Portland Architecture

The Housing Bubble and Condo Demand

There is growing evidence that the multi-year boom of rising housing prices may be finally ebbing. Home prices rose 57 percent over the last five years, but currently (according the the New York Times) the inventory of unsold existing homes is at a 13-year high, and builders' confidence is at a 15-year low.

But the overall market is still dominated by single-family homes. What I'd like to know is exactly how much this will affect the condo market, and particularly in Portland. Certainly the presumed end of the overall housing boom would have some effect. We wont see as much 'flipping' of condos (purchased with the intent of selling soon afterward at a higher price), of course. But how will this downturn affect the spectrum of planned projects in areas like South Waterfront, the West End, and the Pearl District? Or outer neighborhoods that were just starting to become viable for such projects, such as North Mississippi or Belmont?

It was only last Sunday that I came across a cover story in the Oregonian's Homes & Rentals section (not sure if it'd be classified as an advertorial) with the headline 'Condos rise near Belmont: Developers carve modern niche in classic Southeast neighborhood.' It profiled the Andria Condominiums on Belmont just east of 39th (designed by Myhre Group), the Morrison Street Lofts on Southeast 20th,  and the Belmont townhome Condominiums. The article cast these projects as trend setters (although I'm not sold on two out of three design-wise), but will they really be?

To some degree, as we know, the demographics prompting condo buying transcend high and low real estate statistics: the downsizing boomers especially. And in our city the Urban Growth Boundary certainly figures in as well. So it seems doubtful that condo buildings will suffer the same dead period that office buildings have. But there's still a lot of room between that and the kind of boom that's been going on. Where does the needle point, though?

A slowdown means that there are fewer jobs out there for architects, contractors, engineers, and so on. And for architectural enthusiasts like me, it's fewer chances to get excited about the work being done. But from an urban planning and development perspective, I actually wonder if there might be some good that could come out of a slower pace.

I certainly don't wish developers any bad tidings for the future - just the opposite - but sometimes development has happened so fast that there hasn't been time to really take a good long look planning-wise at what we want places like the PD and SW to become. For the most part they seem to be turning out well anyway, but some of the problems the Pearl in particular has today, like the lack of a central spine and relatively low ratio of families, and so on, perhaps might have been addressed given more time. It's also possible, of course, that time would have simply been wasted. Nevertheless a neighborhood is probably only as mature as its trees.

Belluschi Meets Cloepfil

Featured in the new issue of Metropolitan Home magazine is a house in Portland’s West Hills designed in 1937 by the great Pietro Belluschi. What’s particularly noteworthy about this project, though, is that the home’s recent expansion and renovation was designed by the one present-day local architect whose reputation has grown to a similar level of international notoriety: Brad Cloepfil of Allied Works. Although it’s only a small residential job, I was very excited to think of these two architects working on the same project.

And it was a personal one for Belluschi. As his grandson Jeff recently reminded me, Pietro designed the house for himself and his family. Jeff's father was born in 1939 while the family lived in the house. It was a very simple, modest house, which is why the Jays wanted to add some space. They and Cloepfil really respected the need to preserve the integrity of Belluschi's work, but they also didn't cowtow to it in a caricatured way, as had been done in previous renovations by other homeowners between Belluschi and the Jays. On one previous renovation, for example, Belluschi's trademark curving window bay was replicated in other smaller window fixtures, which Pietro certainly would have hated.

I wrote the Met Home article, and I wanted to pass on a few of the quotes, some of which didn’t get used in the story.

Brad Cloepfil talked about expanding the U-shaped plan for the house: “It was the idea of turning it into a kind of garden pavilion. It would open up that terrace a little bit. Before that terrace was kind of a dark, dead spot in the back of the house. By making a kind of glass pavilion that the space would go all the way through, it made that courtyard space less claustrophobic.”

The house is owned by John and Janet Jay, and John is the executive creative director at ad agency Wieden + Kennedy. John and Janet have also founded their own design studio here, Studio J, which is collaborating with Cloepfil and builder extraordinaire Don Tankersley (who worked on the Belluschi house) on a spec house in Portland also under construction.

Talking to me about Cloepfil, John said, “He is spectacular in his ability to articulate the idea, to be able to talk you through it. You sit down and you have a conversation about space, and concepts of the usage of space. I think that obviously this is a much smaller job, a renovation of a residential home, but he always asks those kinds of question, and draws that out of the client.”

