Related Projects

Working with Buildings
  • Man from City Hall

    • Boston City Hall becomes a giant character for First Night celebrations

  • LightPlay

    • A project using refracted light and other day/night lighting effects for a new mixed-use building

  • Terpsichore for Kansas City

    • Turning a 1000 car parking garage into a musical instrument in Kansas City, MO

  • The Benefit of Mr. Kite

    • Re-envisioning a walkway in San Diego, CA into a choreographed path of light and color

  • Terullian Mantle

    • A multi-part response to the International Day Parade of New York City’s Public School 89

  • Glove Cycle

    • Gloves go through a life cycle while leading passengers down into a Cambridge subway station

  • Pillars of Thought

    • Transforming architectural elements into guardians of thought in the Scottsdale Public Library

  • Drawn Water

    • A permanent piece at the Cambridge, MA Water Treatment Plant about where water comes from and where it goes

  • City at the Falls

    • A terrazzo floor and lighted ceiling brings the river and the city into the Louisville Convention Center

Massachusetts
  • Man from City Hall

    • Boston City Hall becomes a giant character for First Night celebrations

  • Portrait Chairs

    • Seats of honor for readers in Norfolk, MA

  • In the Dense Words

    • A book environment for a book distribution company

  • Glove Cycle

    • Gloves go through a life cycle while leading passengers down into a Cambridge subway station

  • Asaroton, 1976

    • Bronze garbage embedded in a Boston crosswalk commemorates a produce market.

  • Ben’s Circular Tower

    • A place for storytelling and imagination on top of Boston’s Mission Hill

  • Gateway

    • An oversized table creates a fanciful gateway in a Cambridge middle school

  • Drawn Water

    • A permanent piece at the Cambridge, MA Water Treatment Plant about where water comes from and where it goes

  • The Bay Circuit Trail

    • A community project traversing the “Emerald Necklace” surrounding Boston

  • Submerge

    • Video collaboration by Mags Harries & Catherine Siller for Art on the Marquee at the Boston Convention Center

  • Winding Down the Charles

    • A performance piece in Cambridge, MA about the length of the river and time

  • Speed of Light

    • Mags’ students illuminate the future route of transit connecting eight communities around Boston

  • River

    • An illusionary river of water, light, and shadow

  • Lucid Moment

    • Bringing together light, liquid, movement, and space

  • Three Gardens

    • Domestic scale gardens make intimate spaces on the grounds of the DeCordova Museum in Lincoln, MA

  • One Legged Table

    • Bringing communities to the table to discuss global warming

  • Our Charles River

    • Exploring the connections between people, water and rivers

  • Reclamation Art

    • Reclamation Artists Boston

300 Summer Street

  • Location: 300 Summer Street, Boston, MA (1995)
  • Client: The Fort Point Arts Community
  • Size: 9 story building, 100,000 square feet, 50 studios
  • Material: Brick, concrete, metals, architectural finishes, recycled steel plates
  • Budget: $3,000,000
  • Funded: The Artist Cooperative members
  • Artist: Lajos Heder
  • Photo Credits: Kathy Chapman

Artist Housing For Boston

Interior of artist’s live/work space

To date, 300 Summer Street is the most prominently located artists’ building in the Boston area. Located in South Boston it is ideally situated to draw together the established Fort Point Arts Community and Greater Boston’s artists and art patrons. The building provides a strong artist presence in the city and offers a significant public space for the arts community. On this project artist and architect Lajos Héder converted the derelict  warehouse to artist studio/housing, and also worked as artist to create the building’s steel plate sculpture.

Goals & Challenges

The 300 Summer Street building encompasses  100,000 ft2 and 9 stories of brick, concrete and steel. Once a neglected warehouse, it has been converted into a space for artists’ live/work studios and art related businesses. The studios are simple, inexpensive lofts. They contain sufficient facilities to meet building codes for occupancy with the intention that the spaces will be further finished and improved by the artist/owners.

Illustration showing how the raw loft spaces can be used by artists

The Main Entrance and Atrium of 300 Summer Street feature sculpture created from steel plates recycled from the original warehouse.

A Community Center

The building is now a vital community center for over 400 artists. It currently contains 47 units of artists’ live/work lofts, 9 units of art-related businesses, a cooperative gallery, and a restaurant.

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