New Orleans, Louisiana
2006

The Holy Cross project led by Global Green USA, sets forth an ambitious effort to build a model of affordable and sustainable housing and community facilities in the devastated Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans. Sustainable systems are rigorously integrated into several building types: single family homes, an apartment building and community center. With high lead levels discovered in the soil, a phased strategy for implementation includes a regeneration field that lays the healthy groundwork for a community common.

The landscape framework provides a structure for legible regenerative loops of water reuse and energy production. A public path functions as an "educational transect" where a new urban ecology, social and environmental, unfolds each day. This walk from the neighborhood streets to the river invites the residents of Holy Cross to gather and celebrate a safe return.

Clients + Collaborators

Global Green USA; workshop/apd, architects; Williams Architects; Cashio Cochran landscape architects; Julien Engineering, civil engineers; LEAAF Environmental, environmental consultants