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Artist Spotlight: Dwell With Diginity Redesigns Lives For Those Emerging From Homelessness

Dwell With Dignity Founder Lisa Robison (left) and Vice President Kim Turner (right) admire drapes with volunteer.
Hady Mawajdeh
/
Art&Seek
Dwell With Dignity Founder Lisa Robison (left) and Vice President Kim Turner (right) admire drapes with volunteer.

In an apartment inside a public housing complex, the sounds of drilling and women talking fill the space. Those women are working to get drapes hung and furniture built, because it’s their final day to whip this empty south Dallas apartment into a beautiful home for a single mother and her four children.

“Terica, where did you get these drapes?” Lisa Robison asks. “They’re awesome!”

Robison is an interior designer and the founder of Dwell with Dignity. She’s driving force behind the work these women are doing.

“We do interiors for families who’ve been previously homeless,” Robison says.

Dwell with Dignity started in 2009. In the beginning, it was only Robison and her friend Kim Turner. Now, the organization has a bevy of volunteers and recruits interior designers, like Terica Cunningham, to create living spaces that change lives.

“This is very rewarding work, and it’s my job to work with families to ensure we create a place they want to live,” Cunningham says.

Robison agrees. She says the place where you lay your head at night plays a role in what you think you can accomplish.

“Your environment is transformative,” Robison says. “It informs who you are. And it allows you to express what you think you can do in the world.”

Learn More

See Dwell With Dignity's work and read a Q&A with Robison in the latest Artist Spotlight from Art&Seek.

Hady Mawajdeh has been a reporter, producer, and digital editor at KERA since 2016. He is the creator and the co-host of KERA's first narrative podcast, Gun Play. And prior to his work in engagement, he also reported on arts and culture, social justice, and gun rights for the newsroom.