Parklawn Housing Development – Milwaukee WI

Description

"Parklawn, a 42-acre tract with the main entrance at W. Hope Ave. and N. Sherman Blvd., is a low-cost Government housing project. Two thousand men, women and children liver here at moderate rental fees. Built by the Public Works Administration, Parklawn was one of the first projects to employ Federal housing funds for other than slum-clearance programs.

A group of architects combined as the Allied Architects of Milwaukee to design nine blocks of brick and tile houses with uniform blue doors and red roofs. The buildings were completed in 1937 at a cost of $2,238,500. The 518 housing units occupy only 20 per cent of the tract; the rest is used for a park, playgrounds, baseball diamonds, and tennis, basketball, and horseshoe courts. A $50,000 community building houses a social center, staffed by the city's municipal recreation department, and home nursing and child welfare clinics supervised by the city health department. Occupancy is restricted to families within a limited income range."
(Wisconsin: A Guide to the Badger State)

"Parklawn today has a community center, daycare, YMCA and a technology-heavy 400-student elementary school. The centerpiece of the development is Monument Park, which the non-profit Project for Public Spaces has honored as one of the great public parks in the country. A network of walkways connects a central gazebo with a variety of monuments, sculptures, informational plaques and other artwork."
(https://www.networx.com)