Portland Architecture

Luxurious Dining & Decor at Lucier

At the south end of Riverplace along the Willamette, beside the new Strand Standard condos, sits the new Lucier restaurant, a very high-end dining establishment with a sizable investment in its architecture and interiors. I visited Lucier last week as part of a press lunch. Hopefully it won't seem like I'm writing this post in exchange for the complimentary striped bass carpaccio with slivered foie gras, which was one of about ten different small plates we had over a four hour meal.

(I particularly recommend the delicious Michima Ranch Ribeye and the Spring Pea Risotto, but maybe that's me. The chef has an obsession, by the way, with micro greens and veggies. Gordon Ramsay would say that's very 1990s.)

The exterior, like the Strand condos, is designed by Ankrom Moisan Associated Architects. It's got floor to ceiling glass and a slanted flat roof that makes it feel a bit like a ship. The back portion also has a wood-paneled curvy cube. The restaurant's 7,600 square foot interior was designed by New York firm Alvarez + Brock, which also designed Le Cirque. The press release has this to say about their design:

"One-of-a-kind features within Lucier include a marble wall milled with abstract swimming designs, a shimmering indoor canal lined with iridescent gold tiles, oversized chandeliers made from bronze tubes of varying heights, hand blown glass sculptures by local artists and a diamond-faceted metal dome meant to replicate the peaks of Mount Hood."

Being inside, I marveled at the beauty of the materials and design, especially the hanging chandeliers made from hundreds of individually hanging tubes that undulate gently. There's even a small waterway that meanders like a creek through the restaurant floor. And that gold dome is something else too, although it separates the bartender from bar patrons, which seems like an unwise move. Still, virtually every surface in this place is made of a luxurious material. It's very impressive, although some might say it also borders on the ridiculous. Will Oregonians go for it?

Obviously Portland like any big city has some affluent types who will flock here, as will others for their prom night or once-a-year birthday dinner at a destination restaurant. It's not Lucier's responsibility to craft their own demographic, of course. It'll be interesting to see how such a fancy place fares, but you've got to admit there aren't many riverfront restaurants except for a satellite of the Newport Bay chain plopped on the water a few feet away from Lucier. Call me crazy, but I don't think of these two as direct competitors.

Although this is possibly the swankiest restaurant I've ever been inside (at least in Portland), I found it curious to know that the proprietor, Chris Dussin, got his start founding the Old Spaghetti Factory and later Fenouil in the Pearl District, while his grandfather started that downtown hipster-stronghold of a watering hole, the Virginia Cafe. Lucier is of course most like Fenouil, both of which have a bit of a corporate feel despite the luxury.

Visiting Lucier (which is named for Etienne Lucier, the man who started Oregon's first independent farm), one also is inspired to ponder what the other most impressive restaurant interiors in Portland may be. We're certainly not the kings of high style with a culture that favors Birkenstocks and shorts, and many of the best restaurants here keep their style unpretentious. That's even more so now with the current generation of fine dining establishments, where often there cement floors to go with your Kobe beef. The first place that comes to mind as an impressive, luxurious restaurant space, though, is definitely the Allied Works-designed Bluehour. What other ones am I forgetting?

No Ordinary Boathouse: Mulvanny G2 Unveils Waterfront Portland City Storage

It was over a year ago that developer Derek Hanna announced plans for a unique dry boat-storage structure shaped like a long cylindrical tower overlooking the Willamette from a riverside spot just south of OMSI on the east bank. The single-tower was a mere rendering based on a German auto storage tower by the Palis company. Now, Hanna's architects at Mulvanny G2 in Portland have revealed the real design.

It's not a single tower anymore, but Portland City Storage has the opportunity to occupy a very prominent if not iconic position along the waterfront. Meeting yesterday with lead designer Eric Cugnart of MG2 (lead designer of the Adidas Village and One Waterfront Place for BOORA before switching firms) as well as principals John Flynn and Gary Larson, I learned the 350-boat facility's design has gone through five or six iterations. "We sort of discovered the program as we went," Flynn told me. The project now consists of two towers, with the front of each tower set back at the front corner.

Cugnart is particularly proficient when it comes to facades, such as the colorful Adidas design and some work for BOORA on the Hatfield US Courthouse. For this project, the budget was much lower. It's also a transitional building between industrial warehouses and something more ambitiously architectural. The Portland City Storage boat storage buildings will be clad in a transparent polycarbonate and layers corrugated translucent fiberglass. For the most part, the structures will be translucent but not transparent. But there will also be glass portions that allow viewers to peek inside at the boats stacked about 100 feet high on several levels with a giant forklift. Larson cited a building by the great Herzog & De Meuron for a dance company in London as an inspiration, with its "partial revelation" of the goings-on inside, which will also include office spaces and a cafe.

The project is also shooting for a Gold LEED rating and one of its distinguishing features is a series of vertical wind turbines and hopes to achieve a "net-zero" energy metering. The project also will harvest its own rainwater to save 20,000 gallons of potable water per month, which will also be a visible part of the project as the two cut-out portions of the front facade will feature collecting pools for the rainwater that recall the upcoming World Trade Center memorial, "Reflecting Absence". It's also much better environmentally for the Willamette River to not have these boats rusting and leaking away in the water.

Also noteworthy is that the river's greenway trail will be continued to cross the storage buildings at the front in an elevated path overlooking the river. The boat launch will be directly underneath the elevated path, so you can stand there and watch the boats slipped down mechanically.

There are other large boat-storage facilities throughout the United States, but this project is unique in how it's also a real work of architecture that people and not just boats will occupy. It will be situated beside the Ross Island Bridge (just across from the undeveloped area north of South Waterfront) between Ross Island Sand & Gravel to the south with the Portland Opera headquarters (formerly KPTV studios) and OMSI to the north. Groundbreaking is expected for this summer with complete buildout in summer 2010.

Casey Becomes First LEED Platinum Condo

The Casey Condominiums in the Pearl District have been certified by the US Green Building Council at the top 'platinum' level of LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design). That makes the Gerding Edlen-developed, GBD Architects designed building the first high-rise condominium residence in the country to reach this highest standard of green building.

This is Gerding and GBD's third LEED platinum project, following the Gerding Theater (the nation’s first platinum historic renovation and performing arts center), and Oregon Health Science University’s Center for Health & Healing (the nation’s first and largest LEED platinum medical office building). Gerding Edlen also has 38 LEED projects in its portfolio, more than any other developer in the country.

The Casey achieved all of the 55 LEED credits it applied for, exceeding the 52 required for platinum. The building incorporates reduced usage of fossil fuels; sustainable, regional, renewable and low-VOC materials; water-efficient fixtures and appliances; glazing to reduce glare and heat gain; an eco-roof for storm water management and to reduce the heat island effect; efficient mechanical equipment; a solar PV system to provide renewable energy to the building; and ERVs (Energy Recovery Ventilators) in each unit that recover exhausted (waste) heat and use it to preheat incoming fresh air. These features are expected to achieve a 52 percent energy savings over a code-compliant building.

The Casey is also one of three high-rises across the country participating in a pilot Energy Star for High Rise Multifamily Building rating system.  Multifamily high-rise structures are a unique hybrid of residential and commercial, and currently have no clear methodology for establishing high performance under the Energy Star labeling program. The Energy Trust of Oregon, which is coordinating the pilot rating system on behalf of the EPA, is using the Casey to inform the development of this new standard.

