‘Turning four bare walls into a home’
Homeless mother gets new start with TV-style home makeover
As Sheronna Ragin-Winters stood against the wall outside the door of her South Side apartment, she stopped to catch her breath. There was still so much to process: Just three weeks before, she and her teenage son had been homeless. Just that morning, in fact, their new apartment had been almost empty.
When their front door swung open to reveal a transformed living room, the multicolored “Welcome Home” banner slung across it took on new meaning.
Across from the entry point was the centerpiece of the room: a velvet, slate gray couch, covered by a faux fur blanket, and purple and canary yellow pillows. A custom canvas painting and coordinating floor-length drapes accented the room, with a bold black-and-white striped rug completing the chic aesthetic. Photographs, coasters, flowers, books and candles completed the room.
“Oh my God! Wow!” Ragin-Winters exclaimed, mouth agape, as she circled the room. Then, she paused. Face scrunched, head lowered, she clenched her chest as an ocean of tears flowed down her cheeks.
“Thank you guys so much,” she bellowed between sniffles. And there were still four more rooms to be revealed.
Before moving into her new apartment, RaginWinters, struggling to make ends meet, was homeless in Chicago for approximately two years. She often found shelter for the night in her car, or if she was lucky enough, on the couches, floors or beds of friends and family. She was able to secure an apartment with the help of a caseworker from Catholic Charities, who later referred RaginWinters to Humble Design, the company that fully furnished her apartment — no strings attached.
Humble Design, which was founded in Detroit, then later expanded to Chicago in 2016, is a nonprofit that provides fully furnished spaces to people emerging from homelessness by using donated local housewares and furniture.
“We’re connecting people that have with those who are struggling and starting over,” said Kristin Drutchas, director of Humble Design Chicago, which has helped more than 100 local families so far — most of them single women with children. “We pull together communities and get people literally up off the floor and moving forward in life.”
Drutchas said 99 percent of the families whose homes they’ve furnished in Chicago and Detroit have not returned to homelessness. “By turning four bare walls into a home, into something to fight for and hold on to, a base, people are staying housed,” she said.
Before Humble Design came, Ragin-Winters and her son, 13, moved into their new apartment with two air mattresses, superstore bed sets, and two blue bins for storage. A set of pots and pans from her grandmother came in the mail later as a housewarming present; other family members and friends bought them a microwave and two small TVs.
Despite their sparse surroundings, Ragin-Winters and her son were content with their portion, she said, especially after not being settled in a home of their own.
A series of events — a separation and divorce; two interstate moves; a loss of her job — led Ragin-Winters and her son to a yearlong stay in a shelter, six-month stints in apartments, and bouncing among houses of friends and family.
“It was beyond hurt; it made me feel angry,” says Ragin-Winters of the unstable time. “I felt betrayed. It was like everyone was judging me in my situation and asking me, ‘Well, how did you get here?’” It was just questions after questions, like whatever I was enduring was my fault.”
But Ragin-Winters received a promising phone call when she was at a low point, sleeping in her car. A friend told her about an organization that quickly helps with housing placement and rental assistance. Ragin-Winters made a call to Southwest Chicago Homeless Services, went through an intake process, was deemed “priority” since she was living in her car, and within two weeks, she got a call from a caseworker from Catholic Charities, she said. Within a couple of days, her caseworker had found an apartment for Ragin-Winters, who is paying 10 percent of the rent.
“It happened so fast,” said Ragin-Winters. “Then (my caseworker) said she wanted to refer me to this interior design company called Humble Design. She said, ‘I’m not certain if they’ll pick you or not, but I can give you a referral. … I think that you’re worth it.’”
Humble Design works closely with caseworkers to identify families who are coming out of a homeless scenario and are on their way to a better life, Drutchas explained. RaginWinters was working the entire time she was homeless, and also managing various health issues.
“I always say that what people think of as a success story — the, ‘Oh, hey, this family got a house, yay, they’re going to move forward’ — people don’t realize these families are moving in with nothing, and they’re living on the floor,” Drutchas said. “The last thing they have is extra money for furnishings; meanwhile the resources throughout Chicagoland are enormous.”
Jill Pable, a professor in the department of interior architecture and design at Florida State University, has researched how design can help people in crisis, particularly those who are homeless. She believes that a person’s environment contributes to overall health and welfare.
“I think the need for people to retain their dignity and regain or maintain their self-esteem is great,” said Pable, who also runs Design Resources for Homelessness, a nonprofit that provides research to those designing shelters or permanent supportive housing. “The physical place where we live, work and play is very supportive of that dignity and selfesteem. Any means we can provide people to maintain their identity is a good thing.”
But Pable acknowledged that it’s hard to know whether the presence of home furnishings can reduce a family’s chance of returning to homelessness.
“It’s difficult to isolate this away from the whole complexity of what causes homelessness,” she said, “because homelessness is so wrapped in poverty, crime, gender and racial disparities. But I think we can say that a properly furnished apartment is certainly going to help, rather than hurt.”
Humble Design offers full design services, with a usual furnishing taking four to five days from start to finish. The process begins with an initial interview with a family, then the Humble Design team pulls furniture from its warehouse and sets up the house in one day.
“We don’t just provide the larger furniture pieces like a bed, a sofa, a dresser,” said Drutchas, “we provide an extreme makeover on a dime to get them started again.”
At her initial interview, Ragin-Winters, a lively woman who loves all things girly and glam, told Drutchas and the two designers she wanted a Tiffany & Co.-themed bedroom and a vanity set in her room, and purple “with a hint of canary yellow” in the living room.
The Humble Design team blew her away with the finished product.
“It was way more than what I expected,” said Ragin-Winters. “And it makes us feel like we’re actually in a home and just gives us the feeling of knowing you are worthy of having decent things.”
Ragin-Winters said her circumstances left her feeling depressed and like a lost cause. She was fearful of never having joy again and that her son would grow up hating her. With this new start, Ragin-Winters is relieved that “a lot of the chaos has been alleviated.” Now, she can freely focus on saving her money to take over the full lease and helping her son finish middle school strong.
“It’s a ray of light,” she said. “We have a sense of stability, and we feel safe, most importantly. Our needs are met, and it give us more time to focus on bonding with one another.”