Old Town will land Oregon College of Oriental Medicine
The Oregonian – July 27, 2009
-- Fred Leeson, Special to The Oregonian
Imagine this: Portland's old Skid Road -- where inebriates used to roam the streets and the hungry still line up for free meals -- is becoming a magnet for institutions it once never dreamed would be interested.
The latest to feel the lure of Old Town is the Oregon College of Oriental Medicine.
The 25-year-old institution now based in east Portland will spend $13 million to $15 million to renovate the long-vacant former Import Plaza, just across the street from the new University of Oregon downtown center and an outfielder's throw from the new Mercy Corps headquarters.
When finished in September 2010, the revamped building -- which started life in 1911 as the Globe Hotel -- will be home to up to 350 students studying acupuncture, herbal medicines and other traditional tools of Chinese medicine. Some 2,500 patients will arrive for treatment each week, and students and passers-by will dine in a street-front restaurant.
Dr. Michael Gaeta, OCOM's president, says the college spent four years looking for a location that would provide more room and higher visibility.
He says the college looked on the east and west sides, including vacant school buildings. But it was the old Globe building that ended the search. "We'd be coming in on the ground floor, breathing new life into the neighborhood. It will give the college a state-of-the-art academic and research facility."
According to plans approved by the Portland Historic Landmarks Commission, the main entry will be moved from 88 N.W. Davis St. to the Couch Street side, which was the original hotel entrance. Architects will create period-accurate storefronts on Couch and First Avenue, including restoration of buff-colored bricks removed when the building was remodeled for Import Plaza in 1962.
The college will add a 4,200-square-foot fifth-floor penthouse, but it will be set back from the historic facades so it's not visible from street level.
Ankrom Moisan Associated Architects found the Globe's original drawings and patterned much of the exterior renovations after them, but also determined that the drawings were not always followed in the original construction.
Richard Engeman, a landmarks commission member, says the original Globe was a utilitarian building lacking the architectural detail of other Old Town buildings. "They've done a good job of enhancing it without making it into something it was not," he says of the renovation plan.
One nonhistoric element that will be retained on the roof is the rotating sign that still says "Import Plaza." Though the power was turned off many years ago, the sign still moves with the breeze. New lettering will say "OCOM." Since the sign itself is not a designated landmark, there will be no squabble about the change, unlike the University of Oregon's episode one block away.