In a Nutshell
What: Founded to empower teen parents through education, resources, and support, nonprofit Rosemary’s Babies Company overcame a myriad of obstacles to open Holloway House & Resource Center, where the organization will provide transitional housing and wraparound support in a safe and supportive environment that enables clients to achieve self-sufficiency.
Sectors: Youth Services, Housing
Location: Cincinnati, OH (Avondale)
Size: 6,900 square feet
Cost: $1.5 million
Funding and Financing Sources: City of Cincinnati, State of Ohio, Corporate Partners, Private Foundations, Individual Donors
IFF Support: $900,000 loan closed in December 2022
IFF Staff Lead: Kelly Cook, director of underwriting – Eastern Region
Design: Moody Nolan
Construction Team: TriVersity Construction, KLH Engineers, Bertke Electric, Silko Fire & Security
Impact: Seven transitional housing units created, 10 jobs created
Rosemary Oglesby-Henry’s life changed at age 16. A junior in high school, she learned she was pregnant and soon found herself in an isolating reality marked by financial strain, housing insecurity, and gnawing uncertainty about how to build a stable life for her daughter. Rather than becoming paralyzed by these challenges, however, Oglesby-Henry got to work. First finding a full-time job with the U.S. Postal Service, she then earned associate, bachelor’s, and master’s degrees over an eight-year period. While Oglesby-Henry’s primary motivation was to set a positive example for her daughter and instill in her the importance of overcoming challenges, the experience also set the stage for a far more rewarding career.
While working on a class project in her master’s program, Oglesby-Henry began researching evidence-based approaches to support teen parents that faced similar challenges to hers. Using what she learned, along with her own experience, Oglesby founded Rosemary’s Babies Company (RBC) in 2016 to help young people in Cincinnati avoid the hardships she endured while navigating teen parenthood by providing a mix of education, resources, and support.
Since then, RBC has helped more than 2,000 teen parents build a stronger foundation in life, and the organization is poised to greatly expand its capacity with the grand opening later this month of Holloway House & Resource Center in Cincinnati’s Avondale neighborhood. Having launched the organization in a 450-square-foot office space that Oglesby-Henry paid for out of pocket, then moving several years later to a facility that was eventually expanded to 1,900 square feet, Holloway House represents an exponential leap forward for RBC. With 6,900 square feet of newly renovated space designed to support the organization’s programming, Holloway House will serve as RBC’s primary facility as the nonprofit continues to operate a children’s playspace in its previous headquarters.
“I know firsthand that there aren’t many resources available to teen parents to help them build life skills as they transition from child to parent, and I’ve always wanted to provide the support that I wished I’d had,” says Oglesby-Henry. “When you provide the right support and resources, you’re not just helping them overcome obstacles; you’re empowering them to break cycles, build legacies, and create a ripple effect of positive change for generations to come.”
“The teens will be challenged to learn and grow while they’re at Holloway House, but the building will also send a message to them that they’re deserving of a place like this and capable of persevering and achieving greatness.”
Among the most impactful components of Holloway House are seven independent living spaces to provide transitional housing for moms and their babies for up to two years. Roughly one-third of the teen parents served by RBC are housing insecure or living in a dangerous situation, and no emergency shelters in Cincinnati are equipped to accommodate infants. Holloway House will ensure that teen mothers without suitable housing have a safe place to live while accessing educational resources, workforce development services, parenting classes, financial literacy programming, and other on-site resources.
In addition to transitional housing, Holloway House includes a STEAM lab and media center to close the “digital divide,” a library, two full kitchens, an outdoor play area and garden landscaped by the Cincinnati Zoo, multiple rooms for children’s learning and enrichment, dedicated space for parenting education and trauma-informed counseling, a “confidant care” space for teens, a spa room, podcast studio, administrative space for RBC partners providing services in the facility, offices for RBC’s staff, and more. The goal is to provide teen parents not just with a place to stay, but a supportive environment that helps them become self-sufficient.
