Franklin Gardens is a light industrial mixed-use development that embraces sustainable materials and layered spatial planning to foster a productive, community-centered environment. At the heart of the design is a hybrid structural system that prominently features mass timber, used throughout the project for its renewable properties, warm aesthetic, and ability to express the tectonic logic of the architecture. Exposed CLT panels and glulam beams provide both structural performance and a tactile, human-scale material experience that reinforces the project's environmental ethos. A defining feature of the site is its central green space—a sunken garden one level below grade. This strategic move accomplishes two primary goals: it offers a protected, more intimate gathering space for residents, makers, and visitors, and it preserves the skyline continuity of the surrounding urban-industrial context. By lowering the garden, the project respects adjacent building heights while still carving out a generous communal amenity. The lowered courtyard also enhances passive microclimatic performance, buffering wind and reducing noise from surrounding activity.
The architectural massing steps back and interlocks around this garden, creating visual transparency and moments of engagement between the private and public realms. Timber screen facades and large-format glazing work together to strike a balance between openness and enclosure, allowing natural light deep into the building’s core while reinforcing privacy and solar control. Franklin Gardens reimagines the industrial campus as a civic landscape—one that’s materially responsible, spatially layered, and deeply connected to both productivity and place.