Eleven West | 291' | 24 floors | Complete
 

Another week, another potential tower. ZGF Architects have scheduled a Pre-Application Conference to discuss a project at 1116 SW Washington St:

Washington is about to become ZGF street! I'm fine with that - their work is great.

Not 100% sure what site this is. Is this the parking lot on the north side of Washington, the two-floor garage on the south side, or the vacant lot on the south side?

This appears to be vacant lot/parking lot--both owned by the Goodmans. This one has been rumored to be in play for awhile--the so-called "11W" building that is a match for "12W," now the Indigo.

Great news if that's the case!

This is the site listed on the intake:

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b112/m...793142abad679cdd72ea287e_zpsmxyscop5.png

I assume the project includes the adjacent taxlots, which are currently being used for surface parking.

Oh, yes! Please let this be a 1/2 block project! I do love the new mural that would end up being covered up... but I'd be thrilled to see that vacant lot get developed, especially if it's done by ZGF.

A ZGF District to complement the WorksPA District on East Burnside.

325' cap, yes?

Stop with the ZGF lovefest already! Sure, on the whole they do good work. Even inspirational on occasion. The big airport canopy...

...what else, help me out here. The east facade of the Eliot... the Temple Building... no wait, that's not theirs... the Indigo is nice, but it's their HQ so of course they were fully engaged there, in marked contrast I might add to their most recent high-profile project here in PDX. Hopefully the dude (or dudess) responsible for that bling-wrapped dud is now happily employed in Vladivostok.

Designing jewelry stores.

ZGF is a big firm with many large projects in lots of different places. The question is how much energy and attention would they expend at any given time on projects here in little 'ol PDX? I'd have much more confidence in TVA doing something interesting. Or what about Allied Works? They never seem to get a shot at high-rise projects such as these.

Please note that the disappointing residential tower nearing completion in the Pearl District was produced by the Seattle office of ZGF. I believe it would have been a better building if ZGF Portland had designed it.

For starters... (and perspective is important when talking about 20, 30 or 40-year old architecture):

KOIN Center
Justice Center
World Trade Center
OMSI
VA Hospital
Umpqua Bank Building
Columbia Square
Boise Cascade Building (whatever it's called now days)
Station work on the west side MAX line
BPA Admin Headquarters
Oregon Convention Center
Almost every Kaiser building in the State of Oregon
Doernbecher Children’s Hospital
And the list goes on and on....

The KOIN Tower might be their best work. But will someone please repaint the faded blue top.

Hmm. Wonder why the hometown squad wouldn't want to have this for themselves? Am I wrong in thinking that this was one of their more prominent projects here since KOIN? Certainly one of the tallest since then.

Especially since they will have to look at it, every day.

I'm assuming here...but Unico is based in Seattle and probably already has a working relationship with ZGFs Seattle based office. I don't think ZGF would have had a choice, but who knows? :shrug:

That is a safe bet, if the Seattle office had been courting this project, it wouldn't make sense for them to give it up to the Portland office just because it was in Portland. I imagine if the Portland office got to design a new tower in downtown Seattle, they wouldn't pass it off to the Seattle branch either.

Yeah but where's the common sense? PDX isn't just another branch office, it's their galactic HQ right? The flagship location for their architectural empire! I would hope that either Z, G or F – heck maybe all 3 of them – would want to ensure that a significant project here on home turf with their name attached to it would pass muster. Now you're telling me Seattle is involved... well doesn't that beat all, those guys are our arch-enemy! I mean think about it, they even went to the trouble of rotating the damn tower such that residents would be forced to stare directly at the pallid reflection of their own building in BORA's majestic glass palace two blocks away! This explains everything. Even the bling (Emerald City!). Talk about rubbing our nose in it!!

First they steal Tazo, screw up the package design, and boot it out of the most profitable coffee shop on the planet... now this humiliation! We can't even laugh at their nightmarish traffic anymore.

If they were going to pass the NV along to another office it should have been Des Moines or Buffalo... anyone but Seattle! We can only hope the same fate doesn't befall these other local projects.

Of Z, G and F, only Bob Frasca is still a partner and he is all but retired. Brooks Gunsul is retired, and very old. Norm Zimmer passed away 22 years ago.

In the 1970's the firm's name was Wolff, Zimmer, Gunsul, Frasca, Ritter. I remember being impressed that the front desk receptionist could get all that out for every incoming call. Wolff died a long time ago. Not sure what happened to Ritter after he left the firm (around 1980, I think).

All of you need to get yourselves updated. ZGF's managing partner is in the Los Angeles office. The founding office in Portland is still the largest base of the firm and much of the firm's talent is in Portland. But it is a highly collaborative organization that distributes decision-making. The NV was the Seattle team's project.