The Center at Belvedere, Charlottesville Mixed-Use Development, Virginia Apartments, Gallery, USA Architecture Design
The Center at Belvedere in Charlottesville
June 24, 2022
Architecture: Bushman Dreyfus Architects
Location: Charlottesville, Virginia, USA

Photos: Virginia Hamrick Photography
The Center at Belvedere, Virginia
Social interaction impacts health later in life more than even some genetic factors. The Center at Belvedere, a community center for senior adults, provides programming and a welcoming environment to promote social engagement, physical and emotional well-being, civic involvement, creativity, and lifelong learning as part of a daily path to healthy aging.

The Center offers more than one hundred programs every week including classes and symposia in the fine arts, performing arts, health and fitness, politics and travel, and also hosts numerous support groups addressing the myriad issues our senior community faces.
Design and construction of The Center was a ten-year community effort that engaged with users of the former facility to learn what was lacking and what opportunities lay ahead, with a community health provider to plan an on-site health clinic, with local transportation agencies to ensure bus service to the facility, with local politicians to secure partial construction funding and with community philanthropists to educate them on the value of such a forward-looking facility.

The Center is a long, narrow building stretching across a hillsid...