As part of Black Hisory Month, we are highlighting the work of Stull & Lee, a prominant Black-owned firm that designed many of the projects at the heart of the Roxbury neighborhood. Familiarize yourself with their work ahead of next month’s Preserving the Recent Past 4 conference in Boston, when firm principal M. David Lee leads a tour of the neighborhood (tours are now open to the public!).

Located in an area originally inhabited by the Massachusett Tribe, Roxbury is one of the six villages established by the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630. Its boundaries and incorporations have changed over time, and today it is considered one of 23 official neighborhoods of Boston. Since the early 1900s it has been a landing point for many immigrants including German, Jewish, African American, and Caribbean communities. 

Stull & Lee, founded in 1966 by architect Donald Stull and later joined by M. David Lee, is responsible for many of the critical institutional and infrastructure projects in Roxbury. Mary Hale, associate teaching professor in the School of Architecture at Northeastern University, explains that “there were only a handful of Black-owned architecture firms in the country” at the time, and “they were very concerned with elevating minorities and women in their practice, which was unique among architecture firms at the time.” Excluded from many private development projects due to discrimination, the firm focused instead on state and federal government projects. The following projects are just a few examples of their work that have had an enduring impact on the region.

Ruggles Station opened in 1987. Its vaulted concourse is "inspired in part by grand European rail stations of the 19th century," and its open ends symbolize reconnection between Roxbury and Jamaica Plain that were historically divided by the railroad embankment.  

The John D. O'Bryant Center for African American Studies at Northeastern University is named after John Donaldson O'Bryant, the first African American to be elected to the Boston School Committee in 1977. Born in Boston, O'Bryant spent most of his adult life working in the school systems, first as a school teacher and then at Northeastern University. Stull and Lee described the design as emphasizing "the distinct identity of the African American Institute within the overall composition most notably with the design of a dramatic two story colonnade whose form was inspired by African architectural precedents."

Stull and Lee completes the Roxbury Community College main campus, comprised of four red brick buildings  in 1973. They completed an additional building, the Reggie Lewis State Track and Athletic Center in 1995. In an interview for The History Makers, Stull shared his approach to the project (this quote was originally share by in Stull's obituary published by Harvard GSD):

"I think a bit philosophically in the way I think about design. If one is going to design an educational facility, it’s my view that you first need to ask and answer questions regarding, what is education, what is learning? And then begin to evolve a design that’s responding to and answering those questions. When I did Roxbury Community College, the question for me at the time was that learning… is an interactive process, that it’s an interaction between student and books, student and teacher, teacher and teacher, student and student, student and environment.

For example, in a learning objective in design, we know that from a physical point of view, from a scientific point of view, the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. Therefore, the most efficient way to get from one place to another place is that way. However, if that is in a learning environment, the critical question is not how quickly you can get there but what happens to your mind on the way? And so that may not be the shortest distance or the fastest way to get there. You may decide to take the line through a labyrinth of learning experiences.

That’s one of the reasons Roxbury Community College is not one big mega structure building, but a campus. And so I looked for ways to create the, the places within that environment where one could enjoy the interactive process of learning at very many different levels. We’ve got some sculptures sitting in different places, places where you can sit outside quietly and contemplate the places and all the buildings wherein that kind of interactive process can happen."

The Orchard Gardens Pilot School, designed by Todd Lee of TLCR with Stull and Lee, was completed in 2003. It is the "visual centerpiece" of a larger revitalized mixed income housing development. 

The Roxbury Post Office opened in 1991. It was completed by Stull and Lee in association with the Primary Group to replace an outdated facility in the community.

In addition to the work of Stull & Lee, Roxbury is home to a number of other significant midcentury and recent past sites that are definitely worth a visit.

If you want to see more, make sure to sign up for the Roxbury's Recent Past tour on Saturday March 22.