FAMOUS PROPERTIES
MODERNIzING A POSTMODERN MARVEL
Sustainable Initiatives at the Controversial Portland Building Give
Oregonians Something They Can Agree With
everyOne faMiliar with the
POrtland BuildinG has an OPiniOn
aBOut it. Love it or hate it, the Portland
Building in Portland, Ore., has been deemed
both an architectural icon and eyesore.
Built and designed by renowned architect
Michael Graves in 1982, the Portland Building
is one of the first major postmodern buildings
built in the country. Since its construction, the
building has been owned and operated by the
city of Portland, and currently houses a number
of municipal agencies.
As cities across the United States were
embracing the unornamented Modernist building designs defined by steel, glass and iron,
Portland’s city leaders wanted to build a municipal building that had its own unique look.
And unique it is. The 15-story building has an
almost kitschy quality with a bold color palate of
copper, red and blue against a sand-colored background. One side of the building is adorned in
stylized garland of blue concrete ribbons. In stark
contrast to Modernist principles, the Portland
Building’s windows are small and square.
“I always say it kind of looks like a cake,” said
Wendy Gibson, LEED AP, sustainable building
coordinator at the Portland Building. “It is much
more brightly colored than a lot of the other
buildings in the area. I have never seen a build-
ing that looks like it, for better or worse.”
One of the defining features of the build-
ing is Portlandia, an oversized copper statue
of a woman sitting above the building’s main
entrance. Sculptor Raymond Kaskey based the
Portlandia design on a figure in Portland’s city
seal. The statue has come to be a symbol in
the city, watching over passersby and greeting
visitors to the building. The 34-foot statue is the
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PORTLAND
second largest hammered copper statue in the
United States, after the Statue of Liberty in New
York City.
“With the building’s colors and with Portlandia
standing over us on top, this is not a building
that you pass by and forget,” Gibson said.
The building has been controversial since
its inception, with critics butting heads over
whether the Portland Building is, in fact, one of
the great iconic buildings of our time or a bad
architectural joke.
“For Portlanders, it is kind of funny,” Gibson
said. “Some people say it’s a great building; it put
Portland on the map, historically for architec-
ture. But then other people say it’s an eyesore.
Everyone definitely has an opinion.”
Locals aren’t the only ones with opinions. In
1985, the building received an honor from the
American Institute of Architects. Yet, 14 years
later, Travel + Leisure magazine named it as one
of the “world’s ugliest buildings.”
GOinG Green
Amid this seemingly unending controversy,
the city is seeking ways to modify the building
to bring it into the 21st century through a wide
range of sustainability initiatives. The city is
currently pursuing LEED for Existing Buildings
Silver Status for the building, and it recently
secured funding to get a commissioning to
evaluate the building’s operational systems, and
identify where and how the building can be
operated more efficiently.
Although the building is still in the early
stages of its LEED journey, the city has already
implemented a number of green programs. For
instance, a green roof was installed atop the
Portland Building in 2006 when its existing
