Commercial
Commercial 01
After the original studio was lost to Hurricane Helene, we served as design architect for its new home: permitting and filing, the main gallery, the member clay studios, and the classrooms. A fast, resilient rebuild that got a community of makers back to work.
Project Info
- Type
- Commercial
- Program
- Arts Studio — Gallery, Member Studios, Classrooms
- Location
- Western North Carolina
- Status
- In Design
- Services
- Design Architecture, Permitting, Construction Documents
Rebuild under pressure, designed around the people
The Village Potters is the kind of place that takes years to grow — a nonprofit ceramic arts community in Asheville where resident potters teach, members work, and beginners find their footing. When Hurricane Helene took their original space, what was lost wasn't just a building. It was the daily rhythm of a community that had built itself around a specific kind of place.
Before we put anything on paper, we had great conversations with the groups about how they worked. They had clear answers — a good sense of program, scale, and how the spaces needed to relate. Our job was to make that work inside an old retail shell that wasn't designed for any of it.
The fit-out included member clay studios, classrooms, a gallery, and a clay sales area — each with distinct requirements for layout, acoustic separation, and surface durability. We coordinated with mechanical and structural engineers to get the kiln firing equipment permitted and operational, which in a former retail space is its own problem. The result is a building that works the way the community already knew it needed to work.