The Portland Mercury's Matt Davis once called the sight of The Casey's colorful precast panels "puke curry". But it's got matchless green qualities, and it's also a wonderful precedent for Pearl condos to be built on a quarter-block. It's not necessarily my favorite visually, but I'd withhold any comments about Indian food or gastro-intestinal problems. Architecture also needs a lot more color. And I think The Casey still looks better than most Portland condos in large part because of this quarter-block scale, which proportionally seems favorable to most half-block or full-block behemoths out there.

Congrats to Gerding and GBD on another piece of platinum for their mantle.

Emmons Architects' Deschutes Brewery and the Magic of Chainsaw Art

Last week at architect Stuart Emmons' invitation I visited the new Deschutes Brewery brew pub on Southwest 11th Avenue near the Brewery Blocks. The building was a familiar one: the former Jim Stevens Auto Body building, where my car was repaired a few years ago after being hit by a Tri-Met bus. I was very happy with the body work, but I think most people will get more out of this building now that Deschutes is here. The pub is right next door to Portland Center Stage's Gerding Theater at the Armory, so this would make an ideal pre- or post-theater stop. (As would, admittedly, any number of other nearby outlets from Sushiland to Henry's Tavern to Pizza Schmizza.)

The goal, Emmons says, was to create a brewpub that was in between two other local pubs' styles: the sleekness of Holst Architecture's Bridgeport brewpub remodel and the homey, lived in quality of McMenamins' approximately 10,000 local pubs. And inside, that's how it seemed. You could tell there was a real architect behind the design in terms of the spatial arrangements. There is lots of character to the place, but I had a sense of the vast wide open space being divided into a series of room-like smaller spaces without the overall sense of light and vastness being taken away.

There was also a lot of fun had on this project in terms of textures and accoutrements. Numerous light fixtures are of the vintage, wrought-iron variety. Like a salon-style art gallery show or the tons of mirrors on the walls at traditional French brasseries, Deschutes is covered with tons of gilded frames, some with historic photos of the building and Portland, others with kitschy drawings and artifacts. What I particularly enjoyed was how even the air ducts were enclosed in gilded frames at their wall openings. There is also lots of raw Douglas fir used throughout the space to give it an appropriately rustic feeling without seeming chintzy. This brewpub feels new, but lived in.

The best part of the new Deschutes brewpub, though -- besides their copious supply of Mirror Pond ale -- may be the cornucopia of chain saw carvings on the entry to each dining room. Emmons tells me the artist works without any drawings or guide; he merely creates with his chainsaw in an impromptu fashion the array of owls, goats and other wildlife. I can't say it's the most sophisticated, refined sculpture I've ever encountered. But God help me: I love it. There are actually some pretty delicate, artful carvings to these chainsaw works. Maybe next the guy could do a chainsaw Portlandia, or perhaps a statue of Tom Potter as a going away present.

Meanwhile, look for Emmons Architects to have an increased presence in town. Educated at Harvard's Graduate School of Design, Stuart has long been one of the better architects in town; his Fire Station 1 design competition entry with Hennebery Eddy was terrific, and now the firm is designing a courthouse in Gresham. Gerding Edlen is actually a co-developer of the Deschutes site; here's hoping Emmons may eventually be designing one of their condos when the market comes back. The Deschutes looks terrific, but Stuart should also be doing bigger better jobs than brewpubs - the brilliance of the accompanying chainsaw art not withstanding. Actually, though, can't you just imagine some of this artwork in the lobby of some ultra-modern condo?

Visiting PNCA's 511 Broadway Building

Today I took a tour of the circa-1916 federal building at 511 NW Broadway that is being taken over by the Pacific Northwest College of Art with the school's president, Tom Manley, and communications director Becca Biggs. The tour was a few minutes late getting started, which actually was good news, because after passing through the security x-ray machines, I was free to peruse the ground floor lobby a little bit on my own.

511 is going to be a magnificent space for PNCA, which was evident as soon as I entered the thin but cavernously high-ceilinged lobby. There is marble everywhere, lots of ornate detailing, and even ceiling panels that have tons of artful workmanship put into them. Upstairs doors and door panels are clad in unpainted stained wood; the doors even have these frosted-glass windows that look they should have the name "Philip Marlowe" stenciled on them. And there is lots and lots of space here. PNCA ought to have plenty of room to grow.

Wherever you go in this building there are wonderful little tarnished gems. It looks pretty drab and dreary right now, of course. The building has federal agency offices upstairs and some Department of Immigration services on the ground floor. The main activity in this grand entrance area, though, is chitchatting between security guards, building maintenance and housekeeping staff. Plenty of working offices still remain here; those were off limits. But there are lots of empty rooms and spaces that we were able to see upstairs - dark places with low ceilings walls that will be removed.

Although this is a historic building to which certain strictures will apply in terms of preserving the original structure, it has already been changed numerous times. I believe originally the building was for the Postal Service. Both on the ground floor and upstairs, there seem to be many, many opportunities to knock down walls and raise ceilings. In fact, to do so would appear to better honor the original architecture than the current interiors do. Over time this grand building was made into somewhat drab offices. But the bones here are incredible. In fact, there's plenty of flesh and skin to go along with it.

While it's a big heavy building that will hold its thermal mass well (staying cool in the summer and warm in the winter), and it can seem imposing from the street with a lack of transparency, this is actually meant to be a building teeming with natural light. There are numerous huge skylights that were actually covered during various renovations; all of which, needless to say, will be made back into skylights.

There is also quite a nice view or, to be more specific, many different view corridors and framed looks at Portland. That includes a rooftop that could someday be a spectacular hangout or party spot, and which my tour guides and I got to glimpse for a few minutes. One side looks down on the post office across Hoyt Street and Union Station just across Broadway, with the Broadway Bridge, the Willamette River, and the Pearl District in the background. The other side looks toward downtown. Even though it's really just some leftover space adjacent to the rooftop mechanical systems, this could be a special little place to have a party or woo a potential donor (or both).

Merely a serviceable renovation of this building as a new building for PNCA would be great news for architecture in Portland on its own. It's got a lot of great stuff to keep. But as previously mentioned, the architect for 511's renovation will be Allied Works and Brad Cloepfil, which makes the notion of a modern building emerging from this dusty, hulk of an old building an extra intriguing one. As Manley and I were walking down a marble back stairway talking about what Allied might do, I said, "This could be Wieden + Kennedy 2." Manley corrected me and said, "No, this building has a lot more to the original than the Wieden + Kennedy building ever did." So it will be interesting to see how Brad and Allied bring the building alive and how much of that is just opening and cleaning it up versus introducing certain material or spacial modernity inside as well.

511 occupies a strange presence, or at least it has until now. It's a wonderful early 20th century work of architecture on one of the more prominent streets in the center of the city. Yet because it's been closed to the public for so long and kept a very discreet profile, it seems a whole generation has gone by without even the architecture enthusiasts and practitioners among us noticing much that the building is really there. In a few years, that's going to change in a big way. And with the post office being vacated, freeing up that land to re-development (although hopefully some of the original building stays), with a MAX line soon to be going nearby, this whole area seems poised to really go through a metamorphosis over the next decade.

