Janten building, NE Sandy Boulevard (image courtesy Architectural Heritage Center)
BY BRIAN LIBBY
Jane Burry: Designing The Dynamic
Dynamic feedback is one of the challenges of the hour – how can designers see the performance effects of design options in real-time? This lecture by Jane Burry Burry, Ph.D., who directs the Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory (SIAL) in the School of Architecture and Design at RMIT University in Melbourne will explore how a phenomenal approach to the qualities of atmosphere, sound, heat, air movement and even people, enriches architectural design processes and outcomes through real time feedback. Novel ways to collect and process data help create design environments in which designers can build intuition while designing. University of Oregon, White Stag Block, 70 NW Couch Street. 5:30PM Wednesday, June 17. Free.
Walking tour: Modernism and Beyond - The Architecture of Downtown
Downtown Portland contains an abundance of post-World War II architecture by some of the leading architects and firms of their time. This Architectural Heritage Center walking tour explores the northern portion of the central business district, with five buildings by Belluschi including his most famous of all, the Equitable (now called the Commonwealth) building from 1946, the nation's first office tower with an aluminum and glass curtain wall. Other stops include the work of noted architects and firms like Richard Sundeleaf; Skidmore, Owings & Merrill; and ZGF Architects. The tour will also focus on three modern public plazas and try to figure out reasons for success or failure of those designs. Tour begins at the northeast corner of SW 6th Avenue and Oak Street. 6PM Thursday, June 18. $20 ($12 for AHC members).
CPID Talks: Killian Doherty - The Architect As Spatial Practitioner
Northern Ireland architect Killian Doherty heads Architectural Field Office, a small collaborative practice. His research interests lie within the exploration of fragmented sites, settlements, and cities at specific thresholds of racial, ethnic, or religious conflict. Doherty's lecture, part of the Center for Public Interest Design at Portland State University's CPID Talks brownbag series, will examine the idea of architects as spatial practitioners. For the past five years he has worked on a number of post-conflict reconstruction projects in Sierra Leone and Rwanda. He is registered for a PhD by Design at the Bartlett School of Architecture (UCL) where he is working with an indigenous community in Rwanda and trying to work through the architect as social spatial practitioner, as opposed to designer of buildings. Portland State University, Shattuck Hall, corner of SW Broadway and Hall Street, Room 217. 12PM Friday, June 19. Free.
Walking tour: From Soda Pop To Swimwear - The Commercial & Industrial Architecture Of Sandy Boulevard
Sandy Boulevard has a long history of commercial and industrial architecture with styles ranging from Brick Utilitarian to Brutalism – all with a generous supply of Streamline and Zig Zag Moderne in between. This Architectural Heritage Center walking tour takes a closer look at a surprising section of the city; an area that hosts some of the city’s most notable businesses. Attendees will also see firsthand how the automobile played a major role in the form and style of 20th century architecture. Tour begins atNE 14th Avenue and Couch Street, outside former Portland Bottling Company building. 10AM Saturday, June 20. $20 ($12 for AHC members).
Walking tour: Portland Vernacular - The Buckman Neighborhood
Buckman is one of the city’s oldest Eastside neighborhoods with a variety of vernacular housing types beginning with late 19th century cottages through the building boom years of the early 20th century when the bungalow and four-square were popular citywide. You’ll even see some early duplex and triplex houses that give Buckman a unique character as well as post-World War II multi-unit housing. Tour begins at SE 14th Avenue and Alder Street, behind Washington High School. 11AM Sunday, June 21. $20 ($12 for AHC members).
Walking tour: Portland's Historic Goldsmith Addition Homes
The fourth annual Walking Tour of Historic Homes will devote to improvements in accessibility for the disabled at the NW Neighborhood Cultural Center, home of NW Children’s Theater & School and other organizations. Inspiration for this year’s tour is the saved and soon to be restored Goldsmith Home, but the tour will also include several historic homes north of Lovejoy Street built between 1892 and 1911. The Goldsmith Home, the family home built by Portland’s first Jewish mayor, Bernard Goldsmith, was designed by one of Portland’s most gifted architects, Edgar Lazarus, who also designed the US Customs House and Pioneer Courthouse in Portland as well as Vista House at Crown Point along the Columbia Gorge Scenic Highway. Losing the Goldsmith Home would have been an unspeakable tragedy, but thanks to 10 neighbors that pooled funds in chunks of $100-$800,000, this home was saved. Tour begins at Northwest Neighborhood Cultural Center, 1819 NW Everett Street. 11AM Sunday, June 21. $25.
