Opportunity Works Partners with TMS Architects for New Project

One of the missions of TMS Architects is to, “…embrace our clients’ visions and translate them into buildings that are beautiful, functional, and sensitive to their environment.” Recently, we’ve had the opportunity to do just that while partnering with Opportunity Works on the design and build-out of their new 37,000 square foot facility.

Opportunity Works New Portsmouth Facility Embraces Style, Functionality and Accessibility

Located in Haverhill and Newburyport, the dedicated and compassionate team of Opportunity Works’s employees and volunteers helps local adults with disabilities to lead full and productive lives. Their campus is open five days a week, working to educate, train, and place adults with developmental and acquired disabilities from around the Merrimack Valley region in rewarding employment positions. Opportunity Works is so successful that it’s now time to expand and build a new facility here in Portsmouth, next to the North Essex Community College campus.

We’re proud to be the design/build team for Opportunity Works’s new campus and have worked closely with their construction committee to achieve a comprehensive design that is highly sensitive to the needs of the buildings’ occupants as well as attractive, cheerful and 100% accessible.

This process required hundreds of rewarding hours spent planning, dreaming, and imagining in order to make the very best use of each square foot of space. Some of the building’s features include:

• Accessibility. Every hallway, entrance, door, light fixture, and bathroom space has been designed with accessibility in mind, so the building is welcoming and user-friendly for anyone who enters, whether on foot, with walking aids or on wheels.
• Spacious bathrooms. A large part of accessibility includes adequate space for occupants to maneuver comfortably. Nowhere is this more important than bathroom spaces.
• Color coordination. Occupational and clinical therapists were consulted to create color schemes that are both soothing and appealing while also serving as directional tools for location within the building and corridors.
• Energy efficiency. The entire project boasts higher-than-required efficient windows, LED lighting and other energy efficient upgrades to reduce precious resource consumption.

Continue checking in with the Opportunity Works website to track our project’s progress.

You can also make a donation in order to help them reach financial project completion goal. Have a unique building project that requires a comprehensive and sensitive design approach? Contact TMS Architects and schedule a consultation.