Restore Oakland

Designed for restorative economics and healing justice

Project Overview

The Restore Oakland building is a permanent home to Bay Area nonprofits that cultivate restorative economics and healing justice. The community hub consists of office spaces, shared amenities and the Peace Room on the top floor, a commercial kitchen and restaurant on the ground floor, and community meeting rooms in the basement. DJDS steered the community listening sessions, supported with the capital financing, and provided full architectural services through construction.

Project Details

Project: Adaptive Reuse: commercial, retail, restorative justice (20,000 square feet)

Location: Oakland, CA

Status: Construction Completed 2019

Spaces for: Restorative Reinvestment

Project & Program Partners: Ella Baker Center (EBC), Restaurant Opportunities Center (ROC)

DJDS Team: Shelley Davis Roberts, Deanna Van Buren, Kacper Bigosinski, Kyle Rawlins

The building’s top floor overlooking International Blvd. maximizes natural light in the office space of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights - the building’s owner (Photo by Emily Hagopian)

Creating a Permanent Home for Local Nonprofits

Located in the Fruitvale neighborhood of Oakland, CA, the building is owned by the Ella Baker Center (EBC), who hired DJDS to support their initiatives to end mass incarceration. DJDS worked with Restore Oakland LLC to locate the project site and negotiate the purchase and sale agreement of the property. Through a series of design workshops with the partner organizations, DJDS developed the adaptive reuse design to support the fundraising capital campaign. The DJDS team then provided full architectural services for the project through construction administration and post-occupancy evaluation.

The Peace Room: A Dedicated Space for Healing Justice

A critical part of the design of Restore Oakland was to include a space dedicated to restorative justice. Designing for restorative justice means ensuring community members feel heard, able to calm themselves, and to see themselves reflected in the space. Named the “Peace Room,” this room on the top floor embodies design characteristics directly tied to calming the nervous system — soft colors, lighting that resembles clouds, maximizing light for greenery, and culturally-relevant art set a calming tone in the space.

Restore Oakland Peace Room (Photo by Ellyce Morgan) — “We don't tend to use the peace room for meetings unless it's a meeting that is connected to healing. It's a space to do different kind of work, and I think it's relational work.” - Restore Oakland staff memeber (Photo by Ellyce Morgan)

Restore Oakland Peace Room Diagram (Illustration by Allison Wong) — Diagram showing the design elements of the Peace Room and their purposes (Illustration by Allison Wong)

“Spaces for Transformational Programming” — a new Post-Occupancy Evaluation

In 2024, DJDS completed a post-occupancy evaluation of the Restore Oakland building to assess the impact of its design on the building’s programming and community member’s well-being. This evaluation places emphasis on how the building’s layout and attributes affect individuals who may have experienced trauma, incarceration, or housing disputes, as well as those in need of workforce development support. Unlike traditional evaluations, this study focuses on how the design makes people feel, rather than on the technical performance of the building. To learn more about the Restore Oakland Post-Occupancy Evaluation and download the report, visit this page.