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  #1561  
Old Posted Apr 14, 2012, 3:03 PM
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Great news for an incredible site. We can hope the best for the design and it would be an incredible opportunity for some height to capture views above the tree line of the park.
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  #1562  
Old Posted Apr 14, 2012, 3:46 PM
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Well designed mixed use
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by bvpcvm View Post
Apartment building proposed at former Powell's Technical Books site in the Pearl District

http://www.oregonlive.com/front-porc...lanned_at.html

tl;dr - 7 stories, LRS
Let's hope for a good design. LRS is not always so inspiring. That said, what a great site. The North Park Blocks is perhaps the most under-realized part of Downtown. The potential there is incredible given the proximity, the green space, and the building stock.
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  #1563  
Old Posted Apr 14, 2012, 11:10 PM
philopdx philopdx is offline
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Vestas HQ update 4-14-2012:

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  #1564  
Old Posted Apr 15, 2012, 9:37 AM
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With more housing and retail this area could easily become one of the most vibrant and desirable places to live/hang out.
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  #1565  
Old Posted Apr 15, 2012, 5:58 PM
PDX City-State PDX City-State is offline
Well designed mixed use
 
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Originally Posted by Grantenfuego View Post
With more housing and retail this area could easily become one of the most vibrant and desirable places to live/hang out.
Very true, but the area need more larger destination retail--like the REI and Safeway a few blocks away. A lot of the small retailers in the North Pearl don't do very well because there's not enough foot traffic. It would be great to see some larger players in the neighborhood.
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  #1566  
Old Posted Apr 18, 2012, 4:12 AM
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ArtHouse | 65(?) feet | 6 floors | UC

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  #1567  
Old Posted Apr 18, 2012, 5:13 AM
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Whoa. Anyone know about Lever?

""We're all very aware that could change in a heartbeat," Powell said. "We don't want to be on the other end of that."

^^^ wise man
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  #1568  
Old Posted Apr 18, 2012, 7:10 AM
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The principle at Lever is ex-Allied Works, and the jury at the last AIA Portland awards couldn't say enough nice things about their Animation Studio in California (front page of their website). So.... may turn out somewhat better than PSU's efforts.
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  #1569  
Old Posted Apr 18, 2012, 2:47 PM
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Maybe Brad Cloepfil will be the Rem Koolhas of the PNW and crank out talent.
Smart project for student housing. It happens on the crossroads of the park blocks to PSU and Powells for research.
I admit though at first glance the image of this project reminded me of the Marriott project by SERA near the USBank tower. I am pretty confident, that whoever made this choice, this is a good project for LRS to team up on.
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  #1570  
Old Posted Apr 18, 2012, 8:42 PM
zilfondel zilfondel is offline
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Quote:
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Maybe Brad Cloepfil will be the Rem Koolhas of the PNW and crank out talent.
Maybe? He already is. Relatively speaking.
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  #1571  
Old Posted Apr 19, 2012, 2:28 AM
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Maybe? He already is. Relatively speaking.
Time will tell.
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  #1572  
Old Posted Apr 19, 2012, 4:44 AM
philopdx philopdx is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by crow View Post
Maybe Brad Cloepfil will be the Rem Koolhas of the PNW and crank out talent.
Smart project for student housing. It happens on the crossroads of the park blocks to PSU and Powells for research.
I admit though at first glance the image of this project reminded me of the Marriott project by SERA near the USBank tower. I am pretty confident, that whoever made this choice, this is a good project for LRS to team up on.
Ah-ha! I KNEW it looked familiar but I couldn't put my finger on it! Take the Marriott and throw in a just a pinch of the geometry of the Weave and there you have it.
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  #1573  
Old Posted Apr 19, 2012, 6:27 AM
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Thanks Mark for changing the title of the thread..
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  #1574  
Old Posted Apr 19, 2012, 5:20 PM
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Patricia Gardner, I love you.

Art student dorm planned for North Park Blocks
POSTED: Wednesday, April 18, 2012 at 02:41 PM PT
BY: Lee Fehrenbacher, DJC

Sometime next year, the North Park Blocks corridor may see an influx of artistic students leisurely strolling to classes, lounging at cafés and displaying their work along Northwest Park Avenue.

The Pacific Northwest College of Art is teaming up with Powell’s Books and Project Ecological Development to replace Powell’s vacant technical bookstore building at 33 N.W. Park Ave. with a uniquely designed, seven-story dormitory structure. The site is near both the Museum of Contemporary Craft and the historic U.S. Post Office building, which is being converted into PNCA teaching space.

“Having this residence hall five blocks away from our flagship campus really anchors this creative corridor of the North Park Blocks,” said Kavin Buck, vice president of enrollment services for PNCA. “It’s going to really activate the blocks, but it’s going to really help us with both our recruitment of students – over half our students come from out of state – and will help with retention and bring this collegiate life into the art school.”

