A conversation with SRG Partnership's Jon Schleuning (part 1)

Jon Schleuning (image courtesy SRG Partnership)

BY BRIAN LIBBY

Last fall, SRG Partnership co-founder Jon Schleuning received the 2014 Medal of Honor from the American Institute of Architects' Northwest & Pacific Region, awarded to architects who have demonstrated excellence in design, architectural education, or service to the profession while promoting public understanding of architects and architecture.

Founded in 1972, SRG Partnership has distinguished itself over the decades with experience in both historic preservation and in new construction, with an emphasis on sustainability and research. SRG's projects usually aren't flashy, but they possess a timelessness and rigor that reflects the wisdom of Schleuning and a team including principals like Kent Duffy and Dennis Cusack.

SRG's first project was the master plan for Johns Landing (in conjunction with John Storrs), which launched SRG’s reputation for planning and urban design. It was soon followed by the Lower Willamette Management Plan for the Port of Portland—the first successful strategic policy plan approved by local, state and national agencies for 16 miles of river use and shoreline development. The firm has overseen renovations to both the Washington and Oregon state capitol buildings, created high-tech facilities for like Intel and Fujitsu, popular public facilities like the Oregon Coast Aquarium and Mount St. Helens Visitors Center, and leading-edge green buildings like the Lillis Business Complex at the University of Oregon, Bellevue City Hall, Shriners Hospital in Honolulu, and numerous works for the University of California system.

In the early 1980s, SRG also served as architect of record in partnership with lead architect Arthur Erickson as one of the three finalists for the Portland Building commission. SRG's work is perhaps the opposite of the Michael Graves-designed building that was ultimately constructed, but as I saw at a recent dinner for Graves when the architect was in town last year for a public talk with Randy Gragg, Schleuning could not have been more gracious towards his more famous colleague.

Schleuning also has a long record civic involvement, including his presidency of the City Club of Portland and numerous review boards for Pioneer Square, Pioneer Place, and the Portland Performing Arts Center.

Recently I met with Schleuning to talk about his career and his passion for architecture.

Portland Architecture: After growing up in Portland, you originally studied at Yale University under famous names like Josef Albers and Vincent Scully, and got to meet Eero Saarinen. Yet you ultimately transferred to the University of California at Berkeley. What attracted you there?

Schleuning: I went through architecture school in that brief period of time where behavioral science suddenly was taking off. Yale’s program was in transition and UC Berkeley had just developed the College of Environmental Design. We were looking at prisons and all kinds of spaces that shaped people’s lives in a constructive way. I was just passionate about it.

What are your memories of working on the Portland Building competition?

It was an interesting time. I don’t see it as a high point or pivotal moment in my career. The Portland Building is probably midway from where I started and where I am today. It came at the end of a period of very intense public involvement that I felt was fundamental to what architecture was about -- cities and people and streets. It was also at a time when we had a lot of urban renewal work, the Portland Development Commission was really powerful, and there was a lot of federal money. So our firm was doing urban design studies for Morrison Street and Pioneer Courthouse Square and things like that. There was an intense interest in the public sector and the public domain. Portland, with its small blocks, has 33 percent of the land in public ownership; so you’re dealing with small chunks of real estate. At the time when other cities were building blockbuster, mega-buildings, Portland was still locked in. And it was a blessing.

When we approached the Portland Building, here was a chance for a public building that had some legitimacy to it. We were excited and delighted to be a part of one of the teams. Erickson had been doing some lovely work and had just finished the anthropology museum at UBC. He was a wonderful man, but we just didn’t have enough of his attention. I don’t think any of the three finalists’ projects were really successful. BOORA had an interesting one with Mitchell Giurgola. It was introverted with a big interior space. In our design, Arthur had the big strand that cut through the middle. It was a great idea that we didn’t really incorporate in any convincing matter, but it was a great idea. There were view corridors through the building. Buildings weren’t barricades, and especially public ones. Buildings were meant to have a porosity to them, especially on the lower levels. The Portland Building doesn’t accomplish that. I don’t think the Erickson building did it well. But to end up with a building that was really more pivotal stylistically rather than architecturally, that was [disappointing].

Arthur Erickson/SRG Portland Building entry (image courtesy SW Oregon Architect)

Why do you think that was?

Part of it was the way the competition was set up. Which gets back to where we are today, in that often there’s a predetermination of what needs to be done without a careful analysis by the right people—not that it has to be only by architects. But architects and urban planners ought to be involved in figuring out what should be done. My mantra is not, ‘What can be done?’ We can do almost anything now. It’s, ‘What should be done?’ That’s the moral imperative that makes sure architecture is not just a commodity. If there’s no moral imperative then we’re cranking out shoes or refrigerators or cars. When you get to that point, someone says, ‘Here’s what I want to do. Do it for me.’ Yet it’s that incredible creative aspect that the design professions bring, to say, ‘What if we did something different? Not for the sake of being different, but let’s turn it upside-down and look at it and see if maybe there’s something we were missing.’ The responsibility of architects today is to get to the decision-makers before they make the decision. It’s being on the policy side so you’re able to say, ‘Instead of doing that building, maybe we should do a smaller addition and two renovations.’

