Catching up with Liz Williams

Broadway Cab, Portland, image courtesy Elizabeth Williams & Pencil Work Studio 

A little over a decade ago Elizabeth Williams was a key design force at one of the city's top firms, Thomas Hacker Architects (now THA Architecture). But, with a special-needs child to raise and increasingly long hours working on Hacker projects like the Columbia Gorge Discovery Center or the OHSU School of Nursing, Williams reluctantly gave up her architecture career for a time.

Over the last few years, she has quietly resumed her design work, completing projects as a sole practitioner like the Broadway Cab headquarters in Northeast Portland, several single-family homes, the Audubon Wildlife Care Center, and the nonprofit Bradley-Angle House for victims of domestic violence under the name Pencil Work Studio.

Williams also belongs to a kind of unofficial group of architects who represent for me a lineage drawing back to the legendary architect Louis Kahn via the University of Oregon's architecture department in the 1970s and 80s. Graduating in 1981, she studied at UO along with local architects Brad Cloepfil, Rick Potestio, Nancy Merryman and John Cava, during a time when Hacker and a few other professors who had either worked for or studied under Kahn before coming to Eugene.

The stream of students graduating from local architecture schools or entering the local design workforce is continuous, with people always dropping into or out of the scene. Within that, there naturally develop certain groups of architects who represent something distinctive, whether it's a collective style, or an innovation, a particular moment in history, or some kind of ideology.

For example, last year's 11 x Design homes tour and the people behind it represented for me, rightly or wrongly, a new generation of designer-developers firms like PATH, Webster Wilson, Design Department, Ben Waechter, William Kaven and SEED that have been making their names with single-family houses and small condos or apartments but ultimately aspiring to larger scale work. There is also, of course, the group of architects who gave birth to Northwest modernism from the 1930s-60s, such as Pietro Belluschi, John Yeon, Saul Zaik, and John Storrs, among others.

Falcon Cove House, Oregon Coast, courtesy Elizabeth Williams & Pencil Work Studio 

I sometimes half-jokingly refer to this group from UO now in their mid careers as the "Children of the Kahn". If you look at the work of Cloepfil, Potestio, Merryman, Cava and Williams, there is not necessarily an obvious connecting thread in their style or project types. But the Kahn brand of modernist architecture fits well with an Oregon sensibility, thinking of architecture and natural light as possessing a soulful quality, rooted in the natural landscape and, unlike the more rigid, dogmatic and social-engineering modernism of Le Corbusier or Walter Gropius, draws from classical architectural principals rather than rejecting them.

This quintet all worked earlier in their careers for Hacker, who has always achieved a compelling balance of modern and classical forms. He also is the kind of architect who draws from the talents around him. He remembers Williams (who worked at the firm from 1988-2000) well.

"I think Liz is one of the best and most complete architects that has ever worked in our office," he told me by email. "First of all, she is a gifted artist and designer. She has an exceptional eye, a richly developed feel for form, space and light (have you seen her landscape drawings?), and an unusual talent for clarity and rigor in her design work.  She is also very sensitive to the nuances of client aspirations and very adept at translating them into organizations of form that achieve a kind of poetic expressiveness that is rooted in the purpose the building serves."

Columbia Gorge Discovery Center, THA Architecture, via roamsters.com 

The School of Nursing at OHSU and the Columbia Gorge Discovery Center that Williams worked on with Hacker both "have a very evocative organization of space, structure and material that are powerful expressions of their human purpose as well as their place within the landscape," he added. "Liz also has a deeply rooted sense of social responsibility and is a shining example in my eyes of an architect who never separated the nuances of any particular building from its relationships to a larger and more complex societal (and environmental) order. In other words, she has a natural gift for getting to know the inner complexities of a client, a program and a place and translating them into a holistic expression of space, form, material and light that achieves its ultimate meaning through the lives and people it serves.  And I think that is what really good architecture is all about."

But each of these Kahn and Hacker disciples wound up leaving the office, each for a very different kind of career. Cloepfil, of course, has become internationally famous and has won design competitions for major art museums against the likes of Zaha Hadid, Rem Koolhaas and Herzog & De Meuron. Potestio is one of the most gifted architectural and planning minds I have ever encountered in Portland. His portfolio of single-family houses is gorgeous, and he could easily be head City Planner based on his knowledge of urban planning. But larger commissions and major-firm ties have mostly eluded him. Cava spends his time mostly writing and teaching. Merryman is a partner was long the city's only firm headed by all women, and they've been involved with a variety of award winning small and mid-sized projects. Williams probably represents a common challenge that women in particular face, between career and family. When we had coffee recently, she considered her daughter, who is about to graduate from high school, her greatest success. But as Hacker's words attest, as does her small portfolio as a sole practitioner, it would be nice if there were a way for Williams to strike the right balance and contribute to Portland's urban fabric. She still keeps a low profile, with no website and just a small rented desk on Vancouver Avenue. But Williams is worth seeking out.

Comments

[Bob Hastings]

Hey Brian: a very nice shout out for one of the best and nicest people I've ever known. All the 'Children of the Kahn' folks you mentioned are terrifc folks as well as top notch designers and architects. It's been wonderful to see how engaged they've all been with their communities through the years. Sometimes in spite of difficult economic, personal, and 'stylistic' challenges. We all were beneficiaries of great teachers, but also a sensibility to translate modernism into our Pacific Northwest environment. Perhaps that's what what imbued Kahn's spirit into this group. Thanks, Bob Hastings

[Rick Potestio]

HI Brian,

Liz Williams is a truly great architect, and I am extremely happy that you have given her your attention. Right on. And I appreciate that you recognize that we all share a great indebtedness to our mentor, teacher and friend, Thom Hacker.

Rick

[Raye Miles]

I'm sorry this post isn't more timely, but I just stumbled upon the article and feel compelled to pile praise on Liz Williams.

Working with Liz was an incredible experience. Her creativity and mastery are evident when you see her work. But if you are fortunate enough to work with her, you see she is also gifted with immense patience, wisdom and humor.

Almost three years later, it is still a thrill to walk into our building. It is stylish and functional (and was done on a limited budget). Thanks again, Liz.

Raye Miles, President
Broadway Cab