From Development Vision to Multifamily Product: How 220 South Claybrook Came Together | Shapiro & Company Architects with Patton Taylor Enterprises, LLC
Updated: 3 days ago
Developers often have a vision for a multifamily project from the very beginning. Their investment is guided by the market they plan to serve, the type of product they want to bring to the market, an the features they believe will make the development competitive.
The challenge lies in bringing together those priorities with the realities of the site.
At 220 South Claybrook, an 82-unit multifamily development currently under construction in Memphis, developers Lee Patton and Cameron Taylor at Patton Taylor Enterprises LLC had a clear vision for the project. The site is positioned near the Medical District and within minutes of Downtown, the Edge District and Overton Square, creating an opportunity to serve medical students, healthcare professionals, physicians, law students and young professionals looking to live close to where they work and study.
Scheduled for completion around September 2026, 220 South Claybrook is designed to bring new housing to a highly connected area of Memphis. Turning that vision into a workable multifamily product, however, required careful planning around the site's size, parking needs, zoning requirements and the individual components the development team wanted to include.
For Shapiro & Company, the role was to help translate that vision into a design that could work.
A Constrained Site with a Clear Development Vision
The 220 South Claybrook site previously housed a seven-story medical office building dating back to the 1960s. Redeveloping the property into an 82-unit multifamily community presented a new set of considerations.
With their knowledge of the area and the high population of medical staff and students looking for housing in the area, the development team had identified priorities they wanted to incorporate into the project.
On a constrained site, however, identifying the desired components of a development is only one part of the process. The next challenge is determining how those components can physically work together.
For 220 South Claybrook, Shapiro & Company focused on the planning required to accommodate the project's units, amenities and parking while responding to the specific conditions of the site.
Making the Site Work
Site planning played a significant role in the development of 220 South Claybrook.
Secure parking was one of the development team's highest priorities, and they wanted to make sure to offer enough parking for all residents, which is something they noticed was lacking in other multifamily projects in the area.
With that in mind, the final design incorporates underground parking to provide residents with the parking capacity the project required. Planning that parking within the development involved coordinating the building and site around the available footprint while also accounting for residential units, circulation and other program requirements.
The project also includes approximately 800 square feet of retail space on the ground floor. The retail component was incorporated to satisfy zoning requirements that allowed the development to include residential units on the first floor. This addition made it possible to create more rentable space for residence without significantly increasing the footprint of the development itself, saving on costs and creating higher efficiency for the project.
These requirements demonstrate how the physical and regulatory conditions of a site can directly influence the final product. Developers may begin with a clear idea of what they want to build, but each site presents its own limitations and opportunities.
An experienced multifamily architecture team can help navigate those conditions by evaluating how the different components of a project work together and identifying a path that supports the developer's overall objectives.
Translating a Vision into an Efficient Product
Shapiro & Company Architects’ role was to refine the unit planning and determine how the 82-unit product could work efficiently within the building and site. That required an understanding of the relationships between unit layouts, building configuration, parking and the broader site plan.
For Cameron Taylor of Patton Taylor Enterprises LLC, the firm's experience in multifamily design efficiency was an important part of the final outcome.
“If Shapiro & Company Architects didn’t have that experience with multifamily development design efficiency, we wouldn’t have had that product.”
Multifamily design efficiency is not simply about fitting the maximum number of units onto a site. It requires understanding how a developer's intended product can be organized into a building that works functionally while responding to the physical constraints of the property.
At 220 South Claybrook, that meant taking the development team's vision and working through the practical questions behind it: How could the desired unit mix work within the building? How could the project accommodate the underground parking that was a priority for the development team? How could the required retail component be incorporated into the ground floor? And how could these elements come together on a constrained site?
For developers, those questions are where architectural experience can have a direct impact on the product that ultimately reaches the market.
Taylor had worked with Shapiro & Company on several projects over the years, giving the development team an established understanding of the firm's approach. One of the qualities he emphasized was the team's willingness to listen to its clients and remain responsive throughout the design process.
The development team understood the market it wanted to serve and the type of resident experience it wanted to create. Shapiro & Company Architects brought multifamily planning and design experience to the process, helping refine the unit layouts, building configuration and site plan around those priorities.
Designing the Product Around the Market
220 South Claybrook was developed for renters who want convenient access to some of Memphis's major employment, education and entertainment destinations.
The Medical District is a central part of that market, with the project positioned to serve medical students, healthcare professionals and physicians. Its location also provides access to Downtown, the Edge District and Overton Square, creating additional appeal for law students and young professionals.
Within the units, Shapiro & Company focused on ensuring the layouts supported the overall product envisioned by the development team. The majority of the units are studios, which reduces rent costs and utility costs for future tenants, allowing young students/professionals a better opportunity to rent without finding roommates. These studio units have space for a bed out of the main living space, a bathroom with access from the bedroom or the main hallways for guests, and spacious living and kitchen spaces. Additionally, some of the one-bedroom options have built-in desk spaces, ideal for this market of residents.
The Value of Multifamily Design Experience
Every development begins with a unique combination of goals and constraints.
A developer may have a clear understanding of the market opportunity and the product it wants to deliver. The site, however, will determine a different set of possibilities and limitations. Zoning requirements, available space, parking needs, building configuration and unit planning all have to be resolved before that product can move from concept to construction.
That is where an experienced architecture partner can provide value.
For 220 South Claybrook, Patton Taylor Enterprises established the vision for the development, including the resident experience and features it wanted to provide. Shapiro & Company's role was to help make that vision work, using our experience in multifamily planning and design efficiency to refine the units, navigate the site's constraints and coordinate the elements required to bring the 82-unit development together.
As 220 South Claybrook approaches its anticipated completion in September 2026, the development is a reflection of how the relationship between the developer’s goals and an architecture firm’s experience shape strong developments in Memphis’s micro-markets.
Article by Shapiro & Company Architects with interview content with Cameron Taylor from Patton Taylor Enterprises, LLC
Get in touch with the Shapiro & Company Architects Multifamily Studio here.
Patton Taylor Enterprises, LLC https://www.pattontaylor.com/
