Architecture students and faculty from Syracuse University and Auburn University have completed a new building for Brady Farm, a Syracuse-based nonprofit, together with local contractors.
Brady Farm is just two miles south of Syracuse University’s campus. Its new Market Shed allows the nonprofit to up its produce volume, expand adult workforce training program offerings, and provide more on-site nutrition education opportunities for local school children.
The 1,500-square-foot, freestanding building was completed pro bono by Mago Architecture, founded by Hannibal Newsom, an assistant professor at Syracuse; in tandem with David Shanks, an assistant professor at Auburn University.
The shed has an asymmetrical pitched roof that, in plan, juts out. Roof windows pour natural light into the interiors. Red doors both inside and outside complement the grayish blue, standing metal seam exterior cladding, punctured by large, rectangular apertures.
“The building design was developed with the idea of using low-cost, standardized, pre-engineered kit-of-parts building materials to create a bespoke structure,” Newsom told AN. “Here, a simple barn typology is split in two, with each half shifted away from the other at the midline, separating the community room from the food processing and storage area.”
“As these volumes shift,” Newsom added, “the roof stretches and shears with them to create covered outdoor spaces and distinct entrances for each separate use. While the final structure relies on traditional framing, the form inspired by experimentation with pre-engineered structures remains.”
Bespoke, wooden shelving systems act as storage for Brady Farm. At certain points, the walls can be reconfigured into tables. Dangling light fixtures illuminate the deeper spaces stepped back from the windows. Refrigerators stocked with healthy drinks abound.
Newsom emphasized the project’s pedagogical dimension. It started when Brady Farm acted as a client for a “speculative agritourism project” in a graduate-level integrated design studio at Syracuse in fall 2022, Newsom told AN.
Students collaborated with Brady Farm to explore the potential of pre-engineered, wood pole-barn construction and standard framing, resulting in another graduate-level research seminar in 2023.
Student researchers from Syracuse that participated in the design-build project that took place between 2022 and 2024 were Madeline Best, Kyra Brown, Ethan Fox, Jose Hernandez, Stella Shao, Mingrui Xie, and Menghan Zha.
Construction on the Market Shed started in 2024. That year, Newsom led a directed research studio with 17 final-year undergraduate and graduate students to design, fabricate, and install permanent millwork in the Market Shed.
A total of fourteen local contractors donated approximately $250,000 worth of labor and materials to the project.
Hayner Hot, Allied Electric, Commercial and Residential Painting, Edward Schalk and Son, Gitzen Companies, Heidelberg Materials Northeast-NY, Hertel Steel, JK Tobin Construction, Little Falls Lumber, Paragon Masonry, Thermal Foams/Syracuse, Upstate Spray Foam and HVAC, and Burns Bros all contributed.
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