Of course the Portland Public Market had also sought 511 Broadway as a home for itself, and I hope there is a place for them in this area. That said, having now been inside this grand old building, I don't see it as a place for a public market with produce and salami and artisan goods for sale. As has been bandied about in the comments following some of my previous posts about this issue, I think a better home for the public market would be the current Greyhound station two blocks east of 511 - contingent, of course, on the bus company's willingness to move. Or if not the Greyhound station, it seems there are a lot of other nearby parcels with potential for the market, which I'll bet a lot of hungry PNCA students would like to patronize, as would the condo residents.

And as I understand it, in addition to PNCA being able to renovate the 511 building itself, the back parking lot is eventually going to be converted to a new segment of the North Park Blocks. The budget doesn't appear to be there for it now, but if the funds were to become available, what kind of landscape architectural wonder might be conjured there, between PNCA and a renovated post office site at the new edge of the Park Blocks?

Congratulations, PNCA. You've just won a landmark of a new home, and then some.

Zooming to A New Art Center

A couple years ago, while attending a Third Angle classical music performance, I met a woman named Carole Zoom and her husband Brett, both recent Eugene transplants. We've stayed in touch since then, which is easy because they're culture vultures who enjoy making it to plays, film screenings and concerts. Brett is also an accomplished journalist who has written frequently about architecture for publications like the Wall Street Journal and Los Angeles Times, for whom he did a nice Thom Mayne profile last year.

Back in Eugene, Carole did something terrific for the local arts community. She bought a building, rented it out (at a reduced rate) to local nonprofit arts organizations as the Midtown Art Center, and then negotiated to sell them the building. (Carole is also an artist and photographer.)

And now, Carole is looking to do the same in Portland. In a recent email she writes:

In Eugene in 2005 I purchased a building with my personal nestegg in order to consolidate eight arts organizations under one roof, allow them shared infrastructure so that they could use more of their money for their missions. The Eugene Ballet took leadership on the nonprofit side and pulled together the tenants for the 14,000 sqare foot building. Our arrangement allowed them reduced rent for 3 years so that they could do a capital campaign to purchase the building from me in 3 years. That building is now used by the Eugene Ballet and seven other arts organizations, and they are purchasing the building from me this summer.

I am searching now for tenants in Portland for a similar set up. My goal is to buy a building in summer large enough for numerous nonprofits to use and work together to raise funds to purchase it from me as their fundraising allows. I am not rich and am not able to give the building to nonprofits, but I want my investment to work for justice in the community.

She wrote me recently asking if I knew of a building that might be suitable. My immediate first thought was the downtown building on SW 10th Avenue with the colored checkerboard panels. It's been vacant for years despite an ideal location; I've heard it's not in great shape, but I still think for the right tenant it could be a real landmark. Carole looked into it, but found the building has been taken off the market. (Does anyone know the story?)

Another thought I had was for Carole to partner with Oregon Ballet Theater to expand their building on Southeast Morrison between Belmont and Morrison, as originally planned several years ago in a Holst Architecture-designed plan. All these years later, OBT is still occupying the same drab old former bank building with nothing to indicate an arts organization is there save for the sign on the side. It's a great location: just a block away from Grand Avenue (where a streetcar line will eventually be) and the Morrison Bridge east terminus, yet with a little bit cheaper real estate than you'd have across the river on the west side. And yet this area is already well on its way to transforming into a denser and more vibrant urban place.

Carole Zoom is no millionaire philanthopist, but it's clear she's ready and able to make this project happen. Her project could end up being some simple conversion of an old building, as was the case in Eugene. But it could also be something more. What site and architect might best work with Carole to provide not only a home for some worthy art nonprofits, but do so in a wonderful package?

I'm afraid I missed writing this post before Carole's informational meeting about the building held last Wednesday. But I will pass on more information from Carole as it becomes available.

PNCA's At It Again: Going From Rent to Own at Cloepfil-Redesigned Goodman Building

It's another week, time for the Pacific Northwest College of Art to secure ownership of major Pearl District real estate at little or no cost. They can't keep it up at this pace, surely, but fresh off the news a few days ago of securing the 511 Broadway building, the school has reached an agreement with the family of the late Edith Goodman, the building's owner, to purchase the school's home since 1997 on an full block between Northwest 12 and 13th Avenues, Johnson and Kearney Streets. The agreement is accompanied by announcement from PNCA of accompanying financial news, summarized thusly (as Alton Brown would say) by DK Row:

The college also publicly launched a historic capital campaign targeting $32 million in pledges by the end of June 2009, when the college celebrates its centennial. The campaign, which has quietly raised $26 million, went public Saturday with the announcement of three lead campaign gifts of $1 million each from PNCA board president Al Solheim, the Harold and Arlene Schnitzer CARE Foundation and the Maybelle Clark MacDonald Fund. The MacDonald donation is a challenge gift, contingent on whether the college raises an additional $3 million.

Renovated a decade ago by Holst Architecture, the Goodman Building has always been a nice environment, I think, particularly its huge open space in the middle. I've been to award ceremonies there, Japanese DJ concerts, a French philosopher's lecture, a design forum, art exhibits, but all the while the renovated old warehouse itself, with its exposed structure and simple white aesthetics, is itself a particularly nice piece of any experience. From an artist's or curator's standpoint in some of the exhibit spaces, maybe there is more that could be done, but I still like the building a lot. And that's before we even talk about the exterior paint job created by Randy Higgins (above), which is a transcription of an Arthur Rimbaud poem into a language of differently sized squares and rectangles.

According to D.K. Row's Oregonian article, Allied Works will oversee design for the $12 million "light" (says PNCA) re-renovation. That's on top of Brad Cloepfil's firm already being selected by PNCA for the 511 Broadway building (pictured at left). So in effect, for all of the huge commissions that Allied has received over the past several years, for art museums in St. Louis, New York, Seattle, Ann Arbor and Denver, not to mention the Wieden & Kennedy job before those, PNCA will be the Cloepfil client with repeat business for his firm. And though it may not be for a few years, I'm betting PNCA isn't done acquiring buildings with these two, wonderful a foundation (pardon the pun) as they may be. How about a ground-up building for PNCA on some of the post office's surface parking lot in the back? Or perhaps something further north, out by the Fremont Bridge and Centennial Mill?

Artist Hub on 82nd: Visiting Milepost 5

If developers Ted Gilbert and Beam Development, the architects at Works Partnership and creative director Gavin Shettler have anything to say about it, 82nd Avenue in Portland may no longer be seen as the armpit of Portland with its an unpleasant melange of traffic, big-box chain stores and prostitutes.

Recently I made the trek out to 82nd near Burnside to see Milepost 5, an ambitious but welcome live-work development intended for artists and other creative types. The  development consists of two renovated buildings: a new just completed structure designed by Works that consists of for-sale loft condos and work space, and a to-be-renovated old brick retirement home next door, Baptist Manor, that will offer rental units to live and work in. Both the old and new structures will also endeavor to create a strong sense of community and collaboration.

The completed building by Works provides the best eye candy, and it's where I'd want to live. But older Manor building has lots of spaces with tremendous potential, such as a huge industrial-sized kitchen, and immediately adjacent to it a former church sanctuary, complete with pews, that would make a terrific screening room. There's also a wrap-around courtyard that the kitchen looks out onto, which would make a great restaurant with outdoor seating.

