The Watercooler

The Watercooler is a 37-unit mixed-use community that helped shape Boise’s emerging West End.

Selected through a competitive RFP process in partnership with Capital City Development Corporation, The Watercooler transformed a publicly owned site into a distinctly urban residential community. The project introduced Boise’s first live/work unit typology, with glass storefronts and direct street-level entries designed to blur the line between home, work, and the surrounding neighborhood. A public-facing pocket park and ground-floor retail further extend the building into the streetscape, creating places for residents and the broader community to gather. Today, PINE Coffee Supply activates the building’s corner retail space and carries that original vision forward. The building itself has become part of Boise’s visual identity through The Big Back Yard, a three-story mural by artist David Carmack Lewis. Recognized for its contribution to thoughtful urban infill and placemaking, The Watercooler received the City of Boise’s Award for Design Excellence and an Idaho Smart Growth Award in 2018.