Retrofit Cohousing

This afternoon we went to "Curious About Cohousing," put on by Grace Kim from the Schemata Workshop. We've been indeed curious about cohousing for a few years now, but since we're pretty committed to staying in South Lake Union where land is at a premium, we've drifted away from the word "cohousing" and more toward "intentional community."

Although there is a lot to be said for good cohousing architecture, we've been suspicious that when it comes to living in (various forms of) community, intention can trump many challenges of the built environment. With this on my mind, I was thrilled to hear Grace Kim open by saying that cohousing is defined by people, not buildings, and elaborate on this point throughout the presentation. When I asked a question about it, she even put a name to what we are trying to do--"retrofit cohousing," and added that without intention, cohousing is no different from any other housing--such as a condo association or an apartment building.

So there you have it. We are a starting a co-housing community after all, even though we don't have plans (or money!) to build a cohousing village from scratch. The idea of using what is already here is attractive to me, anyway. After all, we have a common room, and so do several buildings within a block of us. We have the pea patch right across the street with the playground, playfield, and People's Center whose motto is "A place where you can..." With some intention, we have everything we need for a thriving retrofit co-housing community.