I don't think a painting or sculpture is required as proof when one signs the lease or mortgage agreement, but it's easy to imagine a group of young, creative people here -- some staying for many years and others just passing through. Most of the for-sale units are somewhat affordable, too. A 443-square foot loft spaces starts at $134,995, although naturally it's on the east side of the building, which sits on busy 82nd. Milepost 5 does look out on a lovely park, though. And for those considering such a dwelling but iffy about the location (I sure would be), keep in mind that the place is just a few blocks from the 82nd Avenue Max station.

The hiring of Gavin Shettler, who for the last few years led the nonprofit but now defunct Portland Art Center, is particularly nice to see. Shettler will be exhibiting art in several of the uninhabited units each month, and he'll also organize a lot of other events there. It's great to see him having landed on his feet after the unfortunate PAC closing. Kudos should also go to Gilbert, commissioner Sam Adams and others behind the scene making this happen.

If you move into the for-rent older building, though, where there are 70 years of history as a retirement home, be prepared for the occasional ghost. While Shettler and I toured the space, one room had a locked door and the audible sound of a TV inside. Everyone has long since moved out and there weren't any employees scheduled to work that day. I half expected Jack Nicholson to peek his head through the door and say, "Heeeeerrr's Johnny!" Considering this is an artists' enclave now, I fully expect this to be put to creative purposes.

PDC Board Approves LAB Holding Selection For Centennial Mill

The Portland Development Commission's board of directors has accepted and approved the recommendation of developer LAB Holding for the Centennial Mills project.  It was a unanimous vote and represents the final step in the process of selecting a development team following a recommendation by the Centennial Mills Evaluation Committee and Executive Director Warner. 

“The Centennial Mills site is a key catalytic redevelopment project for both Portland’s waterfront and the North Downtown area,” said PDC Chairman Mark Rosenbaum.  “We are in good hands with LAB Holding and the Board feels confident the company will deliver an extraordinary project for those who work, live and enjoy downtown."

The PDC board received a lot of criticism for going against the recommendation of its evaluation committee on the still-moribound Burnside Bridgehead. You could say they learned from their mistake, but a more accurate answer is probably that they trusted LAB's finances more than the recommended Beam Construction for the Bridgehead job.

Regardless of this decision by the board, a future issue should arguably still be the makeup of that board. The members seem to come much more from financial and business backgrounds than anything related to design. In the long run, whether LAB was the right choice here or not, that's got to change.

With the board's approval, the next step is for PDC and LAB to negotiate a formal Disposition and Development agreement. But the disposition of the economy will surely also figure into when this new Centennial Mills site will really get built.

And for goodness sake, it's past time for LAB and its CEO, Shaheen Sadeghi, to start working not just with PDC, but also to form a real relationship with Hoyt Street Properties, the developer who has built pretty much everything directly across Naito Parkway from the Mills. There's a great deal to figure out about how this isolated site will interconnect with the Pearl, not to mention the as-yet unbuilt northernmost portions of the Pearl near the Fremont Bridge.

Meanwhile, to borrow from 'The Price Is Right' announcer Rod Roddy, Shaheen Sadeghi, come on down!

Kevin Cavenaugh Plans 14-Unit Housing Development By 13 Designers

Over the last several months, one of Portland’s most accomplished designer-developers, Kevin Cavenaugh, has been at Harvard University as part of a Loeb Fellowship, just as then-Oregonian architecture critic Randy Gragg did the prior academic year.

In the past, Cavenaugh has been responsible for the Rocket building on Burnside (the red one with the sunscreen panels featuring individual artworks and Rocket restaurant on top), the Ode to Rose’s mixed use building on Northeast Fremont (a local AIA award winner, with Fife restaurant on the ground floor), and another very successful mixed use project at Southeast 28th and Ankeny housing Noble Rot wine bar. Trained as an architect and previously employed at Fletcher Farr Ayotte, Kevin is not a registered architect and thus it is never his name listed as the architect of record on the documents, but they are definitely his buildings.

I wrote about Kevin a few years ago for a Metropolis magazine story about architects who develop their own projects. “Architects: Looking for the Perfect Client?” the headline asked. “Hire yourself!”

Recently I got a call from Kevin, still back in Cambridge until later this spring. His new project, or projects, would easily be his most ambitious yet.

On a site in Southwest Portland just south of downtown at the corner of Water Avenue and Arthur Street, an ideal location but with difficult hilly terrain, virtually no parking and limited access, Kevin is envisioning having built 14 different housing units – almost all of them by different designers. The details have changed a little bit over the few times we’ve talked and emailed, but I believe the latest would be to have Kevin design two himself, then divide the remaining 12 units equally between six Harvard Graduate School of Design students and six more established architects.

The Harvard students, as I understand it, would be graduating this spring and would probably consist largely of those with whom Kevin has already formed relationships with in lecturing about his plan as part of his Loeb Fellowship presentations. This is the text of a flyer he sent out at Harvard:

...1-WAY TICKET to PORTLAND. I am a Loeb Fellow at Harvard's GSD seeking a few select graduating designers to DESIGN AND BUILD fourteen small parcels with me in downtown Portland, OR. The project will showcase the finest in contemporary urban architecture from the nation's most promising young designers. Starting this summer, each participant will take full control over his/her development. I will help line up bank financing and construction services, but you ultimately you will need YOUR OWN MONEY to secure a loan. I will mentor you through the design and development process, but you will take on both the risks and rewards associated with your project. THIS IS NOT A JOB! 

As for the six established architects, I think that idea is still being hammered out. Kevin and I both agreed that it would be nice to bring in some admired out-of-town designers. Much talent as there is in Portland, I don’t think our design community is challenged much by work in town by out-of-town firms. However, I’d also love to see at least one of those spots reserved for a local. It’s Kevin’s decision, obviously, but I have imagined it being someone with demonstrated high quality residential experience, yet also someone for whom this project would represent a serious opportunity.

Kevin would surely appreciate more ideas about how to shape this process and the ultimate product. What advice might we give this onetime FFA intern who metamorphosed into the most interesting DIY designer-developer in a place already known for just that kind of maverick spirit?

Oh, and is it overly naive to wonder about a bigger developer ever taking on this kind of riskier but potentially far more appealing development?

PDC Evaluation Committee Chooses LAB Holding For Centennial Mills

Late Tuesday afternoon has come word from the Portland Development Commission from its Centennial Mills Evaluation Committee that LAB Holding of Costa Mesa, California is the recommended development team - the winner in a three team race against developers Nitze-Stagen of Seattle and the Cordish Company of Baltimore to turn around this decaying local landmark.

You can read the press release here, but it doesn't say too much yet about the decision. Before reading any comments coming up in Wednesday's papers, I'd assume the less ambitious, and therefore less costly, nature of the LAB proposal weighed in the developers' favor given the downturning economy and so forth. One would assume the Nitze-Stagen proposal finished second. I know The Oregonian's editors and numerous commenters here felt strongly that the Nitze-Stagen proposal, including a design team led by Zimmer Gunsul Frasca, was a good one. I also remember hearing more than one person say they weren't blown away by LAB's proposal in person several days ago. I'm still not completely sure which of these two I favored. Nitze-Stagen and ZGF seemed to have the highest quality plan, but maybe it was a little too ambitious. I'm not necessarily displeased to think that the original Centennial Mills buildings will seemingly be more prominent now that the LAB proposal has been chosen.

