San Juan Square

San Juan Square is a 143-unit multi-family redevelopment of an aging and blighted city housing project, San Juan Homes. Near downtown San Antonio, the new development consists of ten residential buildings, a community center, and a live/work building. Considering lessons learned since the early days of urban renewal, we knew that pockets of low cost housing set apart from surrounding neighborhoods can attract problems. So, in the course of redesign, we looked for opportunities to re-establish a healthy integration with the neighboring city grid, and for ways to make the development more welcoming and less institutional in feel, naturally more attractive to families in the housing market.

When the San Juan Homes were originally built, the street grid within was obliterated, typical of urban renewal projects of the time. Buildings were oriented inward, away from the neighborhood, splayed barracks-like across the site. San Juan Square is re-integrating with the neighborhood by reconstituting Mercedes Street as a pedestrian-friendly, tree-lined drive, and by situating all the buildings with front doors facing the streets. The more natural relationship between street, landscape, sidewalk, low garden loop fence, yard and building at San Juan Square echoes the familiar patterns of the surrounding single-family neighborhood.

The busy corner of Ceralvo and Zarzamora required a different set of responses. There, the masonry constructed, store-fronted live/work building is the backdrop for a pedestrian plaza. To help our design solution fit the established economics of typical common-wall garden apartments, the buildings make cost-effective use of masonry and other more expensive materials and rely heavily on interesting form, color, and landscaping to create a lively streetscape.

Finally, there are a number of heritage oak trees on the site. As mature trees help any neighborhood to feel more gracious, great care is being taken to preserve every one of these irreplaceable assets through careful siting of new buildings and protection of the trees during construction.

Client> The NRP Group
Projected Completion Date> April, 2008
Construction Budget> $10 Million