PNCA has slightly fewer than 600 students, but is the fastest-growing independent art school in the nation, Buck said. The 103-year-old college has added five graduate programs in the past five years and plans to increase enrollment to 1,000 students by 2018. The new dorm building will have 60 apartments and be able to house 144 students.

Construction of the $7 million building – which Powell’s will own and lease to the college – is an exciting prospect for PNCA, but design review may be a big hurdle.

On Tuesday, the development team and LEVER Architecture presented a somewhat radical building design to the Pearl District Neighborhood Association. The proposed 55,000-square-foot structure would have an angular shape with a non-reflective, metallic facade to accentuate light and shadow through irregularly deflected surfaces.

“It’s sort of shaped by light,” LEVER Architecture founder Thomas Robinson said during the presentation. “What we wanted to do is deflect the facades a little bit to open up the building to light. When it deflects it gets a different color because of the way the light hits it.”

The neighborhood association approved the design unanimously and enthusiastically, but Patricia Gardner, the association’s vice president, said the city’s Design Review Commission may not follow suit at its May 3 meeting.

“I am tired of seeing really nice buildings get ruined by the design commission,” she said. “I am going to this meeting to tell them if they ruin this building we will protest.”

Robinson said he tried to extend the use of natural light to the interior as well in order to turn the hallways on each floor into gallery space for students. He said he took cues from other historic buildings downtown, such as the Ace Hotel. A Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold rating will be sought for the project, which calls for installing an interior courtyard as well as rain gardens to capture stormwater.

The building also may activate the street corner with a café and two retail spaces.

“I think a lot of buildings along the Park Blocks … they’re right next to the park, but they don’t have that inside-outside relationship, and so (we are) really creating a transparent ground floor that activates the streetscape,” said Anyeley Hallová, partner at Project Ecological Development.

The project also requires demolition of Powell’s existing warehouse. Emily Powell, the company president and CEO, said that while the vacant building held sentimental value for her family, the proposed project was a much richer use for the property.

“I walk into our main store and to me it smells like my grandfather – no one else probably has that connection,” she said during the meeting. “We looked at options (for the warehouse) and this was the best. The technical store’s history is a little less romantic.”

She said the team was considering whether to preserve the “Powell’s Technical Books” sign and display it inside the building.

The group hopes to begin construction by mid-November and anticipates a move-in date of August 2013. A Design Review Commission hearing is scheduled for May 3 at 1:30 p.m. at the Portland Bureau of Development Services building at 1900 S.W. Fourth Ave.
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  #1575  
Old Posted Apr 19, 2012, 5:47 PM
zilfondel zilfondel is offline
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Well, its in the Pearl District, and they didn't use brick as the main facade material.

$200 says it'll be denied.
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  #1576  
Old Posted Apr 19, 2012, 7:36 PM
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I thought the Pearl started a bit west of the north Park Blocks... or am I misinterpreting where this is?

I love the concept, but the building itself isn't THAT special. I hope it doesn't get turned down, but a bit more design work would do this one some good. It's hard to see what the ground story looks like, but the way the 2nd story meets the ground story looks... well... there's no connection between the two. And I'd fear the metal is going to look cheap when completed. If that's not the case, then I'd be all for it. But I'd bet the metal is going to look cheap, as is so often the case these days. Sadly.
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  #1577  
Old Posted Apr 20, 2012, 5:28 AM
maccoinnich maccoinnich is offline
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Officially, Broadway is the eastern edge of the Pearl, but I always think of the Park Blocks themselves as the boundary.
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  #1578  
Old Posted Apr 20, 2012, 10:58 AM
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European details inspire North Park Blocks project

North Park Blocks looking like it has some great future potential
-------------------------------------------------------
European details inspire North Park Blocks project
POSTED: Thursday, April 19, 2012 at 01:04 PM PT
BY: Lindsey O'Brien on DJC Oregon


Photo by Sam Tenney/DJC


Rendering courtesy of Siteworks Design | Build

...The renovation and addition under way on the corner of Northwest Everett Street and Park Avenue is part of a larger vision to re-energize the North Park Blocks...

... Siteworks Design | Build began renovating the 10,000-square-foot building in March. Crews gutted it and installed a huge structural system featuring steel and concrete. When work wraps up this summer, the space will be divided into two ground-floor office spaces – for Acme Business Consulting and actor representative group Talent Direct – along with a restaurant and a second-story rooftop bar....

rest of the story...
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  #1579  
Old Posted Apr 20, 2012, 5:09 PM
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Good start
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  #1580  
Old Posted Apr 21, 2012, 3:47 AM
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Awesome they are doing this, there's so much potential in this area.
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