What's next? PDC says: "Executive Director Warner will now present the recommendation to the PDC Board of Commissioners at the March 26 Commission Meeting. If the Board approves the recommendation, PDC and LAB Holding, LLC will begin negotiation toward a Disposition and Development Agreement." So speak to the Board or forever hold your peace (except in cyberspace).

Of course as we've learned with projects like Burnside Bridgehead, all this may be moot anyway. We may be several years from seeing something completed there. And if something does get built, the design may change along the way. In fact, that's certain. It's only a question of how much.

In the days ahead, we'll want to look back on this process and whether it was a successful one. How do people feel so far?

One other caveat: It's not a done deal that the PDC board will go along with the evaluation committee's decision. In the case of Burnside Bridgehead, for example, they rejected the decision and went with Opus Northwest over Beam Construction, the latter of which was, if I remember correctly, the committee's recommendation. However, I think it's more likely this time around that the board will agree with the committee, because the board is more apt, as they were with the Bridgehead, to be financially minded -- and the LAB proposal is much less ambitious in terms of what it would ask of public investment and what would be physically built there.

And aside from what was the most appropriate decision for PDC to make given economic and other realities, which plan was best from a pure design standpoint?

PNCA Lands 511 Broadway Building From Feds

The US Department of Education and the General Services Administration have approved the Pacific Northwest College of Art's application to acquire the heretofore federal building at 511 NW Broadway.

This is a big win for PNCA, which will stretch its campus from the Pearl District in to Old Town and, along the way, put a much bigger stamp on Portland's culture. PNCA is quickly becoming the RISD (Rhode Island School of Design) of the West Coast.

The 511 project is also noteworthy in that it could finally provide another opportunity for Brad Cloepfil and Allied Works to participate in a hometown project. Cloepfil has already worked on PNCA's master planning. I mean, why wouldn't they hire him for 511? Besides, 511 could be a similar opportunity to Cloepfil's Wieden + Kennedy building: a historic structure that has a modern, light-filled interior.

This also puts NW Broadway itself on a higher plane in terms of this ugly but important stretch of real estate's future. Some developers have been waiting for a silly one-way couplet on Burnside and Couch to jump-start their projects. (The boarded up Burger King, anyone?) It seems very possible that this street, with the 511 building and the recently opened DeSoto building (home to several galleries), is about to be transformed.

The feds' decision may also be a blow to the Portland Public Market, which also sought 511 as a home. I hope this doesn't bring the market closer to relocating into Union Station itself, which doesn't seem right to me. Where can we put the produce? I liked one commenter's suggestion to a previous blog post of mine: Put the public market in Memorial Coliseum and make it a retail hub (although not for big-box stores).

Meanwhile, fresh on the heels of their Idea Studios that brought James Turrell and Jacques Rancierre here, PNCA has followed a couple of singles with a home run.

The Governor and The Sliver

Today on a walk downtown,  I happened upon two spruced up old buildings with goings on.

The Governor Hotel on SW Tenth Avenue, across from the Galleria building, is coming upon its 100th anniversary. To celebrate, the hotel is having an open house this Sunday, March 9, from 12:30 to 4:30PM. It's a chance to see inside places you'd normally have to pay for, in the form of overnight lodging.

Built in 1909, the Governor was originally called the Seward Hotel and was designed by William Knighton, who also was the first State Architect for the State of Oregon.

As explained in a history of the hotel on its website, "The Seward featured Knighton's signature details still seen in the ornate art deco 'gargoyles' that surround the original building's facade and the bell-shaped architectural details seen throughout the hotel's original woodwork, column panels and even fireplace mantles."

In its more downtrodden days before its renovation, filmmaker Gus Van Sant shot a scene or two from his superlative movie My Own Private Idaho with River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves (and Tom Peterson in a non-speaking role; no Gloria, though). Several scenes from the rapturously bad Madonna movie Body of Evidence were too (hope those hot candle wax stains came out).

Not to be outdone, the adjacent Princeton Building, which the hotel took over a few years ago, also played host as a location for The Temp, a more forgettable movie with Timothy Hutton, unofficial 'Actress of the 70s' Faye Dunaway, Twin Peaks' Lara Flynn Boyle, and a character actor I like, Oliver Platt.

As I've written before, though, I was disappointed a few years ago when the Governor Hotel moved its entrance to the Princeton Building side on 11th Avenue. It brought them more space, but shoulnd't you really enter the Governor through the Governor?

Still, overall I'm very glad the hotel exists as a work of architecture -- and one of the city's minor gems, to say the very least. I also have a fond memory of once, several years ago, having breakfast with the now deceased architect James Freed, designer of the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC after he spoke at a lecture series I helped work on for the AIA in 2001.

A few blocks away at the Gerding Theater, formerly known as the Portland Armory, the renovated structure finally seems to be getting its 'Sliver Park', a water feature and plantings along the north side. Designed by Murase Associates, it's a nice little water runoff retention system that relies on a few simple stone blocks and a modest series of waterfalls created by how that side of the building grades slighty downward towards 10th. (Coincidentally, the Armory was another renovation project that moved its front entrance to the back.)

There are still a couple of orange cones there, and the plantings have barely grown at all yet. But my first impression is that it's a lovely little place, however not even close to being a "park". We're talking about a couple of benches, a bioswale and a few long slabs of stone with a tiny strip of moving water. It's a terrific sidewalk area - just not a park. Looks to me like some nice design work and some over-hyped marketing. And while I'm griping about this nicely done project, what took so long? After all, the building was finished quite a while ago. Still, if there's anything Murase projects do well, it's creating a serene, contemplative space. Perhaps that's a fitting indication not to quabble over details of timing and labeling that will eventually wash away over time like the very rainwater (sniff, sniff) passing through the sliver's stone and bioswale.

Holst Transforms Decrepit Downtown Motel Into Hotel Modera (Updated)

The old Days Inn Portland City Center is currently undergoing a transformation into an upscale boutique hotel called Hotel Modera that will also bring the work of one of the city’s best firms, Holst Architecture, to downtown.

    The intent is to embrace the original mid-century modern original architecture. The five-story hotel has 174 rooms and suites and takes up nearly an entire city block between SW Fifth and Sixth and Columbia and Clay.  It will feature an outdoor courtyard that includes a “living wall” of vegetation, fire pits and plenty of seating.  The plaza courtyard will integrate the indoors with the outdoors and is intended to provide guests and Portlanders with a place to gather and unwind in downtown. It’s also a big improvement on the ugly surface parking lot that’s been there.

Holst created a new motor entrance and lobby off SW Clay Street to accommodate for the condemnation of the SW 6th Street motor entrance due to the new TriMet MAX light rail lines that will run adjacent to the hotel. Led by project manager Kevin Valk, the architects chose to extend the lobby out of the SW Clay Street entrance and design a courtyard with the extra space.

Through the Percentage for Art Program, TriMet has commissioned Michihiro Kosuge to install his artwork on the downtown transit mall.  This will include three sculptures fronting the courtyard of Hotel Modera. The artwork will be created from granite that has been recycled from a fountain that previously existed along the bus mall.

Specific green features of Hotel Modera include a stormwater filtration system in the courtyard, upgraded windows and HVAC, occupancy sensors, added insulation to exterior building shell, and a new reflective roofing to reduce heating island effect.

