Giles Blunden is a Carrboro, N.C., architect who does green building and cohousing. He designed the 46-home Pacifica Cohousing, incorporating environmental and community values, also in Carrboro.

The ElderSpirit Community for people 55 and older in Abingdon, Va., has a focus on late-life spirituality. Residents also agree to care for one another as they age in a community of mutual support. Dedicated in June 2006, the 38-home community has a core group of former nuns. Catherine Rumschlag is the first resident, Dene […]

Mid-Atlantic Cohousing is a regional clearinghouse for cohousing communities in Washington, D.C., and nearby states. Kevin Oliveau, founder of Catoctin Creek Village in Taylorstown, Va., says a common value for cohousing groups is community. While most cohousing groups are not denominational, many Quakers and Unitarians are drawn to the arrangement.

Nubanusit Neighborhood & Farm in Peterborough, N.H., is a 29-unit cohousing community based on environmental values that includes an organic farm.

MetLife Mature Market Institute in Westport, Conn., conducts research for the insurance giant Metropolitan Life, and knows the demographics of people approaching retirement. Contact Christine Bonney in the company’s New York media relations office.

The Retirement Research Foundation in Chicago promotes elder-friendly communities. It funded a project to replicate the ElderSpirit Community in Abingdon, Va., in other areas and provided some development money for the community. Marilyn Hennessy is president.

Stephen Golant is a geographer at the University of Florida-Gainesville who specializes in gerontology and housing arrangements for senior citizens. He has written or edited more than 100 papers or books on the subject.

Chris ScottHanson is a development consultant with Cohousing Resources, a cohousing consulting firm in Langley, Wash. The firm is working on projects in Massachusetts and Oakland, Calif., and has recently completed consulting for projects in Kansas and Vermont.

Rick Mockler is vice president of CoHousing Partners, a cohousing development firm in Davis, Calif. He has a master’s degree in liberation theology from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley. He lives in Muir Commons, the first new-construction cohousing community in the U.S.