October 28, 2024
We just reached a major milestone in the renovation of St. Francis House: We are adding a new floor inside the building, to enable us to create our brand-new kitchen and food service area!
One of the signature features of our major renovation is our new food service operation and community gathering area. Over the years, our staff and volunteers have worked really hard to make our meal service friendly and inviting, but there has been no getting around the building’s many limitations and institutional feel. We have long wanted a way to give guests more choice about what to eat and when, and to do so in ways that are comfortable and dignified. We wanted to create an experience that is much more of a community center / food court-feel than a cafeteria meal line. This renovation enables us to realize this vision.
In our new SFH, we will be significantly increasing access to food—from the current limited hours to all day; from one meal option to many; from cafeteria line-ups to free choice. We have designed a space that enables guests to get a “grab and go” items like hot and cold sandwiches, fruits, and yogurts whenever they wish to eat, or to enjoy the prepared hot meal at expanded mealtimes. To make this happen, we need a much more robust, updated, and efficient kitchen. Fitting it into our limited space was a challenge. So, we actually are building a brand new internal floor to put it on!
Take a peek here at the installation of the steel beams that will soon form the literal foundation for our new kitchen floor, and the figurative foundation for our new way of feeding people and building community.
Steel beams will support the new kitchen floor
