MILL 19

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

5 acres, 2015-2023

Mill 19 is a living emblem of Pittsburgh’s transformation from its industrial steel-making past to a future of sustainable advanced manufacturing. Through a bold approach to adaptive reuse, the project viscerally interweaves new spaces for the Hazelwood Green community and the city’s robotics industry within the ruins of a decommissioned steel mill. The project welcomes the public through a series of linked exterior experiences framed between the 1,360-foot-long superstructure and three multi-tenant buildings sited within it. The visionary landscape celebrates experiential sustainable design strategies that support both ecological and social functions. Features made from reclaimed materials support public gathering, play, and reflection.

Through deep collaboration and a transdisciplinary approach to the design from the initial competition stage through construction oversight, the design for the project set out to investigate, embody, and honor the mill’s industrial legacy across the landscape and architecture. The original metal walls and roof were stripped away, intentionally revealing its underlying steel superstructure. The preserved and deconstructed exoskeleton reinterprets the former volume of the mill, honoring the ghost of what was, while positioning the structure as part of the landscape.
The team identified opportunities for deconstruction and preservation of the exoskeleton, scaling interventions in the landscape to celebrate the tectonics of the structure, while weaving together vertical circulation features and new opportunities to gather, explore, and relax amidst wild disturbance-adapted gardens.

The closure of the last operating steel mill in Pittsburgh left a wake of uncertainty about the future for the community’s residents. Mill 19’s design approach was to provide a community-facing space that engages and welcomes the residents who have felt excluded from progress happening in recent years. The design integrates human-scaled moments in a monumental setting, honoring industrial legacy while providing playful, immersive, and performative landscapes that offer a cleaner, safer environment for play and inhabitation. Through a community-engaged public art selection process, the design team listened to the struggles caused by changing economic conditions and provided art installations that uplifted communal ownership, healing, and pride in their community heritage at Mill 19.