communities across Massachusetts and shared our vision for the integral blend of diversity, equity, sustainability and design excellence.
DREAM saw a number of projects through completion this year. Our completed Passive House-certified affordable housing work includes The Kenzi and LeClair Village—the former serving as Boston’s first emergency back-up power of four-stories. Our team also saw both buildings for Foundry at Drydock open alongside our partners at SGA. Our Urban Design and Planning team led a number of diverse projects including: Fitchburg 3A Zoning, Weston 3A Community Engagement & Compliance Model, Kelley Boulevard Area Plan with Kittelson & Associates, Mattapan ADU Study & Zoning Recommendations, and Springfield Mason’s Square Tactical Urbanism Concept Plan.
Come 2025, DREAM will eagerly deliver another set of transformative projects for our communities. In Roxbury, 2147 Washington Street will provide 74 housing units and a new home for Haley House Bakery Cafe and Jean Appolon Expressions; 24 Westminster Avenue will provide 12-units of affordable homeownership; and First Church Roxbury restoration will return the Historic Landmark to the community as a meetinghouse and performance space. Our team will also complete Safe Streets for All in Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, and Franklin County with our partners Kittelson & Associates and Nelson/Nygaard as well as Plainville Neighborhood Transformation Plan & Zoning.
What else are we up to this year? The DREAM team will continue to work on a number of ongoing projects throughout the course of the new year including: Boston Water and Sewer Commission Parking Lots Mixed-use Development alongside Related Beal, and an affordable housing, artist space, and a Boston Public Library branch at 555-559 Columbia Road in Dorchester’s Upham’s Corner. Construction will also continue throughout the year on Innovation Square III, our new research and development facility with SGA.
DREAM and members of our team shared our expertise and facilitated conversations around inclusivity, sustainability and design excellence from industry presentations to student tours. Those opportunities included:
-
The Boston Foundation: The 2024 Greater Boston Housing Report Card
-
Northeast Sustainable Energy Association (NESEA): BuildingEnergy Pro Tour: All-Electric, Affordable Passive House Development in Boston
-
Boston Society for Architecture (BSA) / Society for College & University Planning (SCUP): Embodied Carbon on Higher Education Campuses
-
Sasaki Foundation: Summer Exploratory Experience in Design (SEED)
-
Massachusetts Building Congress: Breakfast Program Panel
-
Gensler ELEVATE Panel
Our team is also proud to have our work featured in a number of publications in 2024, including:
- Boston Globe: It’s electric! In Boston, buildings are testing cutting-edge technology to transition fully to renewable energy
- Bay State Banner: Roxbury affordable housing development goes fully electric—even when the power goes out
- MassHousing: City of Boston & MassHousing Announce Support for Three Boston Projects to Create New Homes for Purchase by Moderate-Income, First-Time Homebuyers
- Cape Cod Times: LeClair Village: Affordable housing lottery underway for 39 units in Mashpee
- WBZ News Radio: A Roxbury Apartment Is First of Its Kind To Ditch Fossil Fuels
- Universal Hub: Developers propose 45 affordable condos across from BWSC HQ as first phase of undoing a massive urban-renewal mistake in the 1970s
- Bay State Banner: City’s Compact Living Pilot helps developers tackle housing crisis
All of our achievements would not be possible without the dedication and passion of our team and the trust of our clients. Special thank you to the team members that joined in 2024, including: Mohammad Aminul Haque, Andrew Norris, Kenneth Propp, and Megan Ung. Visit our Team page to learn more about our team members and why they choose to work at DREAM.