Perhaps Holst’s biggest project planned to break ground this year, however, is the new Pearl District headquarters for Ziba Design. More on that soon. But for now, it’s great to see that eyesore of a motel downtown be re-imagined, and by Holst to boot.

UPDATE 2/29: It just occurred to me that there are a couple other aging chain hotels in the downtown area that would seem ideal candidates for such a makeover. How about the Sheraton along the waterfront beside the Morrison Bridge? Although my parents spent their wedding night there 40 years ago, I never have once heard of anyone else staying there or even going there.

Perhaps another riverfront hotel, the Marriott, could also stand an upgrade. In its way, it's kind of an iconic building for Portland given its scale and site. But even Bob Frasca of Zimmer Gunsul Frasca, who designed it, has said it's not exactly the firm's proudest accomplishment. What could they do to give this place a fantastic design makeover?

UPDATE 3/5: I've replaced the images with larger, sharper ones.

More Scrutiny of Centennial Mills Plans: Nitze-Stagen Emerges

An editorial in today's Oregonian argues for the development proposal by Nitze-Stagen of Seattle (with Portland's Zimmer Gunsul Frasca as architect) to be the choice for Centennial Mills.

"It challenges the city to create an incubator for its next incarnation," the editors write. (I assume their speaking metaphorically, and not about hatching preemies.) "By bringing to the bursting-its-banks Pearl a heady mix of people with actual neighborhood jobs, it might even make the area something more than an oasis for archly cash-mered retirees." (Cash-mered: get it? Like cashmere.)

Indeed, the Nitze-Stagen proposal has a lot to like. There is a piazza for a farmer's market, a central square to show off the original buildings, a small forested park which, like nearby Tanner Springs Park, uncovers and symbolically resurrects the waterway that used to be there. There are also shops, studios, a hotel, restaurant, and more.

If there's any consensus developed so far, it's that nobody seems to like the proposal by the Baltimore-based Cordish Company -- at least for this site. The paper says their proposal is "so much fun we're already reaching for our dancing shoes." (Who gets that excited about a House of Blues or Hard Rock Cafe chain outlet? I wonder if some aging Baby Boomers with an outdated sense of cool wrote this editorial. Luckily their next point is a much better one.) "But it's ill-conceived for this site. Portland has wanted for years to develop an entertainment district around the Rose Garden. Cordish should be pitching Paul Allen, not the Portland Development Commission."

Really the Centennial Mills proposals seems to come down to those by Nitze-Stagen and LAB Holdings. They both preserve the majority of the mill buildings, unlike Cordish. The Nitze-Stagen is unquestionably more ambitious than LAB's. But with the economy tanking and ample evidence across the Willamette at the languishing Burnside Bridgehead site that an ambitious plan isn't guaranteed of ever getting built, it's definitely arguable that the LAB proposal is a far more realistic one. That said, I wouldn't choose LAB or any other plan simply out of feasibility. You do have to dream just a bit, don't you?

What's more, the LAB proposal would maintain the original mill buildings as the centerpiece of the site, while the Nitze-Stagen one would make them foothills to mountainous tall buildings planned on either side.

Nitze-Stagen has more of a local advantage. As a Seattle developer working with a Portland firm, they'd be better tuned to the nuances of our city. This would also give ZGF a foothold in the Pearl District they've never had before. I could certainly enjoy having some more architecture crafted by Eugene Sandoval and company at ZGF, especially considering how the perennially biggest firm in town has elevated its design quality in the last few years.

According to their proposal, Nitze-Stagen is also partnering with acclaimed landscape architect Peter Walker, who did the master planning for the area of the Pearl across Naito Parkway from Centennial Mills. Walker also designed the very popular Jamison Square Park and the adjacent boardwalk that would conceivably pass through Fields Park and over Naito to the mills. Having Walker on board for this project would give the area some continuity from a very capable hand.

But with Centennial Mills, I also come back to the structure of the RFP process itself. Instead of choosing three developers to make proposals, why can't we choose a qualified developer, but leave the design process and selection more open-ended? Why can't there be a competition to generate a design and not just a developer with a design and architect they've already chosen?

Also, considering that with Burnside Bridgehead PDC chose the developer team, Opus Northwest, mostly on the basis of financial resources and stability, can we feel comfortable that they'll use the right reasoning this time around? Who are the people who'll ultimately make this decision -- and how much do they really understand design compared to balance sheets?

Personally, I'm not completely ready to say whether I would choose the Nitze-Stagen or LAB Holdings proposal. Both would have their advantages and disadvantages. I'm starting to warm to Nitze-Stagen's after initially favoring LAB's, but considering that Nitze-Stagen's proposal took so long to load (34 megabytes!) I had to leave the computer for awhile, I haven't made it through the proposal (or the others) in its entirety.

What's the word around the campfire from the rest of you out there reading these proposals?

A First Look at Centennial Mills Development Finalists: Would Less Be More?

A few days ago, following a national search for a developer of the Centennial Mills site, the Portland Development Commission announced its three finalist proposals. They come from LAB Holding of Costa Mesa, California; the Cordish Company of Baltimore (a.k.a. "Balmer"); and Nitze-Stagen of Seattle.

I’m not an expert on all of the criteria PDC was asking for. I also haven’t yet given a meticulous run-through of all the details surrounding each of these three proposals. But after reading about each in The Oregonian and online, my personal first impulse is that I’m disappointed by at least two of the three candidates.

Both Nitze-Stagen and especially the Cordish Company are proposing several very large buildings on the site that would overwhelm the original Centennial Mills structures or wipe them away all together. In the latter case, looking at the Cordish proposal, I can’t see any of the old mill buildings. (Maybe they're not the right fit for a Hard Rock Cafe.) Nitze-Stagen’s proposal seems to retain more of the buildings, but there are tall thin towers surrounding them.

For that basic reason, my first impulse is that I much prefer the LAB Holding proposal (shown in the photo at top). They’re calling it SEED and, according to Stephen Beaven’s report in The Oregonian, would focus on restaurants, entertainment, green retailers and open space.  Their basic proposal is based around food, and I like how the were cheeky enough to include a famous old Brillat-Savarin quote, "Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are", that began each episode of the original Japanese Iron Chef.

The wildly different scales and ambitions here are reflected in the cost. LAB is proposing a $57.4 project, largely financed privately. Cordish has a $368 million development in mind, with $107 million in public subsidies. Nitze-Stagen’s plan is harder to decipher: according to the paper, they would pay PDC up to $8 million for the land but also require an as-yet-undetermined (very clever, guys) amount of public financing.

As a design enthusiast, I’d be willing to support the more expensive plans if they seemed like the better ones. But at least in the Cordish and Nitze-Stagen renderings, I just see a collection of somewhat banal looking modern buildings. And what’s more, they’d be fairly tall structures sitting right on the waterfront. Even if the zoning allows it, is this what we want?

Here’s another thing that makes me skeptical: Yesterday I happened to be interviewing Tiffany Sweitzer, head of Hoyt Street Properties, which owns and is developing all of the condos and greenspace directly across from the Centennial Mills site. Sweitzer told me that none of the three developers approached her company to talk about how the massive greenspace, condo towers and boardwalk would connect with Centennial Mills. If I’d have been one of the developers going for this job, this would be one of the first calls I’d have made. Are the three finalists PDC selected really telling us that they have zero interest in integrating their proposals with the surrounding urban fabric?