I remember hearing the same thing about Brad when I wrote a New York Times profile of him three years ago, that for all his design talent, Brad’s charismatic ability to articulate space to the client but also to do so through the client’s own needs and desires, is among his greatest talents.

Again, it’s only a small renovation, but for Portland architectural enthusiasts I think this almost serves as a kind of passing of the torch.

City Council Rejects Allegro's Air Supply

In a unanimous decision, the city council has rejected the proposd 21-story Allegro condominium tower in Goose Hollow. The counil sustained an appeal by the Goose Hollow Neighborhood Association of an earlier approval of the project. At issue was the Allegro's borrowing FAR (floor-area-ratio) to achieve a height considerably above what's allowed on that site.

The architect for the project is Sienna, with designer Jeff Lamb a principal creative force. Gary Reddick, who heads the firm, is a real pioneer in the concept of utilizing air rights. He rightfully sees this as a healthy and useful way to foster density. (Several years ago, before 'air rights' was a familiar phrase to anyone, I remember him talking to me in an interview about how churches could utilize their land as a revenue source by putting parking underground and combining church facilities with housing in the same project. All this time later, more than one downtown church is essentially doing just that.)

But the burgeoning market for air rights and FAR transferring also has its danger, of course. Namely that it can act as a kind of 'Get Out of Jail Free' card for height restrictions. A certain amount of elasticity is good for the system, and I think most people involved in the conversation would agree to that to one extent or anothe. But the Allegro case is about degrees: how much is too much when it comes to re-arranging and stacking FAR from all over the city?

I'll be the first to admit I don't know what the answer is. As a city I think Portland is going to need to further loosen its traditional resistance to tall buildings. It doesn't mean we're going to become Hong Kong, but simply that in the interest of density and growing up instead of out, the times have to be a changin'.

My gut feeling is that the Allegro was a pitch just barely inside the strike zone, but the city council saw otherwise. I like this project, both architecturally and urbanistically. Can its developer, M. David Paul, make the building pencil out on a smaller scale? Regardless, we need to re-examine and resolve once and for all just what it and isn't kosher with respect to juggling FAR.

Astoria and Betweenness

This post is coming from Astoria, where my hotel room is overlooking the confluence of the Columbia and the Pacific. The natural surroundings are spectacular, but it’s also captivating to watch the incredible array of human transportation at this crossroads: fishing boats and cargo ships on the water, cars crossing on the massive bridge over the Columbia. It’s the bridge and the boats that illustrate the vastness of the natural panorama.

How does this relate to Portland architecture? Only nominally of course. But I did think of two recent Randy Gragg articles, one in the InPortland section of last Thursday’s Oregonian and one in Seattle’s The Stranger, both of which were about Portland’s growing skyline. I believe it was the Stranger article in particular that pondered view corridors of Mt. Hood and the difficulty in striking a balance between rising building heights and preserving the sight of our local natural wonder. Thinking about it here in Astoria, for some reason I feel more strongly that Mt. Hood can hold its own. If a view of the mountain is sacrificed to a new tower, that’s par for the course. The mountain will still be there to see if you step a few yards in any direction. Nature still dwarves whatever we build, and if it seems otherwise, it’s only in the narrowness of a particular perspective.

Yesterday I also perused Astoria’s downtown, and that too made me think of Portland. Just a couple years ago this small town’s core was pretty decrepit, save for a few taverns and fishing outlets. But with the introduction of restored landmarks like the Liberty Theater and the Elliot Hotel, as well as a charming Sunday market with produce and trinkets for sale, the town seems to be rising quickly.

Encouraging as this revitalization is, at the same time I noticed that the transformation from gritty, junky Oregon coast town to beautiful tourist Mecca is far from complete. My hotel, for example, sits on the site of an old cannery, and it‘s probably a little swankier than any of those cannery workers would have imagined. (Incidentally, the hotel’s owner-architect is the son of one of those workers.) But to either side you can look out on adjacent docks that are crumbling away. And it’s that betweenness that I enjoy. When a place gentrifies, it’s nice to enjoy the restaurants and shops and spruced-up architecture that accompany it. But when everything in a town is polished up, one misses that dose of grit.

And of course that betweenness exists, to varying degrees, in the Rose City. In the Pearl District there are still, for the time being, auto repair shops amidst the condos. In the Central Eastside there may be web designers and a couple gourmet restaurants, but they’re still outnumbered by business requiring a forklift.

