About

Common Boston Week 2010

Common Boston Week 2010 will open up the city for its fourth annual event this June 17-27, 2010. The week will feature a rich program of more than forty open buildings, neighborhood tours, exhibits, and events concentrated in six “common points” around the city. This year’s festival will focus on the theme of “Where We Connect.”

During last year’s Common Boston Weekend, the lack of social, intellectual, and physical connections between neighborhoods was repeatedly cited as an impediment to the sharing of ideas and experiences that could improve the city’s quality of life.

Yet Boston’s physical environment has also been shaped by inspired efforts to connect the diversity of its residents: from the nation’s first public park and its first public municipal library, to the nation’s fourth busiest subway system and contemporary projects like Zumix and the Community Rowing boathouse. Common Boston Week ‘10 will explore the places we connect in Boston, with a special focus on open spaces – including parks, waterfronts, roads, alleys, rooftops, courtyards, and empty lots.

Featured neighborhoods this year are: Chinatown, East Boston, Fort Point Channel, Jamaica Plain, Lower Roxbury, and Uphams Corner. Other special feature events include the Youth Media Project (YMP), the Common Boston Common Build (CBCB) design build competition, a photographic scavenger hunt, the dParty (“d” for design!), and a community forum. To help out by volunteering or to make a donation, please contact info@commonboston.org.

What is Common Boston?

Common Boston is a volunteer committee of the Boston Society of Architects that organizes Boston’s only free, public festival that opens up city to celebrate architecture and design in our neighborhoods.

Each year, we feature events around a number of “common points” which are areas of activity, typically focused within one of Boston’s many neighborhoods. Programs are centered around neighborhoods to enable the general public to explore good design that has benefited their communities, while also allowing designers to connect with specific communities regarding their ideas for future projects. We organize active programming with the goal of upholding our mission to inspire people who live and work in the Boston area to collectively and effectively shape a sustainable, equitable, and beautiful built environment.