Design Hope is the kind of architecture that tears down walls.

It is an architecture of people and caring and giving, and what it builds mostly are ideas. Ideas and images. And hope.

No, you can't live in an idea of a home or an image of it or take shelter in a song. But people who find themselves in circumstances, on the outside of our walls, in the cold, may find some warmth in the spaces that the artists, musicians and architects who participate in Design Hope help open up in the minds and eyes and wallets and schedules of the rest of us.

This is what Design Hope has been doing for eight years now. It asks area architects, artists and musicians to riff on what home means, what shelter is, in its various connotations and metaphorical associations. They make often whimsical models of homes, sculptures, paintings, prints, drawings.

Those pieces are auctioned off at a big gala, which this year is happening next Friday, Dec. 5, starting at 7 p.m., at 270 Sherman St. N. in what used to be known as the Imperial Cotton Centre.

The musicians of Design Hope, for their part, put together a CD of their songs. This year, the CD is called Under Angels. And the money from the sale of those CDs and from the auction all go to support the work of Sister Carole Anne's Hamilton Out of The Cold Program.

The Out of the Cold program gets churches to open their doors overnight to provide a place to sleep for homeless people during the coldest months. People who avail themselves of the program get an afternoon soup, a dinner, a breakfast in the morning and a bag lunch to take with them when they leave. They are also given toiletries, socks and underwear, as they so need.

The whole thing grew simply enough out of one family's tradition of building gingerbread houses around Christmas time. Dundas teacher and community activist Cheryl Paterson saw a fit for her small tradition within the larger picture.

Her husband Chris Harrison is an architect, and together they took this idea to his firm, Vermeulen Hind Architects in Dundas. The architects there made maquettes and models, some of them playfully based on famous buildings, like Frank Lloyd Wright's Falling Water. These were their "gingerbread houses."

Now, eight years later, Design Hope has raised $225,000 for Out of the Cold, produced some terrific art work and music, and has given birth to babies -- there is now a Design Hope not only in Toronto, but in Peel Region as well.

In fact, the Peel Region Design Hope is sending three Peel artists to do a live performance art piece at the Hamilton gala auction on the 5th. They will build up art on three canvases, each improvising on each other's.

And this year, for the first time, the CD launch party is being combined with the art auction. In previous years, the launch was a separate event.

Last year, between the music and the art, Design Hope raised a record $55,000. But it's not just about the money.

People attend the gala, or even just hear about it, and are so swept up in the feeling of the project, because, really, it is quite something. And so they volunteer.

Simon Geoghegan has been working the kitchen at Central Presbyterian in Hamilton for two and a half years now. (He also happens to be on the Design Hope executive.)

A leadership coach and partner in his own business, Epiphany! Coaches, Geoghegan says he can't quite explain what drove him to volunteer.

"I couldn't tell you exactly why," says Geoghegan. "Giving back was the motivation, but it was more than that. It was something I just felt so passionate about. I wanted to do something front line."

It was something that seemed to take hold of him. And he says it has been an incredible experience -- the camaraderie, the sense of larger community and, of course, the presence of the indomitable Sister Carole Anne.

Some of the artists and musicians also volunteer at the churches but whether they do or not, they all give of themselves and their time and their talent by providing the lifeblood of Design Hope -- the compelling beauty of their work.

All of the Design Hope art pieces are available for preview at the Carnegie Gallery, 10 King St. W. in Dundas until Dec. 4.

Under Angels, the Design Hope CD, features Liam Titcomb, Hailey and Ariana Gillis, Jacob Moon, Jeremy Zeyl, Steve Strongman, Lisa Winn, Jamie Oakes, Jeremy Fisher, Harrison Kennedy, Michelle Titian, Tim Laidman, Mary Simon and Tomi Swick.

The CD is available at retail stores, at The Hamilton Spectator, and will be on sale at 270 Sherman Ave. N. on the night of the gala auction and CD launch.

Some of the musicians on the CD will be performing live at the auction and launch.

Admission to the event on Dec. 5 is $10 or pay what you can.

Robert Diemert and Evelyn Kelch

This husband and wife teamed up for the side table they contributed to Design Hope.

"Using the idea of the 'gift' of shelter and the material of birch plywood, our piece evokes both a tree, in the negative space, and the shape of a partially folded, one-piece fold and tuck gift box," says Kelch.

She is an artist and designer and he is a furniture-maker, who also teaches in the furniture program at Sheridan College.

Lorraine Roy

Lorraine Roy, a Dundas textile artist, is providing a piece for Design Hope for the second time. She did one two years ago and was about to say no for this year because of time constraints but then reconsidered because she had a piece on the go that she felt tied in so well.

"It's of a Mennonite barn and everything seemed to come together with it. A barn is a kind of shelter, not a home exactly but a kind of home, and it related to my childhood. I grew up on a farm in Pain Court near Chatham.

"It was a really great childhood and I have good memories of playing in the barn, which was a special place."

It's done as a kind of fabric art, which she calls collage with net. It grew out of her work with hand embroidery.

Judi Burgess

Judi Burgess has wanted to contribute art to Design Hope in the past but this year's submission is her first.

"It's such a good cause," says Burgess. "I made a set of functional tea, coffee, and sugar containers. I thought it was kind of appropriate. These foods are so taken for granted and everyday that we forget they're kind of luxury items."

And yet they are so strongly associated with ideas of comfort, home, kitchen and family that they are kind of essential.

The containers are painted over with animal symbols -- the fish for food, the turtle for shelter and security, and the dove for peace and comfort, Burgess explains.

Gord Leverton

This is Gord Leverton's first year doing a piece for Design Hope.

"It's a project I support and a lot of my work is inspired by urban space. It's a kind of semi-abstract inspired by city laneways and back alley" and the buildings that rise up around them.

"I'm exploring space and colour as well as the idea of practical living space."

jmahoney@thespec.com

905-526-3306