Many times in the past I’ve looked at places like this, seen the multi-year transition happening and almost instantly begun to anticipate the completed transformation: When is the last auto body shop in the Pearl going to wise up and sell? When are they gonna remove that East Bank freeway overpass? But it’s actually the time of transition, however short or long, that now seems to me to have the ideal urban equilibrium. Unfortunately it’s not really something you can create on its own. And even though I appreciate the science and art of urban planning, maybe that’s why this betweenness is appealing. It’s a naturally occurring equilibrium that can’t be replicated.

Affordable Housing, the City Counciland Jean Nouvel

Recently I watched on DVD a documentary from European television  called Architectures 1 about a government-sponsored affordable housing project in Nimes, France designed by renowned architect Jean Nouvel. I wanted to write a blog post about it, but wasn’t sure how I could make it connect to Portland architecture.

Today, however, an Oregonian article by Ryan Frank reports that a three-member majority of city council (Sam Adams, Randy Leonard and Erik Sten) is in favor of spending 30 percent of redevelopment money on affordable housing. The existing number is 16 percent, so it’d mark a substantial increase.

But as we all know, budgets for any affordable housing project will be tight. At the same time, the process for developing those projects will be an open one, with committees and task forces and requests for proposals.

How does this connect to a Jean Nouvel building around the world? Well, even though Nouvel is a flashy architect known best for landmarks like the iconic Arabic Institute in Paris, his Nemausus 1 project in Nimes, the building profiled in the documentary, was very innovative in doing more with less. I wonder if we can do the same here in Portland.

  Nemausus 1 couldn’t be simpler in its construction, even though it's characterized as 'experimental' architecture. It has a concrete base, onto which at regular intervals are stacked concrete walls that separate the apartments and also support the floors above. That’s about the cheapest way to build something. Nouvel then put the elevators, stairways and walkways on the outside of the building and connected them to the concrete façade.

The lesson here isn’t just about building cheap, but doing so in a way that’s innovative and beautiful and functional. And, again, experimental. I’m sure some of what Nouvel did design-wise wouldn’t fly with our codes and guidelines. But the question is, does our system allow an architect to create something like Nemausus 1? And would a great architect like Nouvel even get the chance here?

If Portland indeed begins devoting more of its redevelopment money on affordable housing, it’d be nice if more than the status quo emerged. Just because it’s affordable housing doesn’t mean it has to be mediocre and rote. I think affordable housing is an ideal opportunity for talented young architects. But it will take support from the top to make this happen. It’s commendable that Sten, Leonard and Adams want more affordable housing. But will they settle, or will we allow them to settle, for process-heavy second-rate buildings?

Centennial Mills: Manufacturing Impotence?

In today’s Oregonian, Fred Leeson reports on a “sobering financial warning” about revamping the old Centennial Mills site in Northwest Portland: converting the former grain mill probably can’t be done without public financing.

I must be naïve, because I assumed this would be the case all along. But I didn’t think of this as sobering or in any way negative. Isn’t the preservation of a historic building at a very prominent site, one that could act as a catalyst and anchor for the soon-to-be burgeoning northern Pearl District, precisely the kind of public investment the Portland Development Commission was created for?

In the article, Leeson reports trepidation on the part of PDC about including the probable need for public money in the text of its request for proposals. Developer Art DeMuro, a historic landmarks commission member, argues that the commission should be more explicit. But PDC’s Steve Shain tells Leeson he is “reluctant to list a potential subsidy in the request to developers because he fears it would become locked in as an assumption.”

It seems to me that the reality for big projects in the wake of the tram and Fire Station 1 funding fiascos is that PDC and the city have to apologize for doing what they exist to do. Nobody wants to set off an explosion of media articles and politician grandstanding about spending too many taxpayer dollars. What are we, Republicans? Why not take some pride in investing in such a potentially terrific project like Centennial Mill?

Certainly budget consciousness is important, especially with schools and other services woefully under-funded. But I wouldn't lose a wink of sleep over PDC investing in an iconic, historic building along the riverfront and across Naito Parkway from some of the most coveted real estate in the city. In fact, the only real ire should come if they don't step up to the plate.

Questioning the Pitched Roof Vernacular

Yesterday I was walking through my Southeast Portland neighborhood, one filled with Craftsman bungalows and other historic homes. I've lived and walked around here for years, but for some reason on yesterday's walk in particular I got thinking about how virtually all the houses in this neighborhood and any other have pitched roofs.

If I were having a house designed and built for me from the ground up, there's no question in my mind that I'd want a flat roof, so I could make use of it as usable space. Certainly there would be concerns about water mitigation during all the rainy months. But can't good construction do that in this day and age?

