Maverick Landing

Boston, MA

180

private back yards

228

new trees for a net increase of 798 caliper inches of shade

5

new public streets created to reestablish the historic street network

Situated on the East Boston waterfront, the $120M redevelopment of Maverick Gardens, a deteriorated and severely distressed three-story barracks-style public housing development, called for the demolition of the 1940’s super block housing to be replaced with 396 units in newly constructed buildings and 50,000 square feet of green space. The newly envisioned community includes 20 townhouse buildings, six six-story mid-rise buildings and a community center sited on the existing lot and adjacent Carlton Wharf.

Total acreage extends five full city blocks and features the first LEED certified multifamily housing development in New England. Replacing the crime-ridden blocks of housing, new homes mimic the rhythm of the neighboring townhomes, with a front entry and a private yard for each family. The reconfiguration of the historic street pattern provides a new, safe corridor to the Boston Harbor and successfully re-joins the site to the surrounding community.

DMLA’s inventive landscape design capitalizes on land preservation opportunities along the fragile harbor front, introduces a new tree canopy, and offers effortless visual access to the water from abutting uses and neighborhoods, activated by pedestrian-friendly sidewalks. The strategic re-greening of public and private amenity areas results in a distinctive community with a strong sense of character and place. This innovative development was honored with an Urban Land Institute’s Jack Kemp Excellence in Affordable and Workforce Housing Award as well as a Boston Society of Landscape Architects Merit Award for Urban Design.

It would be very easy to end up with cookie-cutter landscape design in these multi-block, dense multifamily developments that we do—but not with Deb Myers as our landscape architect… her vision of the urban environment led us to a better place.
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Frank Edwards, Trinity Financial
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Project Team

  • Deborah Myers designed this project as Senior Associate at Stantec
  • Client: Trinity Financial
  • Developer: Trinity Financial
  • Architect: ICON Architecture
  • Civil Engineer: Nitsch Engineering
  • General Contractor: CWC Builders
  • Landscape Contractor: Brightview (formerly Valley Crest)
  • Photographer: Charles Mayer

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