I don’t mean to go on record at this point saying I unequivocally love the LAB Holding proposal. You can’t do that from one rendering and a few bullet points in the paper about their proposal. And if I did, that choice would be a process of elimination.

There are individual things to like in all three of these proposals. I like the central piazza proposed by Nitze-Stagen and the inclusion of local institutions such as OMSI or even Portland Public Schools. Cordish would include a waterfront ampitheater and an extension of the Willamette River Greenway Trail. LAB would have a public market there, which would finally end a search for a home that’d make the Israelites blush.

More than anything, I wonder if the intent is to squeeze too much into this Centennial Mills site in an effort to make it viable. Everybody talks about it being green, or putting a maritime museum there, but it seems like they’re just throwing in as many ideas as possible, like leftover veggies from the fridge into a soup pot. And unless they’re holding something back, I don’t see any evidence that any of the three developers has made great design a priority.

All three developers will present their proposals and answer questions at an open house from 6-9PM Wednesday, February 20, at the Pacific Northwest College of Art (1241 NW Johnson).

The Case of the Irvington Squire

In this ongoing era of Portland’s sometimes stressful densification in historic neighborhoods, the latest proposed building project to draw the ire of neighbors and the attention of city regulators is at the corner of 15th Avenue and Hancock Street in historic Irvington.

Called the Irvington Squire, the project would add 18 condominiums in a quarter-block building of potentially six stories and 71 feet. That’s a size within ‘RH’ zoning code strictures. The neighborhood is asking for 55 feet. However, Irvington is designated as a ‘Historic Conservation District’ and there is an effort underway to give the neighborhood additional protection as a full fledged Historic District. What’s the difference? I really don’t quite grasp it myself. But the bottom line seems to be that this building is within the range it’s legally allowed to be, but that the city may still have some leeway in approving or not approving the project.

“The Historic Design Guidelines clearly would preclude such a building,” one Irvington resident who is against the Squire, Jim Heuer, said by email. “The very big question is can the Historic Design Guidelines trump zoning? Based on the first Landmarks Commission review of this project, the Commissioners are divided as to whether they have the right to turn down a building that would be permitted by the zoning in the absence of the Historic Design Guidelines.  Which, of course, raises the question: why have a Historic Landmarks Commission and Historic Design Guidelines?”

Clearly some people in Irvington are concerned not just about this project, but about  density in the neighborhood in general. A flier sent out by the Irvington Community Association last month for a meeting about the building had as its major headline, “Is Irvington about to become ‘Pearlington’?”

I think that particular quote is being a bit silly. Density is coming to historic neighborhoods, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. The Pearl is a success story, not a cautionary tale. Granted, Irvington is a place of single and two-story homes, but it's also adjacent to the Broadway-Weidler shopping/retail area. Even if the Squire itself should be rejected, Irvington should get some high-density condos as long as the city continues growing. No matter what tax bracket most Irvingtonites are in, their neighborhood shouldn't be immune from the future.

The Squire would be sited next door to the Gustav Freiwald House (currently home to The Lion & The Rose bed and breakfast), which is listed on the National Register. Some would argue the Freiwald would be dwarfed by the Squire. However, there are numerous taller buildings nearby, such as highrise housing one block over at 14th and Hancock.

The project comes courtesy of a Lake Oswego developer and is designed by a small Portland firm, Perkins Architectural. The design is a neo-historic style that seeks to ape some of the historic architecture nearby. This also brings up the continual argument of whether neo-historic honors or patronizes the actual historic architecture nearby. I, as regular readers know, definitely prefer modern design, but I can’t tell you that the Perkins design for the Irvington Squire is some pitiful work of cartoonishly faux design, either. Although as the project's opponents point out, it could probably benefit from greater setbacks and landscaping.

But Heuer had this to say: "One of the many objections that people had was that in this case 'faux historic' architectural style was an insult to the neighborhood, as it assumed that a grotesquely oversized building could be made palatable to the community by dressing it up with some cornices.  Further it was suggested that if a modern building had to be constructed next to the Queen Anne Styled Freiwald House, it should be minimally ornamented to provide an unobtrusive backdrop to the ornate historic structure."

What do you make of the Squire and its right to land in Irvington?

A Great Move By Powells

When I started writing the Portland Architecture blog three years ago this month, the very first post (after the one that said, "Welcome to the blog") was about Powells Books.

I've long felt that the store, considering its cultural landmark status here and how it anchors the Brewery Blocks area as a gate between downtown and the Pearl District, has a responsibility to make their buildings better. Granted, no one wants Portland to lose the rough edges that balance out its more glossy new condo buildings. But having a single-story building along Burnside with a shabby facade isn't good enough for Powells.

Now, the nation's largest new-used bookseller is stepping up with a plan to renovate the store's entrance and principal rooms at the Southeast corner entrance by 2010.

Of course not all renovations are created equal, and while it's exciting to imagine a new front door and more space, I'm not at all a fan of the architecture that Powells favored in its last renovation, of the Northwest corner in 2000, which has a very bland and neo-traditional look that seems counter to the spirit of Powells and Portland. I'm not saying they need some clean-lined modernist look with no grit or enduring power to it, but there ought to be a happy medium, ya know?

Powells' entrance also sits at a very key corner, of Burnside and Southwest 10th. If they're renovating and expanding that building, it will also be important to integrate it with the surrounding environment. There's talk of making Burnside and Couch into one-way couplets (an idea I'm vehemently against). How might that affect the architectural decisions? Is there a way to do something special with that intersection? I once heard architect extraordinaire Rick Potestio suggest some kind of plaza there with the buildings themselves curved to create some kind of grand circular public space. At the very least, Powells seems better served with widened sidewalks on a two-way Burnside than being hemmed in by two one-way streets.

Regardless of Burnside's plan, though, we're finally getting a fixed-up Powells, and I'm excited to see how second-generation Powells head Emily Powell puts her stamp on the job. And Emily, just on the outside chance that you read this, how about opening up the dialog about who you hire as an architect?

TVA Unveils Revised UO Arena Design

Bob Thompson and his firm, TVA Architects, have released a new design for the University of Oregon's arena that is more transparent -- arguably making it, to the project's benefit, a little more like Portland's Memorial Colisseum and less like the Rose Garden.

I was a fan of the previous, more boxy design, but this clearly seems to be a step up. There will be a lot more light entering the arena now, especially at the perimeter. A building of this massive scale needs to be transparent, I think, to avoid the common problem of being a closed-off, monolithic presence on the landscape.

One of the new features beside the glassier exerior and more curving form, according to a report in today's Oregonian, will be a wooden seating bowl that harkens back to Duck fans' beloved Mac Court. This would also add some greater natural materiality to TVA's work, which is always very sleek and modern.

Naturally there are still a lot of questions to be answered, from financing for the arena to priorities at the UO given that overall academic performance there is in decline. There may also be further opportunities to integrate the building with its environment. That said, as both a Duck fan and design enthusiast I'm overall very pleased.

Originally I had several other images to show of the arena design, but UO is being silly about releasing them and has pulled TVA's reigns.  When the university eases off its paranoia and takes a chill pill, I'll try to post some more.

More High Density Growing Pains: Award Winning Up-And-Comer Works Partnership's Latest Critized as 'Brutal'

An article by Tyler Graf in yesterday's Daily Journal of Commerce highlights a seemingly controversial new condo project near Montgomery Park at NW Upshur and 26th.

