Charlotte Urban Design Center

Dec 22, 2022

Making People Places: Programming Five Points Plaza

We have had an eventful year at the Urban Design Center, and our most literally event-full project is Five Points Plaza in the heart of Charlotte’s Historic West End at 1803 W. Trade Street. Six years after our very first sketch on trace through an intensive co-creative planning, design, and…

4 min read

Making People Places: Programming Five Points Plaza

4 min read

Nov 23, 2022

A space becomes a place in Miami — the Underline

When I think about Miami, I’ll usually associate it with the bits and pieces of pop culture embedded in me from my childhood years. Due to my slightly advanced age, that means Crockett and Tubbs, Ferrari Testarossas, Versace, and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. Those will likely stay with me…

4 min read

A space becomes a place in Miami — the Underline

4 min read

Nov 10, 2022

The Second Annual Urban Design Awards

Why do we host the Urban Design Awards? On October 27th, The City of Charlotte Urban Design Center and the UNC-Charlotte School of Architecture presented the city’s second annual Urban Design Awards. Affectionally dubbed “The Urbies,” this awards program recognizes and celebrates quality urban design in Charlotte. The Charlotte Urban…

9 min read

9 min read

Oct 20, 2022

Dorothea Dix Park — Place, Community, Planet

The Design Imperatives conference hosted in Raleigh this September focused on challenges facing our region today and opportunities for the future regarding how we build more connected, sustainable communities. The first day began with a series of walking tours to public spaces in the city, some in process and others…

3 min read

Dorothea Dix Park — Place, Community, Planet

3 min read

Aug 25, 2022

The 2nd annual Urban Design Awards or “Urbies,” presented by the Charlotte Urban Design Center and…

The 2nd annual Urban Design Awards or “Urbies,” presented by the Charlotte Urban Design Center and UNC Charlotte’s School of Architecture, will take place on Oct. 27, and this year we need YOU! Do you know of a cool urban design project or designer that deserves recognition? Nominate them today…

Charlotte

1 min read

Charlotte

1 min read

Jun 10, 2022

Bike OKC

At the end of March, the UDC attended the Congress for the New Urbanism in Oklahoma City. After a week of learning from and connecting with fellow urbanists, the final day was upon us. An award ceremony was planned to follow breakfast, but I had planned a bicycle rental with…

3 min read

3 min read

Jun 9, 2022

Oklahoma City National Memorial Museum

…is a place of terrorism transformed into a commemorative landscape that moves your heart and then your soul. One of the things that come to mind about Oklahoma City is the bombing of the Alfred Murrah Federal Building on April 19, 1995. The Urban Design Center was in Oklahoma City…

4 min read

4 min read

Jun 8, 2022

Oklahoma City’s Wheeler District

If I were to ask you what a 90-acre former airport, the old Santa Monica pier Ferris wheel, and an Instagram-friendly sculpture had in common, you might be hard-pressed to find an answer. If I told you that all those items make the framework of one of the coolest new…

6 min read

6 min read

Jun 8, 2022

Congress for the New Urbanism CNU#31 Comes to Charlotte

The City of Charlotte and the Urban Design Center are so pleased to announce that the Congress for the New Urbanism has chosen Charlotte as the location of their next Congress — CNU31. Monica Holmes, Division Manager of Design and Preservation and Erin Chantry, Manager of the Urban Design Center…

1 min read

Apr 11, 2022

Five Points Plaza — It’s Open!

Last month the City of Charlotte cut the ribbon on Five Points Plaza in the Historic West End. This public space is the first that the City has constructed in 30 years — the last was Polk Park at Trade and Tryon streets. Located at the intersection of W. Trade…

3 min read

3 min read