Silver Sage Village Cohousing
Silver Sage Village Cohousing
- Project Type: Cohousing, Multi Family
- Location: Boulder, Colorado
Silver Sage Village is one of the first senior cohousing projects in the country and is the only one associated with a multigenerational community (Wild Sage) just across the street. It’s also 40% income- and deed-restricted.
Caddis, the project architect, collaborated with Wonderland Hill Development Company as the developer, and McCamant and Durrett on the conceptual design. Silver Sage Village was designed for community-minded seniors who take a progressive view of what it means to age in our society. They are activists and intellectuals and creatives.
This urban infill development uses universal design and aging-in-place principles, along with affordability strategies, to ensure the community’s accessibility, both physically and financially. The entitlement process was complex, involving site review, parking reductions, and height modifications. A deep understanding of the Boulder County Land Use Code and engagement in the public process were required to make it all happen.
With 16 units on eight-tenths of an acre, this is a senior cohousing project for adults over 55. All elements of the site design emerged through a participatory design process, a way of working with future residents that is critical to cohousing. Despite having a small overall footprint, Silver Sage Village makes plenty of room to bring the natural world into close proximity with residents.
As with Wild Sage, Silver Sage Village was designed so that people get out of their houses and become involved with each other in an immersive and rich landscape. Private homes face the green and have entries on the new-urbanist street. The Common House connects the street to the common green and organizes the community to face south, embracing a garden-focused common green with incredible views from a large roof deck. Buildings that line the alley to provide parking also activate the green by housing a potting shed, a bike shed, and a wood shop. Our goal was to line the common area with tons of activity and human-initiated interactions – and it worked!
In addition, many sustainable elements were incorporated: passive solar, solar thermal, photovoltaic, and earth tubes, resulting in a HERS rating of 60 to 70 and meeting Energy Star 5+.
Silver Sage received several awards:
- 2010: Renewable Energy and Sustainable Design in Buildings Award, Colorado Renewable Energy Society
- 2009: Award of Merit for affordable senior housing from the American Institute of Architects and the American Association of Homes and Services for the Aging.
- 2008: National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), Best of 50+ Housing.
For more on the way Caddis has designed with nature at Silver Sage Village and at other sites, read our blog post “Designing with Nature: Biodiverse Design in Caddis Projects.”
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