Pearl District News

[bvpcvm]

weird. the courtyards appear to run north to south, but in several renderings the shadows indicate the sun is shining from the north. do architecture companies not pay any attention to this sort of thing?

[MarkDaMan]

Design for Pearl District hotel doesn’t impress city design commission
Lee Fehrenbacher By Lee Fehrenbacher, Daily Journal of Commerce
January 19th, 2012

It might be back to the drawing board for the team designing the Marriott Residence Inn in the Pearl District.

SERA Architects, led by Principal Kurt Schultz, presented early designs today of the six-story, 225-room, 170,000-square-foot hotel to the city of Portland’s Design Commission. The commission had a lot to say.

“My first reaction is that I’m struggling with it and I’m trying to figure out why,” said architect and commission member Katherine Schultz.

The design SERA put forth featured a U-shaped building with an interior courtyard and driveway. Deep gray concrete was offset by yellow perforated metal panels with a large golden-yellow, beacon-like tower anchoring the building on the northwest corner.

Walker Templeton of SERA said the team tried to take inspiration from striking and lively buildings around the world, presenting slides of various boldly shaped structures.

“Something that was very striking that hit us all right away is most of the neighborhood is dark brick, beige, steel and glass – lots of industrial,” Templeton said. “So right away we said ‘How can we maybe introduce some new material and a little more life into the neighborhood.’”

The design did not seem to be received well by the commission.

Schultz and the other commission members – including Chair Guenevere Millius, Vice Chair David Wark and Ben Kaiser – pointed to conflicting interests between the building’s colors, its imposing form and the neighborhood.

“I think the comments about how to make it feel less brooding and less heavy should be taken to heart,” Millius said.

During the meeting, the commission heard one public comment from Steve Bell, a resident of a building directly across the street from the proposed hotel. While not opposed to the project, Bell raised several concerns about the construction and design of the building – namely whether the courtyard could be rotated to face his street (Northwest Ninth Avenue) minimizing the effect of the building’s future shadow. Currently SERA has designed that courtyard to face the neighboring design firm Ziba.

“Primarily we’re concerned about how much light we get and how much view we can maintain,” Bell said. “As suggested, we are looking at a 70-foot wall … I understand that’s 30 feet below what it could be, but it’s still 70 feet.”

The hearing was a preliminary design advice request and is an optional meeting before SERA submits its official design for formal review, hearing and approval by the commission. No date has been scheduled for that hearing yet.

Also at the meeting, with considerably less discussion, the commission approved plans for the OHSU/OUS Collaborative Life Sciences Building in Portland’s South Waterfront neighborhood.

The commission has jurisdiction over the exterior look and massing of the building – including height, color, finishes and landscaping – and with the approval, construction of the building can now continue.

“I think it’s been almost eight months since our first design advisory review,” said Brian Newman with OHSU’s Campus Planning, Development & Real Estate department. “It’s been quite a journey from then to here and we all feel that the project has improved significantly because of your participation.”

During the presentation, Arnold Swanborn with CO Architects out of Los Angeles, and Lisa Peterson with SERA Architects, addressed some of the commission’s questions from an earlier meeting that had to do with the external façade and lighting in the parking garage.

Approval passed unanimously among the commissioners.

http://djcoregon.com/dailyblog/2012/...gn-commission/

[Derek]

I hate when they have articles like that, but don't put up the rendering. I live a couple blocks from that lot, I want to see this thing damn it!

[victor.cmyk]

Here is a link to a rendering + floor plan of the proposed Pearl Marriott.

http://www.portlandonline.com/bds/in...379888&c=42259

[2oh1]

It looks like a college dorm.

[cab]

Funny its an odd lot almost triangle and the architect found away to get two box shapes. That's almost difficult. These guys cannot get out of cubism or whatever they're doing with the generic box. Can we get something different already? Its like regurgitating the 90's over and over.

