At Neighborhood Allies, we pride ourselves on making meaningful connections and building impactful partnerships.
A new and exciting partnership began in 2025 between Neighborhood Allies, the Carnegie Mellon University School of Architecture, and Abeille Voyante Tea Co. when two CMU professors of architecture reached out to Senior Program Manager for Social Impact Design, Tamara Emswiler, a graduate of the School of Architecture herself, to see if there were any opportunities for students of their upcoming project-based course to partner with someone in the Neighborhood Allies network. The goal was to find a way for the students’ architecture project to live on past the end of the Spring semester.
Tamara connected them with Abeille Voyante Tea Co., a tea shop located in Millvale looking to utilize its outdoor space for events and community gathering. The project team at CMU, alongside our SID team – Tamara Emswiler and Jordan Swartz – worked with tea shop owner Danielle over the course of the Spring 2026 semester to create a long-lasting community space in Millvale where Danielle can host everything from tea making workshops to small, intimate weddings.
Project leads and faculty members Neal and Kristina explained the planning process that brought this collaboration to life:
“Every year, a student-led team works to build a gateway pavilion for Carnegie Mellon’s annual Carnival festival. This year, the student design team—composed of members of the Architectural Crafts Collective—imagined the structure as a collection of outdoor furniture pieces for Abeille Voyante Tea Co. stitched together to create the gateway arch, and in this way, the project was designed with re-use in mind. During its first life on Carnegie Mellon’s campus, the structure was constructed entirely of disassemblable wooden frames connected by orange ‘infill’ panels that function as seats, tables, and planters.
Once disassembled, all of the elements could be packed and shipped flat, making transportation to the tea shop easy. The structure was taken apart in a matter of hours and transported to the site, where it was reassembled with the help of student and community volunteer groups to serve as furniture for a tea garden, including lounge seating, tables, and a traditional open-air tea house.”
-Neal Hitch and Kristina Fisher, Faculty at the Carnegie Mellon University School of Architecture
Phase 1: Building the Gateway
The finished gateway on CMU’s campus
Phase 2: Building the Tea Garden
Phase 2: The finished tea garden in Millvale
“This project exemplifies the spirit of the Social Impact Design program and of Neighborhood Allies as a whole,” said Tamara. “As a connector, Neighborhood Allies was able to support this collaboration, which directly benefited a local, small business while also providing an opportunity for CMU students to connect directly with community members. It was a hands-on experience for them that emphasizes the importance of community-led design principles through an Equity-Centered Community Development Lens. We are thrilled to continue making these important connections and supporting more projects like this one! ”