The site occupies an entire block in this borderline zone (along with the adjacent Vaughn Street) between residential and industrial areas. It is to be six stories in a neighborhood with mostly smaller two and three-story ones. In the DJC article, neighbors from the La Torre condominiums next door to the project, including Academy Award winning animator Joan Gratz, express worry and even a little hostility. She even is quoted as saying, "It makes you wonder what (architecture) school they went to," and complains that the development would "block views, create street congestion and tower over the sleepy hillside."

I'd paraphrase that as another day in the more or less healthy development of a city.

One thing I didn't get from the DJC article is the important context that the firm designing this project is an especially good one: Works Partnership. They've won multiple AIA awards over the last couple of years, and their hand has been all over the Central Eastside with renovations of the East Bank Commerce Center and the more recently rehabbed B&O Warehouse. Their B-Side6 office building planned for lower East Burnside is turning lots of heads for its powerfully bold look. They're definitely one of my favorite firms in town.

This has also become such a broken record in Portland: a project comes along that goes to the allowable height limit on a key street or at a key intersection, but it turns out that allowable height feels incongruent and too high for some of the nearby neighbors. It's not to say they some of these neighbor complaints don't have merit, but too often I think these people criticize the design simply because they haven't come to terms with how the new building's perfectly allowable scale is going to change their patch of the urban fabric. But cities change, and Portland is on a multi-decade path of big growth. Too much of it is happening on the suburban outskirts anyway. Even with the Urban Growth Boundary, we're not preventing sprawl. We're just slowing it down a little more. This latest project on Upshur is just the latest example of a worthy project that also represents growing pains.

I exchanged email with Bill Neburka of Works Partnership, and he stressed that the design process is an ongoing one, but that they've worked hard to involve the neighbors and do much more than they're required to in order to meet La Torre and other neighbors' concerns. (He also stressed that the attached images are very preliminary.) Here's more of Neburka's comments:

"Our office and the developer, George Hale, have made great efforts to incorporate the La Torre residents' concerns into the massing of the building, including an overall reconfiguration to shift mass away from that condo building and provide additional light and air not required (by any measure of) the zoning code.  Minimum required setback we have looked to increase that up to almost double. The La Torre condominium itself does not meet the current set-back requirements of its CS zoning (abutting a residential zone), and we are trying to be mindful of this existing condition.  We have met with the NW neighborhood association twice, are scheduled to meet with the La Torre condo association on Saturday, and have another meeting set up with the neighborhood association next Thursday. We have stated many times that it is our intent that this building contributes to the Northwest neighborhood and the city of Portland in a positive way.  This is a big building, but it is a very valuable city-block sized site (40,000 square feet) with existing high-density zoning.

In conjunction with larger format apartments, this courtyard typology has explicitly been encouraged by the planning department and public officials as a way to increase the density of the central city and and encourage family oriented living without sacrificing overall livability. I think the idea that a 100,000+ sf building is going to resemble a single family house or a semi-detached rowhouse is really unreasonable.

It is, of course, a modern building that looks to modulate the scale of its mass through a series of screened exterior zones/facades and glass connector bars.  The final material selection has not been determined. We are looking at a wide variety of materials to form a simple palette, from metal to wood to brick. I have no idea where the DJC writer came up with reflective metal.  We will try to achieve a subtle richness and variation from whatever the final palette is. But we have worked earnestly to create the beginnings of a relevant piece of fabric architecture, rather than pandering to a knee-jerk historicism that would be both insincere and patronizing to the many beautiful (truly) historical residential buildings in the Northwest."

If one wants to take on a condo project that doesn't fit with the neighborhood, a better target might be the nouveau historic building planned -- and being fought -- in Irvington.

What Ever Happened to Burnside Bridgehead?

Remember a few years ago when there was a big to-do over which developer would win the Portland Development Commission's RFP contract for the Burnside Bridgehead? You can be forgiven if it's a foggy memory by now. In fact, it was a full four years ago that PDC first floated the idea of having a big-box retail outlet there, before withdrawing the plan amidst widespread community uproar against it.

As I read in Lee Perlman's Southeast Examiner report, but has also been reported in bigger media outlets, the winner of the Bridgehead development rights, Opus Northwest, has been unable to find a non-big-box anchor tenant. They're now asking PDC for more "flexibility" in choosing one. According to the article I read, an Opus representative told members at a Buckman Community Association meeting that while it won't be Wal-Mart or Home Depot, it ought rightfully to be able to be something popular like Ikea. It seems to me that's just a way of pointing out that people's feelings about retailers are not all the same, and trying to use that as a wedge to get approval for big-box scaled retailers there.

Opus, unlike the two other developer finalists for the Bridgehead job, also has in its plan improvements paid for by PDC to facilitate Northeast Couch as part of a new couplet with Burnside, as per Commissioner Sam Adams' proposal. Other causes for delay cited Opus says have been PDC's fault: securing zoning changes for the property and relocating tenants of the Convention Plaza office buildings on the site. PDC, according to Lee Perlman's Examiner article, has conceded some blame on this. But the other big factors are "the collapse of the condominium market and other changes in the marketplace, rendering Opus's original development plan unfeasible."

Let me ask you this: If we had to choose between an Opus-developed Burnside Bridgehead that supplants their original plan with a big-box retailer or having PDC select a new developer, what would our answer be? On one hand, you can't blame Opus for the market changing, or for delays on the PDC side. Yet I can't help but wonder if Gerding Edlen or Beam Development could make something interesting and more architecturally compelling happen here without, say, a Lowe's occupying one of the most prime riverfront spots in the central city. If PDC were to select a new developer, it might further delay something happening here. And regardless of how one feels about Opus, might there be a risk that kicking them out undermines the integrity of such a city-sponsored selection process? What kind of message does that send to companies vying for, say, the Centennial Mills development rights?

Personally, I think if the original plan no longer works economically, even by Opus's admission, then PDC should hold some kind of intervention to jump-start things in terms of ideas and brainstorming. With all this dour economic, legal and real estate talk, it's easy to forget what an incredible site this is, right along Burnside and MLK and the bridge and the river, all directly across from Downtown, Old Town, and the Pearl. What kind of use do we want there? What works? But it may also have been a mistake to put developers first and their designs second, as this RFP process did. What if we were to have some other kind of setup that favored both economics and design.

I also can't help but wonder if there necessarily should be one developer handling all of this big Bridgehead development. Why not parcel it out to a few different ones working in tandem? After all, too often these big developers tend to have one firm design a cluster of buildings in these big developments. It's an understandable from the developer's point of view, but in terms of the good of the city I'd much rather see a variety of different firms working here on a variety of building types.

One other bit of interesting news I picked up in Perlman's article. At the aforementioned Buckman Community Association meeting, Bruce Wood of Opus said his company is negotiating with a potential 8,000 square foot performing arts hall, and a 25,000 square foot museum. Who might they be? If there's a new museum planning to set up shop there, or an existing one planning to move, that ought to be significant news in and of itself. Portland really needs a major contemporary art museum. It's terrific having all these young arts organizations here like the Portland Art Center, Organism and Disjecta celebrating the huge influx of emerging artists to the city. But any major urban city worth its stripe has a contemporary art museum. That should be on Portland's big-item wish list along with a new concert hall, relocating the east bank freeway, and a robust network of streetcars.