[tworivers]

cab, totally agree. Don't you think it's just embedded in the culture here, though? A combination of not a lot of money floating around plus provincial design sensibilities = developers without vision and architects without art?

Its like regurgitating the 90's over and over.

Insert Portlandia reference here

[tworivers]

Also, it doesn't look any worse than many of the infill projects we see going up around the city. And the architects had the balls to actually utilize the miracle of color (yellow, no less), something that strikes me as alarmingly rare in a climate such as ours...

[zilfondel]

I feel that the criticism coming from the design review board is rather lame - isn't the point of having a dense urban fabric to put up a "street wall?" I recall reading Portland design guidelines for streets suggested that designers attempt to accomplish the street wall. In fact, thats what makes any city feel "urban."

During the meeting, the commission heard one public comment from Steve Bell, a resident of a building directly across the street from the proposed hotel. While not opposed to the project, Bell raised several concerns about the construction and design of the building – namely whether the courtyard could be rotated to face his street (Northwest Ninth Avenue) minimizing the effect of the building’s future shadow. Currently SERA has designed that courtyard to face the neighboring design firm Ziba.

This guy is an idiot. We live in the Northern hemisphere. This means the sun shines light to the NORTH, not the WEST. This guy lives to the West of the building. Therefore, no shadows will be cast on his building except early in the morning during the summer - and only for a few hours, at most. By 10am, there will be no shadow. For the rest of the day, HIS building will cast a shadow on the hotel.

Portlanders want to neuter the urban environment, because they have no understanding of how buildings relate to the street environment.

Otherwise, I think the plan at least would be highly effective at bringing light into the interior courtyard. I'd hate to have a full-lot building this size not have light coming in from the interior.

I do agree that its pretty boxy... but thats SERA's calling card!

[Derek]

Originally Posted by victor.cmyk

Here is a link to a rendering + floor plan of the proposed Pearl Marriott.

http://www.portlandonline.com/bds/in...379888&c=42259

Ah thank you.


I think it could be better, but I don't think it's horrible.

[65MAX]

The solid street wall is perfectly appropriate for the Pearl. But really? MORE staggered windows?!! On a hotel?

This is the post-modernism of the early 21st century.

[crow]

Originally Posted by Derek

Ah thank you.


I think it could be better, but I don't think it's horrible.

It certainly is not horrible, but I think the roof line actually makes it look odd. The flat overhang just stacked on top wit the last floor dark...I get it, but perhaps a more simple roofline might help create a more elegant solution.

[tyroneshoelaces]

I think the goal of design review should be to keep the really bad stuff from being built. If it is minimally "ok" the design/development team should be able to do it the way they want to. There is nothing like spending months in design meetings going though various scenarios and coming up with what seems to work only to have some pin-head on 4th Ave want to do re-visit what you have already discarded. Sometimes they don't get it and sometimes they just didn't live though the process. Often some combination of those is responsible. Tall poppies don't even make it to the board because everyone knows they will be cut down.

The end result is beige boxes.

[M Kass]

@ tyroneshoelaces-- Well played, good sir.

[Eco_jt]

Rendering courtesy of SERA Architects
Image from DJC


Portland Online

So which rendering is it actually? Are these suppose to be the same? I live right across the street from this too, in the Lexis condos. When I moved in, I knew something was going to built there...you'd be stupid to think that your view was going to remain what it is forever. It's actually a saying I've heard from folks in the neighborhood "you can't buy a view in the Pearl"...eventually something will get built that blocks it. To me this is a good thing, more density, more of an urban environment, and more neighborhood vibrance.

I'm glad something is going to built here. I don't really mind the use of yellow here, but of these two images, I actually do like the top image.

I'm mostly excited that the project will bring more activity to this portion of 9th and 10th.