Watzek House (photo by Brian Libby)
Father's Day Watzek House Tour
Perhaps the most architecturally significant house in Oregon, the Watzek House (now owned and operated by the University of Oregon's John Yeon Center) is only available for tours a few times each summer. But its architecture, and the story behind it, make this Father's Day tour and talk a special opportunity. The lumber baron Aubrey Watzek and an ambitious young designer, John Yeon, skied and climbed together. The older Watzek used his political connections to help Yeon stop a state road engineer from devastating Neahkahnie Mountain. And in in 1936, Watzek gave the 26-year-old Yeon, with no formal training, the architectural commission of his life. For Yeon, whose father died in 1928, Watzek served as inspiration, mentor, and patron. Yeon Center director Randy Gragg and Blue Sky Gallery director Todd Tubutis will a tour of the Watzek House, along with a look at vintage photographs of it published worldwide. (A second tour will be held on July 9.) Watzek House, 1061 SW Skyline Boulevard. 1PM Sunday, June 21. $40.
Architects Without Borders: a report from Haiti
Earlier this month a Pro Publica/NPR story revealed the failure of Red Cross aid efforts in Haiti in the years following the 2010 earthquake. Nick Troutt, an Architects Without Borders volunteer, lives in Haiti eight months out of the year, teaching English and training masons who work on AWB-designed schools such as the Bon Repos Orphanage, located in a suburb of Port-au-Prince, which the chapter working to repair and perform a seismic upgrade. At this month’s open meeting Troutt will describe his experiences and answer questions about the challenges of living, working, and volunteering in Haiti. AIA Center for Architecture, 403 NW 11th Avenue. 6PM Wednesday, June 24. Free.
Walking tour - the Garthwick neighborhood
Located just south of Sellwood and north of the Waverly Country Club, this hidden residential neighborhood provided a great outdoor laboratory for architects and builders working in the most popular residential styles of the 20th century. This Architectural Heritage Center tour explores one of Southeast Portland's lesser-known historic neighborhoods. Tour begins at SE 17th Avenue and Ochoco Street, 6PM Wednesday, June 24. $20 ($12 for AHC members).
Walking tour: The Pearl District - Preservation In The Midst Of Change
Over the last 20 years, the Pearl has been transformed from an outdated and tired industrial area into one of Portland’s premier residential and retail districts. A century ago, the area went through a similar transformation, from a working class housing area at the edge of a marsh, to the city’s premier industrial and warehousing area. As this Architectural Heritage Center tour will demonstrate, many of Portland’s best known architects of the period designed buildings for important local and national companies. Most of these buildings remain, with their exteriors intact and new uses inside. Tour begins at SE corner of NW 10th and Johnson - near the Portland Streetcar stop. 6PM Thursday, June 25. $20 ($12 for AHC members).
James Beard Public Market: Grand Reveal
Architects from the famed Norwegian firm Snøhetta will be on hand as designs are unveiled for the James Beard Public Market, set to occupy a waterfront spot along Naito Parkway between two curving Morrison Bridge ramps. Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, 1945 SE Water Avenue. 6:30PM Thursday, June 25. Free.
Walking tour: The South Park Blocks - A Cultural Mandate
This eleven-block downtown area was first platted and donated to the City in 1852, transforming a fire break parcel into the most desirable residential area of its day –complete with schools, playgrounds, stately homes and places of worship. Attendees on this Architectural Heritage Center walking tour will demonstrate, the South Park Blocks stand alone in the central city as a place of revitalization, refreshment and cultural allure. Tour meets outside the First Congregational Church, 1126 SW Park Avenue. 11AM Sunday, June 28. $20 ($12 for AHC members).
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re: James Beard Public Market. It will be interesting to see what kind of design solutions Snohetta can muster for a site that is less than satisfactory. (For the sake of brevity we will leave aside all the dumbfounding symbolic implications of siting a Portland identity institution in a stranglehold of auto traffic a la 1960's interstate invasion.) A Public Market must have a clearly defined entrance accessible by common pathways. Without removing the ramps one must either cross Naito (not a common path for most) or a bridge over the max tracks BEHIND a new office tower. My guess is they will reveal designs based upon ramp removal. Then the monumental task of ramp removal will further delay groundbreaking. I would really love to see the Public reveal but according to the JBPM website they are full and will not allow anyone else to view the plans. Let's hope the market--if it comes to fruition--is able to successfully overcome the present site selection and public process.
Posted by: David Dysert | June 18, 2015 at 02:16 PM