Weinberg House Conquers Site Challenges to Provide Affordable Senior Housing

Over the course of seven years, starting with an empty half-acre site on a busy Boston street, 2Life Communities and Abacus Architects + Planners conquered myriad challenges to create a mixed-use, affordable senior development that harmonizes with its urban context and creates a sense of openness and spatial connection for its residents.

The Weinberg House offers 61 one-bedroom apartment units with 10,000 square feet of community space centered around a two-story atrium and stairway that form a connection with the natural exterior and welcoming entry scene.

Outside, Weinberg House responds to its urban surroundings with overlapping, rust-toned fiber cement paneling and gray-faced window protrusions. The façade scales back to accommodate a drop-off and turnaround. The majority of the site has been regraded in order to provide compliant slopes for wheelchair ramps, with an original rocky outcropping retained on the southwest corner as an ongoing connection to the natural world.