Cornerstone Village is located at 171-195 Harvey Street in North Cambridge, a dead-end street, close to where Fresh Pond Parkway meets Rt. 2 –near the Alewife MBTA station.
Their website, the articles written about the place, and diverse photographs of people living there, demonstrate a close-knit community of happy people. Excepts follow.
http://www.cornerstonecohousing.org/
ABOUT
Cornerstone Village Cohousing began in 1993 with a group of people to develop a cohousing community in the northwest inner suburbs of Boston, Massachusetts.
Our project in North Cambridge, MA, is composed of 32 private housing units — ranging from one-bedroom flats to townhouses — and common facilities.
We are committed to living as a community that promotes sensible sharing of personal, social, and natural resources, provides a safe and stimulating environment for the growth of children and adults, and fosters beneficial relationships with the surrounding community and the world at large.
HISTORY
During the summer of 1993, Elizabeth Locke asked Marc Daigle and John Adelberg of The Cohousing Center for assistance in starting a cohousing community in the northwest suburbs of Boston. The three of them sketched out a development plan for the community and began to seek other interested people and potential sites. By spring 1994 they had found a good potential site.
In December 2001 the first group of households moved into Cornerstone…
The year 2003 … we got more practice in living together. This allowed us to refine and improve our ways of doing things — an ongoing process of community evolution. The grounds around our buildings began to show the fruits of the previous year’s work…
Late 2003 and early 2004 saw a big baby boom. We welcomed five new babies in as many months, and it became a delightfully regular sight to see infants being passed from one eager “baby holder” to another during common meals.
In late 2007 … we began to turn the open area in the center of our property from a parking lot and water retention pond into a gorgeously landscaped garden curving around and among a flat grass yard,… One of the first events in our new center yard in 2008 was a Sunday dance recital choreographed and performed by some of the younger residents. Since then the yard has been a perfect place for the children who have outgrown our community playground.
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from a website offering unit for sale:
http://soldonmls.com/default.asp?f=listing_details&listingid=429701&listingtype=2
…
Common areas include an arts and crafts room and separate playroom for children;
a large common room complete with a community kitchen and dining facility for all the residents.
There is a “quiet room” where one can read a book or organize a game or watch a movie.
There is also a wood working shop, guest room with bath that is available for residents to reserve, an exercise room, and bike storage area.
A large newly constructed room with a giant TV monitor serves as a meeting or social room.
The community has a number of celebrations and rituals that residents can choose to participate in, including a communal meal each Sunday, annual talent show, field day, spring Carnevale, Pysanky egg dyeing, music share, Halloween party, 4th of July BBQ, and many other planned and spontaneous gatherings.
Some families share childcare, others regularly attend concerts together, and children in the community will often find neighbors showing up for their school plays and sporting events.
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FROM a recent article:
Cohousing group brings generations together
Edward McClelland, NowU
OCTOBER 21, 2014
Elizabeth Locke, 68, the community’s “founding mother,” spent a decade sharing a two-apartment commune with a dozen friends…
She spent the next decade living in a single-family house, but neighbors came and went.
Then she read a newspaper article about cohousing, a type of community originating in Denmark that combines private space with common areas, such as dining rooms, lounges, gardens and libraries.
“I realized that I really wanted a community that could last through life changes,” Locke said. “People could move away and it wouldn’t fall apart. Also, the whole issue of community versus privacy was one for me. Cohousing seemed like a wonderful solution. You had the community, but you also had the space where you could go and close the door.”
Finding Acceptance
It was also a solution to the rootlessness felt by professionals who had moved to Boston for work, then had trouble finding acceptance in the city’s clannish neighborhoods. As Locke put it, her Cornerstone neighbors are “a little less than family and a little more than friends.”
Locke sought out residents through notices in newspapers and signs in public libraries. She organized dozens of recruitment meetings at local community centers and interviewed architects and contractors.
Once 15 people had committed, Cornerstone had enough funds to make a down payment on land and break ground in North Cambridge just outside Boston. By the time the development was completed, all the units had been sold…
A ‘Dream Team’ Offers Support
The close-knit community also has a “Dream Team” of doting neighbors who help residents going through difficult times. When Sue Donaldson’s partner, Julie, was diagnosed with a brain tumor, her Dream Team drove the couple to radiation treatments, fed their cat and delivered their groceries…
Providence Cohousing 