A Berkemeier house in Beaumont/Wishire (image courtesy Jack Bookwalter)
BY BRIAN LIBBY
This Saturday, architectural historian Jack Bookwalter will discuss one of Portland’s most distinguished residential architects of the 20th century. “Artistry in Brick: The Distinctive Mid-Century Homes of Ken Birkemeier” is an encore presentation of Bookwalter’s sold-out talk from last year.
Ken Birkemeier’s career spanned the 1930s to the 1970s as part of the post World War II building boom in Portland, which presented many opportunities for architects and builders to express their own interpretation of the “modern” home. Birkemeier, who was both a designer and builder, saw approximately 700 homes and apartment units constructed in Portland over his career. Although he is credited with building colonial, English, and conventional ranch-style homes, it is the “Birkemeier Modern” house that remains his most recognizable house style today. They were largely made of brick, but also possessed elements of avant-garde or whimsical detailing. These “houses of tomorrow,” as Birkeemeier often called them, looked forward to an optimistic future of technological promise. Some of his houses seem quite futuristic even today, or at least they possess a kind of retro-futurism that, born of 20th Century icons like the New York World’s Fair of 1939 or the space program of the ‘50s and ‘60s, continues to captivate.
A Birkemeier house in Irvington (image courtesy Jack Bookwalter)
Although Birkemeier houses can be found throughout the Portland metro area, the largest concentrations are in inner Northeast neighborhoods like Alameda, Irvington, and Rose City Park. Smaller concentrations can be found in Southeast Portland around Reed College as well as in Northwest Portland.
Although these homes were usually built on vacant infill lots, many Birkemeier houses though were built on challenging hillside land that had been passed over during earlier rounds of neighborhood construction. Birkemeier benefited from advances in construction technology that made such hillside construction possible by the 1950s.
“But the true genius of his hillside houses,” Bookwalter writes, “ies in his artful use of land planning. Each house was tailor-made to the site, often fitting it as smoothly as a hand inside a glove. Carefully designed rock retaining walls were often incorporated into the overall design of the building. Also, a towering hillside site could accent the drama of a Birkemeier futuristic house.”
A Birkemeier house in the West Hills (image courtesy Jack Bookwalter)
Most Birkemeier Modern houses were built (at least partially) of Roman brick, showing the influence of Frank Lloyd Wright’s prairie house designs of the early 20th. “Birkemeier, together with his head mason Frank Snelling,” Bookwalter adds, “built fanciful designs into the brick walls: decorative ledges, rounded portholes, brick-courses laid in diagonal lines, rock interspersed with brick, and other interesting details. Frank Lloyd Wright’s influence can also be seen in Birkemeier’s open, flowing floor plans, great rooms with high ceilings, and in the meticulous care he took relating each house to its specific site.”
Besides being influenced by Wright and by Portland architect Pietro Belluschi, Birkemeier was additionally influenced by the Arts and Crafts movement, with many interior built-ins like those found in Craftsman houses of a generation before. Birkenmeier also rejected the 1950s trend toward painting natural wood. Influenced by Arts-and-Crafts style, he insisted on letting its natural beauty of the grain show through.
“Birkemeier’s post-war houses were modern. Yet he distilled the best elements of the past and incorporated them into his often-daring visions of the future,” Bookwalter adds. “Sadly, most middle-class housing built today provides neither the charm nor the workmanship of the past, nor any inspiring design vision of the future. The Birkemeier houses remain a treasure — a treasure for owners who live in them, and a treasure for Portland’s neighborhoods.”
The lecture begins at 10:00am at the Architectural Heritage Center (701 SE Grand) and there is an optional walking tour immediately afterward. Cost is $13 for AHC members and $18 for the general public.
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