Spaces evoke powerful feelings. Sometimes we are aware of how our surroundings affect us and other times we are not, but we are still impacted. A space can help us feel welcome and even inspire joy or faith. It’s important to spend our resources on environments that reflect our deepest values because we spend so much time in them. I’m thankful for creative people like Mel and his team who push the envelope and haven’t given up on creating our sacred spaces.

Our vision for the community is to see it transformed, to see it become more vibrant and connected than ever before.

We’re a traditional camp and conference center, but we needed a fresh set of eyes to look at our spatial design and wayfinding. PlainJoe Studios came in and painted a vision for our future. They upped our game. It’s been a tremendous partnership. It’s enhanced us and people are really impressed. They’ve said, ‘This isn’t like any other camp we’ve been to,’ and I would attribute that in large part to PlainJoe and helping us take it to the next level.

When I look around at the new design of our campus and our new worship center, I can’t help but feel joy and excitement for the people in our community and in our city who will come and learn about Jesus Christ. I think we’ve succeeded in creating a warm and welcoming environment that honors God in all the details, big and small. And we’ve built this new worship facility not only for the lives that will be transformed for Christ today, but also for future generations.

Summit is located in Reno/Sparks, Nevada which is nestled next to the towering Sierra Nevada Mountains. The mountain vibe permeates our valley. As a result, for our church to speak the language of our community, it is vital to reflect the outdoors “mountain house” theme. The mountain-themed environments at Summit put people at ease and help them to feel like our church is a place they can relate with. In many ways, the architectural themes at Summit open the door so they can hear theGospel more clearly!PlainJoe Studios has been an incredible team to work with! They areamong the most creative and talented people I’ve ever met!

We refused to build inside the old paradigm: member-only club, open one day per week. What if we came together and leveraged our resources and combined our generosity to build something that could be received by our community as a gift?

It gives us a chance to flip the paradigm from one where the church occupies a building and tries to convince the community to come inside, to building something for the community to occupy, and inviting the church in.

Our project was built on a 100+ year old dairy farm with multiple barns, farmhand residences, and an old dairy building that had fallen into disarray. It was a decaying rotting skeleton of something that had once been thriving and necessary for the community. Mel helped us develop a vision for the property that would tell the story of how God can restore our dry bones in our spiritual lives through the restoration and development of this old campus into something new and thriving again.

It seems that whatever we step into together, the Gospel ripples out from there bringing light, life and freedom to those we serve. We captured this concept with concentric circles rippling out throughout the building and even in front of the building. The story of the Gospel redeeminga community is being told even as you park your car.