“Bringing the housing and resources for teen parents together under one roof hasn’t been done in Cincinnati before, and it’s been heart wrenching that nobody ever stood up and created something like this for teen parents,” says Oglesby-Henry. “The teens will be challenged to learn and grow while they’re at Holloway House, but the building will also send a message to them that they’re deserving of a place like this and capable of persevering and achieving greatness.”
Perseverance pays off with Holloway House
The fact that Holloway House exists at all is a valuable lesson to the young people RBC serves about the importance of perseverance. After a lengthy search for a suitable property to renovate, RBC identified an opportunity to purchase a historic mansion from the Hamilton County Landbank at the Port. First, however, Oglesby-Henry and RBC had to overcome significant resistance from neighbors who objected to the proposed plans for the blighted property. Compounding the challenge was Oglesby-Henry’s lack of development experience, which was weaponized by project opponents in an attempt to derail the sale. Fortuitously, local media coverage of RBC’s plans prompted Mel Gravely, the former CEO of Cincinnati-based TriVersity Construction and a one-time teen parent, to contact Oglesby-Henry with an offer to help RBC plan for the overhaul of the 120-year-old building.
“They walked me through the process and covered all of the important components of a project like the one we envisioned for Holloway House, including budgeting and design,” recalls Oglesby-Henry. “After that, KLH Engineers gave us a grant and came aboard to help us understand mechanical systems and electrical engineering, and Moody Nolan also got behind the project for help with architecture. These are conglomerates, and it was very heartwarming that they lent their support and made sure I understood what it would involve to get the project done.”
With clearly defined plans for Holloway House, as well as $1 million raised over a six-month period that demonstrated the organization’s financial capacity, RBC overcame resistance to the project and completed the acquisition with the help of a $900,000 capital campaign bridge loan from IFF. Additional funding for the $1.5 million project was provided by the City of Cincinnati, the State of Ohio, and a variety of corporate partners, private foundations, and individual donors.
“The question I’ve always challenged myself with over the years has been, ‘is the sacrifice worth the reward?’ In Holloway House’s case, the answer to that is very clear. This project is going to help so many young people move forward with their lives, and Holloway House is a place that’s going to make them feel safe, loved, and appreciated.
Though TriVersity provided RBC with invaluable support earlier in the development process, the firm was unable to serve as the general contractor by the time construction was set to begin. This presented another hurdle for RBC, forcing the organization to secure a new general contractor. The nonprofit was able to do so on short notice, enabling renovations to Holloway House to begin in November 2022, but it became apparent over the next 12 months that the quality of work wasn’t aligned with RBC’s expectations. Because IFF’s loan required a payment performance bond to ensure that construction was completed as outlined in RBC’s contract with the general contractor, the nonprofit was able to part ways with the contractor without losing all of the money invested in the project up to that point.
“The contingencies that IFF required put us in a position to terminate the relationship without breaching our contract,” explains Oglesby-Henry. “It felt like we failed when we had to pivot a year into construction, but we learned a lot through the experience. Personally, it helped me transition from a founder who was passionate about the cause to a CEO who could lead the organization into the future.”
With Oglesby-Henry and several other RBC staff and volunteers overseeing a team of subcontractors tasked with completing Holloway House, the project was completed early this year, and a hard-earned certificate of occupancy for the renovated facility was issued in early February. Having worked for years to make Holloway House a reality and being forced to adjust course repeatedly, Oglesby-Henry can’t help but reflect on the journey she and RBC have traversed and the impact of pushing through barriers in service to the teens and children they serve.
“The question I’ve always challenged myself with over the years has been, ‘is the sacrifice worth the reward?’” says Oglesby-Henry. “In Holloway House’s case, the answer to that is very clear. This project is going to help so many young people move forward with their lives, and Holloway House is a place that’s going to make them feel safe, loved, and appreciated. It’s also going to serve as an example for them of the barriers that you have to push past to achieve your goals.”