It would be arrogant of me to presume I know something others don't about why the overwhelming majority of houses have pitched roofs. But why is it I see a missed opportunity for usable space on a rooftop when 99% of them aren't built that way?

I also think that as Portland continues to grapple with space in enforcing an urban growth boundary, and housing developments thus becoming more compact all the time, the flat roof only grows in importance.

That was one of the arguments I made during the Living Smart design competition for narrow-lot houses held last year by the City of Portland. If space is at a premium, why turn down an entire floor of potential use when you're unlikely to have much of a yard? But the first houses being fastracked for pre-approval for builders have pitched roofs--a nod, I think, to most builders' conservative leanings. Which I can't blame, because the impetus for Living Smart was that existing narrow-lot builder homes have received a lot of complaints from neighbors.

But still: I'd take a usable rooftop over some angled shingles any day of the week. What do architects have to say about this?

Another Wal-Mart Revolt

As David R. Anderson reports in today’s Oregonian, the Beaverton City Council has unanimously rejected a proposed 152,300 square foot Wal-Mart store in Cedar Mill, just off US 26. This reverses an initial approval of the project by Beaverton Board of Design Review. According to Anderson’s article, the council has more discretion than the Design Review board did, and that the board had been against the proposal yet felt compelled to approve a proposal within the law.

Regardless of legal/political questions, anybody in favor of sensible, sensitive urban planning must certainly be celebrating right now. (I’d of course be one of them.) Wal-Mart probably is pretty angry that they’re playing by the rules (zoning allows a store of that size) and still were turned away. And legally speaking, perhaps Wal-Mart is right. To guard against that, Beaverton might want to try and fast-track some zoning changes, but I’d be pretty surprised to see that happen.

There is also the case of a proposed Gresham Wal-Mart, also reported in today's Oregonian by Dee Anne Finken. The city had approved a scaled-down version of a store there, but now citizen activists have filed an appeal that will at least temporarily delay groundbreaking.

More broadly, I think the Wal-Mart revolts that have occurred in the Portland metro area (Beaverton, Gresham) are a good signal that suburbs are growing more concerned with controlling the scale of their environments. Ultimately this shouldn’t be about Wal-Mart per se, but the broken model of giant stores the size of airplane hangars occupying hideous concrete boxes before seas of asphalt.

Wal-Mart has promised to appeal the Beaverton council’s decision, but regardless of whether they win or lose, the chain’s best strategy ought to be to seriously re-think everything about the way it builds. If they can build a Wal-Mart that’s pedestrian friendly, of an appropriate scale, and well connected with mass transit, then we ought to welcome them.

By the same token, if we’re going to stop Wal-Mart from coming to Cedar Mill, then we should also be taking a similar posture with Home Depot or any of the other big-box retailers.

Certainly there are realities I’m conveniently ignoring here, such as the fact that these stores are built the way they are for a reason: to keep costs low. Those big savings that Wal-Mart offers are helpful to lower income people and moneyed cheapskates. But I’m not going to shed any tears for the gargantuan retailer either. You go, Beaverton!

Ankrom Moisan Adds AnotherLos Angeles Tower

A few months ago I wrote about how developers Gerding/Edlen and Williams & Dame had announced a handful of new mixed-use condominium projects in downtown Los Angeles designed by Ankrom Moisan Associated Architects and TVA Architects. Now Ankrom has announced a new condo project, called Circa, for a different Southern California developer.

Here's the information Ankrom gave me about Circa:

CLIENT GOALS: Design a mixed-use gateway building in the up and coming Koreatown District of LA, just minutes away from the downtown core on prestigious Wilshire Boulevard.

DESIGN RESPONSE: The building takes all its design cues from the site, the views and the historic buildings in the area. The 5 story base of the building responds to the scale of the low rise historic buildings that are prominent on Wilshire Boulevard. The 18 story residential tower incorporates a modernist palette of glass, metal and pre-cast concrete. The tower’s north-south axis is designed to take advantage of the views of the city, Hollywood Hills, and the active street life on Wilshire Boulevard. The 400,000 SF project will provide 190 residential units, retail space, and parking.

Merely being hired for this job is a positive sign for Ankrom. They're not just part of Portland-based developers work in Los Angeles now, but have caught on with a local co-developer. And while the condo market seems to be slowing nationally, there remains a lot going on in downtown LA, what with the Frank Gehry-led Grand Avenue development and a host of other projects happening there.

