Set into the side of a hill fronting Clifton’s Rawson Woods Park, the newest addition to the Cincinnati Innovation District is likely a first for the city’s startup ecosystem.
The so-called “Boulter House," located at 1 Rawson Woods Circle and designed by famed American architect Frank Lloyd Wright, will serve as an “innovators in residence” program and more for Lightship Foundation, the nonprofit founded last year by entrepreneur Candice Matthews Brackeen, who also serves as the general partner of local venture capital firm Lightship Capital.
Check out the slideshow above for an inside look.
Standing inside the property last week, Matthews Brackeen said she envisions Boulter House as a host site for underrepresented artists and entrepreneurs. A place from which founders new to town can get their bearings.
“I don’t think anything like this exists (in Cincinnati),” she said.
In many ways, the concept mirrors Miami’s famed Fountainhead, an art residency open to folks from around the globe. Fountainhead provides time and space for artists to get to know the city, offers mentorship and access to area art patrons and more.
Day-to-day, she said Boulter House will house similar activities, including residencies and Lightship’s bootcamp program, for early-stage business founders. The goal is to offer a space for underrepresented students, artists, architectural designers and entrepreneurs — for free.
“This is our giveback to the community,” Matthews Brackeen said. “This offers folks a soft landing in Cincinnati, a place where they can get acquainted with town — it’s hard to do that from a hotel for two days. It can be a space for artists to come work or for founders or students to have great conversations.”
It’s one of two new properties in the Cincinnati Innovation District, formally added last week during a high-powered news conference at the 1819 Innovation Hub headlined by top officials from the city and state, including Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, Lt. Gov. Jon Husted, JobsOhio President and CEO J.P. Nauseef.
The Cincinnati Innovation District, an ecosystem anchored by University of Cincinnati and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, currently includes the 1819 Innovation Hub, the under-construction Digital Futures Building, the Uptown Innovation Corridor and more. It was officially unveiled by DeWine and Husted and JobsOhio in March 2020.
Matthews Brackeen and her husband Brian Brackeen, who also serves as general partner for Lightship Capital, purchased the Boulter House for $519,000 in March, per Hamilton County property records.
The other property, “the Beacon,” at 121 E. McMillan, will house Lightship Foundation’s new headquarters when it opens late next year. The University of Cincinnati plans to purchase the 121,000-square-foot building following a one-year lease, making an $11 million investment. JobsOhio has pledged another $1 million to help fund the Beacon’s build out.
The Boulter House is also a renovation-in-progress, although at a smaller scale. Named for its original owners, Cedric G. and Patricia Neils Boulter, who commissioned the build in the 1950s, the two-story home features four dormitory-style bedrooms upstairs and another off a dining room on the main level, which was later built as an addition.
Most of the furniture is original to the home and was designed by Wright. Matthews Brackeen said the original plans, along with several books about the architect’s life, were also left behind.
It was either fate or complete happenstance that the property ended up in the Brackeens’ possession. Matthews Brackeen said they first came across the Boulter house in April 2020, during one of their walks around their Clifton neighborhood.
The home, listed the National Register of Historic Places since 1999, had been boarded up due to a small house fire inside. “Out of sheer nosiness,” Matthews Brackeen said, the couple promptly looked it up on the auditor’s website. Brook Smith was listed as its owner.
“He lived in Louisville, so we put it out of our minds,” she said. “We figured we would never hear about this guy again.”
A month later, Brian Brackeen got a call from Endeavor Louisville, an entrepreneurial support organization. Endeavor wanted him to serve on its board, so Brian Brackeen set up interviews to meet with the team. Endeavor’s chairman at the time, turns out, was no other than Brook Smith.
The rest, as they say, is history.
"They’ve having their conversation, and (Brian) goes, ‘Do you own a Frank Lloyd Wright (home) in Cincinnati?’” Matthews Brackeen said. “Smith said to send over a proposal, and we frantically spent an entire weekend jamming out what we would do with the space.”
Boulter House will welcome its first entrepreneur, Kare Mobile CEO, Dr. Kwane Watson, starting Nov. 1. Watson is relocating Kare, a mobile dentistry provider that serves under-represented communities, from Louisville to Cincinnati.
It’s one of a handful of Lightship portfolio companies Matthews Brackeen hopes to lure to town. Another, Femi Secrets, a feminine care startup based in Atlanta, will bring its contract manufacturing stateside to Cincinnati in 2022, she said.
“I’d love to see this home alive,” she said.
