Major Construction and Landscape Grants - Design Grants

Major Construction and Landscape Grants - Design Grants

Status: ACTIVE
Funder: Van Beuren Charitable Foundation Inc.
Last Updated: August 04, 2025

Summary

The Major Construction and Landscape Grants - Design Grants support nonprofit organizations and public institutions in planning significant construction and landscape projects. The grants focus on three key areas: Strong Starts for children, Healthy Lifestyles for community members, and Community Prosperity through regional economic growth. By investing in innovative and collaborative approaches, the program aims to enhance the quality of life in Aquidneck Island and Newport County while providing a framework for successful project execution.

Overview

NOTE: For first time applicants and major construction and landscape grant applications you will need to contact Program Assistant before applying to setup an introductory call. Design applications are considered on a rolling basis. Our Approach Our grant making priorities focus on the impact we aspire to make in the community. Aquidneck Island and Newport County remain at the center of our work. We recognize that communities are part of larger systems and economies and we welcome proposals from outside this region that can make a clear case for the benefit to our target communities. These grant priority areas are intentionally designed to recognize the connections between education, health, economic development, and place. Emphasis in the grant consideration process will be on the impact the proposed activities will have on one or more of these grant priority areas. The Foundation is open to innovative and collaborative approaches, encouraging proposals in the discovery, planning and pilot stages. Additionally, we invest in strengthening organizations. Through our programming and grant making, we seek to advance our community’s capacity for leadership and best practices needed to thrive and to sustain high-performing nonprofits. Grant Priorities Strong Starts:Our Goal: Children and youth have a strong start in life, benefitting from a supportive community and an education that prepares them for the future. The Difference We Want to Make: At every age children are ready and engaged learners, supported by their family, schools, and community.Our Point of View: Investing in the success of our children is fundamental to the community’s future. Healthy minds and bodies maximize learning. A reputation for excellence in education will both retain and attract families to our community.Healthy Lifestyles:Our Goal: Residents experience health throughout their lives. The Difference We Want to Make: The community offers access to quality health care as well as positive social and physical environments where residents can make healthy choices.Our Point of View: Health improves learning, workforce productivity, and the ability of residents to contribute to family and civic life. Healthy places support healthy choices. Communities known for outstanding health care and healthy lifestyles are attractive to both employers and talented workers.Community Prosperity:Our Goal: Regional economic growth creates opportunities for residents and enterprises. The Difference We Want to Make: The regional economy is home to a skilled workforce and thriving enterprises, and continues to foster a strong sense of place.Our Point of View: A diverse regional economy supports job growth, improves wages, and raises the standard of living for residents. Creating synergies between our workforce, enterprises, institutions, and quality of place will contribute to community vibrancy. A prosperous community can shape its future and invest in its social, environmental, and cultural values.Excellence in the Commons:Our Goal: Quality common spaces and institutions make our communities desirable places to live, work, and play. The Difference We Want to Make: The quality of landscapes and buildings support the community’s aspirations and contribute to community vitality.Our Point of View: Our buildings and landscapes can inspire, shape, and reflect the aspirations of the community. Well-designed natural and built environments enhance the local community and economy--they are physically and socially connected, welcoming, and vibrant. Robust planning processes and thoughtful design lead to quality facilities and landscapes that support program excellence. Major Construction and Landscape Grants - Design Grants And three types of Major Construction and Landscape Grants, typically for building renovations and upgrades, new construction, and major landscape redesign and improvement. Because large capital projects can be complex and happen infrequently enough that organizations may have had limited experience with them, we’ve found it helpful to break the process into several phases, based on MASS Design’s Planning for Impact Toolkit. A proposed project doesn’t necessarily have to fit neatly into one of these phases, but thinking about them in this way does offer a framework that can help organizations work through projects, anticipate challenges and opportunities, clarify, and inform important decisions, and ultimately yield projects that better meet their needs and aspirations. Phasing also allows organizations to adapt project designs based on what they learn along the way. What’s more, even smaller-scale capital projects can benefit from this approach. These grants are designed to support one of three phases of construction and landscape projects: Design Grants can help organizations who have decided to move forward on a project put together the requirements to be ready for construction. The design phase responds to the “design brief” that describes the requirements of the project (amount of space, types of programs, constraints, and context). It’s not unusual for design grants to include some planning activities. Typical outputs from design grants include the key elements of construction projects:Schematic drawings Design development Construction documents Project budget If you are requesting funding for equipment (e.g. computers, furniture, tools, etc.) that is not part of a major building project, please use our project/program grant application.

Eligibility

You can learn more about this opportunity by visiting the funder's website. vBCF provides funding to nonprofit organizations and public institutions for projects and activities that advance its mission and priorities. While our interests center on Aquidneck Island and surrounding communities, we welcome proposals from outside the region that will benefit its people and places.

Ineligibility

The Foundation does not make grants to individuals, for general operating purposes (except on occasion for longstanding partners), to support lobbying, or to attempt to influence legislation.