Multifamily projects are continuing to pop up in the Slabtown area of Northwest Portland, including one at 2222 N.W. Raleigh St.

General contractor R&H Construction is building Raleigh Slabtown, a six-story mixed-use development that will cover three-quarters of a standard city block at the corner of Northwest 22nd Avenue and Raleigh Street. The project, designed by SERA Architects, is technically just outside of the Con-way Master Plan area. But the development from Cairn Pacific and Prometheus Real Estate Group will complement buildings being constructed within the area.

Raleigh Slabtown will have a total of 173 residential units, including a select few on the ground floor that will be accessible only from a landscaped courtyard.

The project team is employing the typical top-down construction for wood-framed buildings of this type. And right now, drywall installers and other interior tradespeople are dominating the job site.

The use of prefabricated wall panels and other strategies have combined to accelerate construction.

“Pretty much all trades are on site,” said Ted Rhodes, a project manager with R&H Construction. “We’ve got at least 100 guys here every day right now, and with 173 (residential) units you walk around and it seems sparse in some places. But yeah, there are over 100 guys here each day.”

More than 60 of those are drywall installers from Westside Drywall and Insulation. But the site also is populated at present with HVAC technicians with American Heating, sprinkler fitters with Delta Fire Protection, and ironworkers with Refa Steel Erectors who are erecting the steel canopies on ground-floor units. Another subcontractor with a large presence is B&B Masonry; its workers are busy laying brick masonry for the exterior.

Five wood-framed stories are atop a concrete podium and two levels of below-grade parking.

Builders broke ground in late 2018, and the first slab pour followed in January 2019. Now, completion isn’t far off.

“The project is going really well,” Rhodes said. “We’re on schedule and slated to finish at the end of July. We’re going to start our site concrete in the courtyard, where it wraps around. And then we have a west courtyard where there’s a mail room, but mostly it’s private patios for the ground-floor units.”

A Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold rating is being targeted for the project.

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Development has been ramping up in Portland’s Northwest District for the past several years. One of the latest projects to move ahead there is Raleigh Slabtown, a six-story mixed-use building designed by SERA Architects for the partnership of Cairn Pacific and California-based Prometheus Real Estate Group. R&H Construction is serving as general contractor.

The project site – formerly occupied by the George Morlan Plumbing warehouse – is slightly west of the Con-way Master Plan area, which consists of 20 acres formerly owned by Con-way Freight. Raleigh Slabtown will be across Northwest 22nd Avenue from the new Breakside Brewery and New Seasons Market. Other developments nearby include the Leland James Building and The Carson Apartments.

Raleigh Slabtown will have a total of 173 residential units – some on the ground floor.

“There’s a lot of retail space on the ground floor too, and we spent some time focusing on setting it up for successful leasing,” said Mike Kremers, a senior project manager with R&H Construction. “It’s got a rooftop amenity as well, and it’s basically full of fairly high-end finishes.”

A Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold rating is being targeted for the project.

The building will feature five wood-framed stories atop a concrete podium and two levels of below-grade vehicle parking. These days, crews of carpenters from Whitaker Ellis are busy building formwork, while ironworkers from Bar M Steel and MEP workers from Bear Electric and other subcontractors are installing conduit, plumbing and other utilities on the second level deck in advance of pouring the second half of the concrete floor slab.

A prefabricated wall-panel system is being used for Raleigh Slabtown. Carpenters from Wood Mechanix are preparing to arrive on site in the next few weeks to start installation of wood-framed interior and exterior wall systems. The interior walls will consist of bare timber while the exterior walls will come framed and covered with DensGlass sheathing. Exterior masonry and metal panel siding will be installed separately along with drywall and MEP fittings on both interior and exterior walls.

“It’s a huge effort to do the shop drawings, but it’s a smaller framing crew on the site,” Kremers said. “We’re in a tight labor market, and it’s really to Wood Mechanix’s and R&H’s advantage to do this. To get large framing crews – it’s tough.”

Building stick-framed walls on site would extend the schedule, R&H Construction project manager Ted Rhodes said. Because of the project’s scale, he added, purchasing prefabricated walls from Pacific Wall Systems made financial sense.

“On a project like this (on-site framing) probably adds at least four weeks to the framing schedule,” he said. “And there are less labor hours on-site (with prefabrication), so it’s safer.”

Because of an ongoing shortage of skilled labor, Kremers said, it’s likely that use of prefabrication in construction will only increase.

“I see us in the future panelizing virtually everything,” he said.

“There’s a shortage of labor, especially after the last downturn,” Rhodes added. “We lost two million workers (nationally) and those people never came back. The market is now way hotter and we just don’t have the bodies.”

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The Portland Design Commission approved SERA Architects‘ proposal for the Raleigh 22 apartment building on Thursday. Five commissioners voted to approve the project, Chairman David Wark voted to deny it and commissioner Tad Savinar abstained.

The project, at 2222 N.W. Raleigh St., will include 173 residential units and stand 70 feet. The development team made revisions to seven different areas in response to the commission’s recommendations made during a March 22 hearing.

“We got some really helpful advice that we think has improved the project, and we are really happy about that,” architect Kurt Schultz said.

The biggest change was the addition of brick to the façade, replacing metal from earlier renderings. The entryway was altered to include a pavilion to provide for a more active ground floor. Changes made to the windows included adding brick and bringing them in farther from the building’s edge.

While the commission was appreciative of the addition of the brick, there was some concern about the different colors used on the L-shaped structure. The concern was that the complex looked like two separate buildings.

“I think there was a bit of a missed opportunity in not doing two buildings rather than one in two different colors,” Commissioner Don Vallaster said.

The commission applauded the designers’ efforts to better match buildings in the surrounding neighborhood. Changes made to the entryway and ground floor also won the commission’s praise.

“I think the building was strong before,” Commissioner Sam Rodriguez said. “I think the ground floor is going to be great. I am happy with changes you made.”

Concerns about whether the structure appeared as two buildings weren’t enough to keep it from being approved.

“We are really happy with the way that the entry turned out,” Schultz said. “We are really pleased with the changes.”

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