You seem to think as much like an urban planner as you do as an architect.

I remember when I was working with [former Portland Mayor Neil] Goldschmidt on Pioneer Place. We got down to the three finalists and visited with them. We had all the boards and presentation materials. Neil had moved to DC [to be the US Secretary of Transportation] and came back. I said, ‘Do you want to see what we chose?’ We were really excited about this three-block development downtown and these great boards that Rouse had developed. Neil came in and said, ‘It looks great. But what are you doing about JC Penney? What are you doing about the old bookstore?’ He was two steps ahead of everyone. He said, ‘This is great, but it doesn’t help the city if it puts JC Penney out of business or you lose JK Gill.’ You’re looking at a bigger chessboard. And you’re trying to get people to say, ‘I know you need that 60,000 square feet but think of what the next move is. Don’t make a move that two moves down the line will not allow you to do something even more spectacular. And there’s a lot of good examples of that, where people are rushing into what I would call premature decisions. Part of what we need to do as architects is step back and say, ‘We’re imaginative people. Let’s use our imaginations.’

How have things changed over your career with respect to that kind of civic planning and ambition?

Twenty years ago, the public sector had a lot more money. They brought more dollars to the table. Once the money dried up and they became facilitators of the city rather than real leaders You’d ask, ‘What’s the big move?’ We had the Blazers or a baseball team looking to relocate. There were civic things motivated by the fact that the public sector needed more than just talk. Once they were undercut financially, they lost their nerve in some ways. I was lucky enough to participate in a time that was about leveraging what you did have. The attitude was not, ‘What can you do?’ or ‘What can’t you do?’ It was, ‘What should you do?’ It wasn’t restrictive. It was, ‘How do we solve it?’

UO's Lillis Business Complex (photo by Lara Swimmer)

I remember being on the planning team for the first part of South Waterfront. We the best economic resource consultants out of Los Angeles and San Francisco. They said, ‘Housing just won’t work.’ We said, ‘Well, we want housing .’ They said, ‘It just won’t work.’ We sat at the table and finally at one of the meetings with Larry Dully, who was leading the process for PDC, we said, ‘we’re asking the wrong question.’ So we turned to the economists and said, ‘Assume that housing is an integral part of what we do. Tell us what we have to do to accomplish it.’ Don’t just say what works, because we’ll just get the same formula. And they came up with some creative ideas that allowed housing to proceed. Previously the best thing they suggestsed was a shopping center. Give us a break!

SRG's offices overlook Pioneer Courthouse Square from a classic A.E. Doyle-designed building from the early 20th century. How does the urban setting outside your window reflect the kind of work you like to embrace as planner and architect?

It speaks to the power of mid-rise high density. You look at the differences between what’s happening in South Waterfront and what’s happening in the earlier portions of the Pearl District. The mid-rise high density allows me to sit here and see people’s faces. This time of year you’ll start getting the guitarist on the corner or the bell-ringer for Christmas. You talk about connectivity. I practiced for a year and a half on the 16th floor of what was the Georgia Pacific building where you don’t have that kind of connectivity.

When you talk about density from and urban point of view, the important part is you want not only this visual connectivity, but also the physical connectivity. If you have to walk 400 feet before you can turn 90 degrees, that’s not successful. You’ve got to be able to move laterally and be able to have greater choice. When you do that you’ve got shafts of light coming in, you’ve got some other view corridors. It’s not just about low-rise or high-rise or mid-rise. The density is the denominator that makes the urbanism.

What do you love best about the job and what is your skillset?

I’m practicing today because it’s probably the most exciting period in 50 years. There’s no real dominant ideology, so everything can be evenly examined. We’ve got technology at levels unperceived when I began in the early parts of the profession. We’re able to visualize in animations all kinds of situations. We’re able to test lighting and glare. Just the whole technical level is at a point where we can look at issues in a much more intellectual manner than just intuitively.

Washington Legislative Building renovation (photos by Laura Swimmer)

The second aspect is the profile of the people you work with. When I started in Berkeley in the early ‘60s, the joke was that only the plumbers had less diversity than architects. Architecture was just a bunch of gray old men. Now, just take a look. I cannot practice today without being surrounded by people of all ages, nationalities, and different skills. Never before has it been more collaborative or more team-oriented.

You know the famous story of Edgar Kaufman getting ticked off at Frank Lloyd Wright and wanting to see how the house was coming. He got on the phone and said, ‘I’m getting in my car and I’m going to be up there in three hours.’ Wright had been doing other things and procrastinating. He sat down wildly for a few hours, and Fallingwater appeared by the time Kaufman arrived. We don’t have that today. It’s not within the mind of one person. So what you require are really great team players and collaborators.

I pride myself on having been around long enough to know that I’m an idea person. I’m not a detail person. You can talk about craft and say how wonderful craft is, and you’ll put me to sleep sooner or later. And that’s why we have people that really can do that well. I’m more interested in putting together combinations of things that haven’t been done before. ‘Why not have the psychologist in the office.’ Why not do this or why shouldn’t other things occur?’ It’s that ‘What if?’ aspect that generates new ideas. That, plus working with the creative people we have. We’ve never had stronger talent than right now – in our office or in the profession.