It's hard to see some of the tower's details very well in this nighttime rendering, but in the residential portion above the base, there seems to be a nice pattern of floor-to-ceiling glass and flat sun shades. There seems to be some big planes of concrete at the base, which I'm not sure about compositionally, but again it's hard to discern much from a nighttime rendering.

Regardless, this project is another sign that Ankrom is not only the most prolific of Portland's condo builders, but also a firm that out-of-towners are coming to for their expertise and experience.

BOORA Goes For An Encore

BOORA Architects and developer Hoyt Street Properties have unveiled their newest condo collaboration in the northern Pearl District. It's called 'The Encore' and is planned for 'Block 19' on NW Overton Street between 9th and 10th Avenues. It'll have 177 condo units (presumably pricey ones) and ground floor retail.

The building has a curving shape and will occupy a prominent site adjacent to a new park being planned. It'll have views of the nearby Fremont Bridge and Willamette River. Quite awhile ago I saw a study for the building that had it as a cluster of linear forms, but that plan was ultimately scrapped. The Encore seems to borrow a little bit from the architect's unbuilt One Waterfront Place office project for Jim Winkler, but also has evolved into something its own.

Looking at the rendering here, I like how the geometry of the white non-glass forms seems to act like a series of individually floating planes. It's not the curve of the overall facade I notice so much as the undulating and interlocking shapes within it. That will help break up the mass of a building like this that will be more or less sitting on an open site.

The Encore is one of several buildings ultimately coming to this undeveloped northern edge of the Pearl near the Fremont Bridge. BOORA has also designed a master plan for Hoyt Street's remaining parcels, although there are still unresolved questions with the city about height limitations and FAR related to how tall and skinny some of these buildings can go.

Also a related factor as the architect and developer move forward is the fate of Centennial Mill. If it's successfully restored, how BOORA and Hoyt Street orient the planned park, future buildings and even the streets themselves to Naito Parkway and the mill will be very important. There's been talk of extending the existing boardwalk on 10th Avenue through the new park and over Naito in some kind of pedestrian bridge, but it's all just talk at this point.

Meanwhile, first impressions of The Encore are welcomed as always.

Designing a Lobby

I’ve been meaning for several days to mention a recent Oregonian article by Ryan Frank about the first-ever release of lobbyist visit lists by city hall.

According to Frank’s July 19 article, the Portland Business Alliance “met, mailed, called or e-mailed city officials 109 times in three months...132 people from 24 groups had registered as lobbyists. Half belong to the City Club of Portland, the Building Owners and Managers Association, and Portland General Electric.”

And, Frank continues, “Portland State University conferred 32 times with the mayor's office, planners and the Portland Development Commission, among others. Ron Tonkin Family of Dealerships contacted City Hall staffers 16 times to talk zoning issues around its dealership at 122nd Avenue and Burnside Street.”

I saw nothing in the article about anyone lobbying city government on behalf of design and/or architecture. The closest thing I remember was one of the general contractors' organizations -- AGC, I believe. I would like to have seen the American Institute of Architects on the list, or perhaps another institution or firm. Whether it's the kind of tax credits for renewable energy Ted Kulongoski proposed Monday, or lobbying the city to soldier on holding design competitions in the wake of the tram and Fire Station One difficulties, or for a streamlined permitting system, or any number of other issues, I think we'd all benefit from the increasingly wide array of designers and firms in Portland getting together and making their voice heard.

Sometimes member organizations and other nonprofits pledge neutrality in political issues for fear of polarizing their ranks. That's understandable. But it needn't be an either/or proposition. Besides, there was a time in Portland's relatively recent history when architects and planners wielded great influence with local legislators.

At the same time, it's not to say the architecture organizations aren't involved in the community today. The AIA puts on Architecture Week each October as well as various other events throughout the year. The Architectural Foundation of Oregon gives out scholarships and conducts the Architects In Schools program.

Speaking of which, AFO exec director Jane Jarrett recently told me about a two-day training session for high school teachers that Architects In Schools conducted. An array of math, science, humanities and other teachers came from Salem, Hillsboro, Woodburn, and Beaverton as well as Portland's Benson and Roosevelt. Architects volunteering included Kent Duffy of SRG Partnership; Rudy Barton, head of Portland State University's Architecture department; and Steve Poland of Ankram Moisan.

These people have set a great example. Now what the design community needs to compliment those laudable community efforts, I think, is a political one.