topaz

This weekend Mosaic Commons had its Private Unit Design workshop.

Weekend-long workshops are always exhausting. This one was no exception. On Saturday we settled on designs for all five of our unit types. We examined full baths and half baths. We debated ducting options and closet arrangements. We agreed to make the 2-bedroom units all townhouses rather than stacked flats. We made all sorts of choices on accessibility issues.

Today we examined building types (duplex and triplex designs). We discussed whether to jog or not to jog. We considered shared porches. We measured and we taped and we stickered and we penciled. And we made a wrenching attempt at unit selection.

The Private Unit Design component of cohousing design is one of the stickier, emotionally fraught parts of the process. It's an attempt to find the uneasy balance between providing for everyone's personal needs and sticking to a site design that is simple enough to build. No one wants to be told that they can't build their home the way that they want to build it, but to get through this process we all have to be prepared to do exactly that. It means a lot of compromise. A lot. And in a group where everyone has already compromised a lot to get to where we are. This weekend I watched people who I love dearly struggle to find ways to meet their neighbors' needs. It was a fierce and beautiful sight.

It is a motley bunch of oddballs we have fallen in with here. I am continually amazed at our ability to keep moving and get the hard decisions done. It may be a funny-looking crew but it is, ultimately, my community. And it is my home.

This is what consensus looks like.