We are honored to share PAYETTE has received five 2025 Chicago Athenaeum American Architecture Awards, recognizing the nation’s best new buildings.
MA Veterans Home at Chelsea Community Living Center
An Iconic Hilltop Home for Veterans – Crowned by its iconic solar array perched high above historic Powder Horn Hill, the Veterans Home at Chelsea emerges from the hillside, a new landmark exuding compassion, warmth and dignity. Located on the highest point in the Boston basin, the new Community Living Center is a long-term care facility for veterans designed to harness 360-degree panoramic views of downtown Boston and the Harbor.
Land’s Sake Farm is a non-profit community farm that donates 30% of its produce for hunger relief to communities in need and provides CSA and retail produce for its neighboring communities. The Farm also serves as an educational venue for over 5,000 children annually. PAYETTE assisted the Land’s Sake organization in developing a long-term master plan for their 40-acre farm along with the design of a new Animal Barn and Farmstand. The plan set out to increase efficiency of the farm operations, improve the site’s infrastructure, create a sustainable model and enhance the farm experience for its year-round visitors.
The Ragon Institute of Mass General, MIT, and Harvard
The Ragon Institute is a unique union of Mass General Brigham, MIT, and Harvard at the forefront of infectious disease research, such as HIV-AIDS and COVID-19. Its new 323,000 GSF home is located on a free-standing triangular site along Main Street at the edge of Kendall Square and the MIT Campus. Cantilevered dramatically on 3 corners, the design approach embraced the unusual triangular site as a singular object by floating the mass above a continuous band of landscape on all sides, and seamlessly navigating the gateway site and its varying alignments with the gentle sweep of its mass: its green roof fluidly sloping downward three stories around the block. The elliptical Courtyard Sweep carved into the mass further scales the profile and provides a dynamic silhouette along Main Street; it is an extension of the organically shaped atrium that defines the heart of the institute.
EXP is the final component of the phased development of Northeastern University’s new 600,000 GSF science/engineering precinct which includes the award winning ISEC building (completed in 2018), pedestrian bridge and landscaped plaza. This major expansion occupies a former brownfield site of surface parking lots across a major rail corridor from the main campus. LEED Platinum certified, EXP provides advanced science and engineering research space focused on computational research, data science and drug discovery, along with autonomous vehicles, drones and humanoid robots. The expressive stainless steel exterior integrates with the neighboring ISEC, creating an iconic hub for science and engineering collaboration.
University of Hartford Hursey Center
Envisioned as a mix of cutting-edge spaces for engineering with technology-rich learning and simulation environments of the health professions, the Hursey Center is a showcase building that places student projects and hands-on learning at the heart of the University of Hartford’s beautifully landscaped campus. The building takes an unconventional approach to place-making: it is sited at the very center of its iconic Main Academic Green, prominently exposing each of its sides. While this inherently disruptive act could have easily overwhelmed the scale and intimacy of the open space, the new building is integrated seamlessly into its surroundings and has quickly become the crossroads of the campus. The principal organizing feature of its visually complex interior is a multi-level skylit commons that runs the length of the building, affording students and visitors with expansive views into a diverse array of experiential learning spaces along either side.
Congratulations to our clients, collaborators and project teams on these achievements!
Photography (c) Robert Benson Photography; (c) Warren Jagger Photography
