The goal of turning a once run-down house in North Hill into a gathering place for the Bhutanese community and an international hostel for guests is taking shape — and its organizer hopes it will be an example copied in other parts of Akron.
Last year, Jason Roberts, founding director of the Dallas-based Better Block, came to Akron to help community organizers pull off North Hill’s first Better Block event, temporarily transforming a stretch of North Main Street with pop-up shops and restaurants.
Roberts was so impressed by the growing Bhutanese community in North Hill that he applied for and won a $155,000 grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to purchase and repair a foreclosed home for use as a hostel and neighborhood center for the immigrant population.
The grant was one of 32 — including two in Akron — awarded last year as part of a national challenge by the foundation to make Knight cities better places. The hostel will use the Airbnb website, which allows people to rent rooms or houses for short periods of time.
Roberts said he plans to set up the hostel and community center and then establish an association of Bhutanese community members within 18 months to run it.
The Bhutanese community is very excited about the hostel and community center, which will be called the Exchange House, said Naresh Subba, owner of the nearby Family Groceries.
“I hope it will be a channel for the community and bring people together,” said Subba, who estimates there are several thousand Bhutanese refugees in North Hill who came to the United States from camps in Nepal.
Work inside the house has been taken down to the studs, with several walls knocked down so changes can be made inside. An open house was recently held to get feedback from the Bhutanese community.
“We want to show the community how you can take a house that was once considered a liability and turn it into a space that’s not only functional, but make sure the neighborhood is stabilized,” said Roberts.
Two to three bedrooms will be used as Airbnb rooms, and the first-floor area will be a cultural area for the immigrant community. Ultimately, there will be a room to have a live-in innkeeper, as well as community gardens and a nearby international marketplace.
Project organizers hope to have the Exchange House completed by May 1 but it’s still a work in progress as changes have been made to stay within the relatively low budget.
Demolition work was done by crews with Truly Reaching You Ministries, an Akron-based group that provides work and training for men and women transitioning back into the community from incarceration and addiction.
As the interior of the house comes to life, Roberts and his team want to use members of the Bhutanese community to reflect their heritage in bright colors, decorations and perhaps building furniture.
“We’re still working on how to create it,” he said.“We’re catching the stories. How do we help facilitate the space?”
Bright, open design
Sai Sinbondit, a designer for Cleveland-based architectural firm Bialosky Cleveland, is working as the project designer for the Exchange House.
An extension to the house will highlight a larger kitchen, said Sinbondit.
Sinbondit has designed the kitchen exterior with screens to create a greenhouse effect and let sunlight in during the day and glowing lights through the screen at night.
“It’ll be a bit of a show from the back of the house,” said Kyle Kutuchief, Knight Foundation Akron program director.
The current back of the house will also be redesigned to have a front-porch feel to face North Main Street and give access to the community’s main thoroughfare, Roberts said.
Roberts and his crew have partnered with Frank Caetta, who owns several buildings along North Main Street, to allow for use of one of his parking lots for extra parking as well as an entrance directly from the house to Main Street. A door has already been cut in an existing fence to allow for quick passage from the house to North Main Street. There also are plans for a garden and international marketplace in the parking lot.
Plans for future
Roberts has been working with Kent State University architecture students on designs for the international marketplace stalls. In the spirit of wanting others to replicate the project, Roberts said the idea will be to post the architectural designs for the marketplace stalls on the Internet for others to copy.
The Exchange House is a test of a small intervention that can show others how to reclaim and rebuild a house into an asset, Kutuchief said.
“This is just one house. But it has the potential to transform how older homes in communities could be used,” said Kutuchief. “We want this to be replicated.”
“How many spaces do we have like this in Akron? If we can prove in one area that we can do it at a pretty low cost” it can breed more projects, said Kutuchief.
Jason Segedy, Akron’s new planning director, echoed Kutuchief’s thoughts, saying other run-down houses in Akron could be brought back to life, perhaps in different functions, according to the needs of the community.
Segedy said he’s excited to see how the Exchange House can help transform the North Hill block.
“This is a street I’ve seen for a long time,” said Segedy. “I’ve seen this community change and in the last five years the uptick. It’s cool to see the life cycle.”
Betty Lin-Fisher can be reached at 330-996-3724 or blinfisher@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her @blinfisherABJ on Twitter or www.facebook.com/BettyLinFisherABJ and see all her stories at www.ohio.com/betty.