[New Madrid]

I have a hard time believing SERA would have the balls to bring the first rendering to the city. The second, watered down, airport hotel looking lump is more their style, no?

also: that north facade is awful. well, they're all pretty bad...

also: why was that djc article make such a point of what a "bold" shape the building was? maybe it's sort of triangular in plan (which is nearly impossible to appreciate from street level anyhow) but it's ON A TRIANGULAR SITE. If they'd plopped this building down on a square block maybe it would seem "bold" as it is it looks like they're just maximizing their budget.

meh.

[Shilo Rune 96]

Blick Art Materials moves to the Pearl District
By, PearlHelp.com Staff



Today the Pearl District art community just got better. With the addition of Blick Art Materials, visitors and residents of the Pearl will get access to all the art supplies they need. The retailer previously operated a store in downtown Portland off SW Yamhill street.

The Grand Opening was today, they cut the ribbon and the first 100 guests received gift bags full of art supplies valued at $100. Don't worry if you didn't make it today, the Grand Opening celebration continues through Thursday, February 8. You can expect exclusive discounts on art supplies.

With the addition of this retail outlet, Pacific Northwest College of Art thought it would be nice to create a partnership. They did just that. Students and faculty will be able to purchase anything from custom frames to general art materials. This location will also benefit The Art Institute of Portland, which is just four blocks away.

Blick Art is a national retailer with approximately 30 stores. The original catalog was issued in 1911, and was founded by Mr. and Mrs. Dick Blick. They ran the catalog-based business out of their home for many years.

For information about all the Grand Opening events and any future events visit Blick Art Materials online.


More photos available within the original post.

Via: PearlHelp.

[tworivers]

also: why was that djc article make such a point of what a "bold" shape the building was?

Ha. Perhaps it's the use of color in a design backwater like Portland? Or a backhanded dig at Sera's decidedly lackluster record?

I'm going to have a good laugh if what ends up getting built looks more like the bottom rendering (with the Marriott sign) than the top one because the honorable commissioners had a problem with its "conflicting interests" of color and "imposing form". Granted, I'm quoting a likely-incompetent DJC journalist rather than one of the commissioners themselves -- it would have been good for one of us to be there. I, for one, would have loved to have caught this part of the presentation: "Walker Templeton of SERA said the team tried to take inspiration from striking and lively buildings around the world, presenting slides of various boldly shaped structures." Surely amusing.

Seriously, the culture here sucks. Even worse because of how smug people are. I remember traveling across Spain and coming across a roadside hotel with a multitude of primary-colored panels for its skin. All I could think, besides admiring how a boxy hotel could be made interesting with such an eye-catching and, dare I say, bold use of color, was "damn, that would never get built in Portland": developers wouldn't want to step out of the box (pun intended), architects wouldn't think of it, neighbors would be up in arms, design commissioners would lay an egg... and we're all poorer for it.

[MarkDaMan]

^While I agree with you tworivers, I'm not terribly bothered by the safe architecture in the Pearl. The origins of the neighborhood was the re-purposing of warehouses into condos, and building new structures that mimicked the feel and design. A little Disney, if you will. The boldest architecture will probably ever be the Metropolitan, and while I hope for a more progressive design on the empty land toward the Fremont Bridge, no doubt the now established neighbors will complain about any proposed buildings that don't fit the established look. If that's what it takes to get the Lake Oswego people out of their McMansions and living in a dense, yet inauthentic neighborhood, I'm fine with it. The tourists that I bring to town eat it up.

BUT if the land south of the Marquam Bridge stretching to the Spaghetti Factory doesn't produce some world class architecture, I'll be extremely disappointed in Portland. I think the neighborhood is off to the right start, and am really encourage by the sidecar building on the new OHSU/PSU build.

[2oh1]

Is this the thread where we were talking about Hoyt's illegal parking lot in the Pearl?

The senior member of TriMet’s board said Wednesday that she knew her development company wasn’t allowed to pave a Pearl District parking lot when tenants started asking about it in 2008.

But the prominent Portland developer said she did it anyway, because she disagrees with the city’s ban on adding surface auto parking downtown.

Here's the article, from Portland Afoot.