Nothing new here for us, but good to see someone's paying attention.
Damn! Check This Building Out!
Willamette Week
March 8, 2007
Mike Thelin
Lower East Burnside is about to be stunned and shocked, but mostly just straight prettified. Next door to the Plaid Pantry on a once cracked-out corner along the busy thoroughfare, a spankin’ new seven-story building will rise from an empty lot later this spring. Designed by Portland’s Works Architecture Partnership, Bside6 may be tiny, but doesn't it look cool as all hell?
With a pocket-sized footprint of 3,800 square feet, Bside6 is dinky as commercial buildings go, covering less ground than an average residential lot in Portland (5,000 feet). Its north face will showcase a number of protruding glass bays that extend eight feet over the sidewalk, forming a dialogue with the arcades of existing historic buildings along the street. Their dispersed placement creates an asymmetrical pattern that appears to diminish the larger facade of the building, as Bside6 is a bit taller than anything around it, for now. If the PDC’s long-stalled dinosaur, the Burnside Bridgehead Mega-Complex Super Center, ever breaks ground, buildings as tall as 20 stories may pop up several blocks to the west.
The ground level of the building is slated for retail space, and Works Principal Bill Neburka says it’s well suited for a local fashion retailer or similar merchant. A number of the office spaces are already leased.
Certainly one of the most courageous pieces of pending Eastside PDX architecture, B-Side 6 will likely also be one of the most visible. Not only will you see it from various Westside vantage points, more than 40,000 cars pass the busy corner each day.