At Hinge, we have been thinking alot about this time we are in – a strange, scary, unpredictable time – but we’ve decided to shift it and flip it on it’s head.
Covid has given us time. And we see time as a gift. A gift we would like to offer back to our community in the form of ideas and visioning for the spaces in which you work and live.
We understand that in this time of uncertainty it’s challenging enough to live in the moment, let alone to be able to dream about the future. We are offering our creativity, our ideas, and our experience to help you dream big.
The Hinge Team is accepting proposals to consider select projects for pro-bono architectural visioning services. We’re calling it our Virtual Napkin Sketch Project. How can we rethink your spaces at home, at work or in your community to solve a problem or just to make your world better? We will provide selected projects with up to 32 hours of intensive virtual design services. We will utilize information you provide (photos or drawings of your space, manifestos, etc) to put all of our creative brains together. The result will be a concept design packet of sketches, drawings or imagery customized to your project. We will focus on solutions that could actually be built and implemented now or in the future. For more information, please visit frequently asked questions at the bottom of the page.
If you are interested in being considered, please fill out the form below.
FAQ
What are some examples of the types of Projects I could propose?
The sky is really the limit. We are imagining everything from things on a neighborhood scale, to how to create a better retail display. We want to keep this really open ended so as not to limit ideas people might have. But here is a list of the kinds of things we can imagine:
- Concept design for a pocket park for a neighborhood group to take over an abandoned lot, or cul de sac.
- Studying how to improve visibility and street presence for a small business on a busy arterial
- A retail store wants to downsize and lower their rent so they want to envision how they can bring in subtenants or create space for a pop-up shop in their current store.
- A home owner wants to be able to have their elderly relative live with them but still have independence and wants us to explore their house to add an accessible living space in their home.
- Someone has an overgrown portion of their lot and they want to create a club house for kids in the neighborhood
- A restaurant wants to study how to install a take out window and have street presence so they can improve their grab and go.
- A municipality wants to create mobile shower facilities for the homeless.
Is my project a good fit for a Hinge Virtual Napkin Sketch?
We hope to receive a variety of proposals for Residential, Commercial and Public Projects. A preference will be given to projects that:
- Give back to the community in this challenging time.
- Assist individuals, non-profits and businesses that have been negatively impacted by COVID-19
- Provide our team with an intellectual, creative problem to tackle.
- Provide an opportunity for us to expand our expertise in new sectors
- Could germinate future work for Hinge.
What is the process and how much time will it take?
We are still assessing how many projects we will take. However, once a project is selected we anticipate the entire process will take about two weeks and will include the following:
- Kickoff meeting – You will have an initial virtual meeting with our team so we can really hear you and understand what you are looking for.
- Intensive iterative process. Our team will then have a collaborative brainstorming/work session to generate initial ideas which will then be further developed by one or two of our team members and brought back to the larger team for critical review and ideas
- Wrap UP meeting. You will have a meeting at the end of our process when we will reveal our ideas and solutions for you and answer any questions you have.
What are the deliverables at the end?
We anticipate that each project will require different things. In general, we will be providing quickly produced documentation of ideas and solutions. Depending on what information you provide, we are imagining everything from hand-drawn plans, 3D sketches, concept imagery, and even quick renderings or 3D modeling. The goal is to provide you with drawings and imagery that can help you reimagine your space.
Will what you provide be able to be built?
We intend to provide solutions that can be turned into reality. However we will be providing concept level drawings. More work will be required to create drawings that could be permitted or built from. We can help you understand what the next steps are for various projects.
