honoring the past to inspire the future

I'll admit. I love old buildings. Whenever I see an older building that has been neglected, I dream of what could be. But even I didn't expect to gasp out loud when looking at images of this cultural center in a former bank in South Side Chicago. It's that good.

The Stony Island Arts Bank is the latest project of Rebuild Foundation, an organization dedicated to to rebuilding the cultural foundations of underinvested neighborhoods and inciting movements of community revitalization that are culture based, artist led, and neighborhood driven. With that goal in mind, the way the Arts Bank's design does not merely restore the bank to its former glory, but uses the decay to create a new design that honors the original design, the more recent past of neglect, and the current mission, all in order to inspire the future of those who enter.

[Images originally found on Slate.]