The Portland Design Commission met for more than eight hours on Thursday, and approved two Pearl District projects: a renovation, including seismic upgrades, for two office buildings; and a new 14-story mixed-use building.

The commission also extended a design review for the St. Francis Park Apartments to next month, and provided a second round of design advice for a superblock redevelopment in the Lloyd District.

510 N.W. 15th Ave.

Plans call for a renovation of two existing buildings to provide 83,000 square feet of creative office space over ground-floor retail space.

Commissioners expressed concern that a parking lot (now up for sale) on the property’s southwest corner needs to be brought up to city code. Kevin Valk, senior associate at Holst Architecture, said an upgrade to code would be a condition of purchase.

The design was approved unanimously. The only condition was that designers work with the Portland Bureau of Transportation to work out the location of an underground transformer vault, Holst project manager Mara Indra said.

“The commission was very supportive of the project and the building,” she said. “It’s really going to improve the neighborhood at the site on (Interstate) 405, where it will be really visible and a gateway to the Pearl District.”

After the meeting, Holst Architecture owner Jeff Stuhr said he hopes that construction can begin in early 2016 and finish in about a year.

530-535 N.W. 11th Ave.

Plans for a new 14-story building call for 102 apartments with 1,500 square feet of retail along the east frontage of the ground floor. A mechanized system inside the building will provide parking for 52 vehicles entering from Northwest Hoyt Street. A large basement will provide 155 bike parking spaces for tenants.

Commissioners discussed at length whether some of the parking spaces should be removed to allow for a small ground-floor retail shop, but in the end decided to leave retail at 25 percent.

Isaac Johnson, managing principal at Ankrom Moisan Architects, said a total of nine parking places would have to be eliminated to come up with about 400 square feet to increase retail to 47 percent as recommended by staff.

“I don’t think we get a lot with that extra retail,” Commissioner Don Vallaster said.

City planner Staci Monroe told the commission that two large art pieces for the ground-floor, glassed-in retail space had been proposed and that the client was working with the Regional Arts & Culture Council to select an artist.

Commissioners decided that the art pieces would qualify as public benefit to justify transferring 20,000 square feet of floor area from 530 N.W. 11th Avenue.

Eloise Damrosch of the RACC told commissioners that her group gave “a unanimous thumbs-up” to the art pieces that would form an end wall to the 675-square-foot retail space that will be visible from both inside and outside the building.

Vallaster was also concerned about the 13-foot, 9-inch height of a wall around the cooling towers on the building’s roof. Johnson said the wall height could be lowered.

In the end, with Chairman David Wark abstaining, the commissioners approved the project, striking a requirement for expanded retail and that the glass garage door be 90 percent opaque.

St. Francis Park Apartments

Plans for this project, on Southeast Stark Street between 11th and 12th avenues, call for 106 units of affordable housing on a one-acre site presently occupied by St. Francis Park. The building would hold 73,000 gross square feet, including a community room and office on the ground floor and a communal front porch. The U-shaped building would partially surround a 6,300-square-foot plaza for residents.

Residents will include women transitioning from homelessness and victims of domestic and sexual violence, according to the city staff report.

Trell Anderson, director of housing for Catholic Charities, told commissioners that the building will have 86 affordable workforce units and the rest will be for the women, whose average age is early 50s, he said.

Anderson said the city of Portland has committed $6.5 million to the project, and his agency is working with St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church and Home Forward to build and manage the units.

“This is not our first large project and our mission is to serve the community’s most vulnerable (population),” he said.

After asking for more landscaping and that the design be softened to fit better into the neighborhood, commissioners said they understand that further delays can run up costs for the project. Nevertheless, they asked MWA Architects to come back one more time, on Nov. 12.

Lloyd District redevelopment

Holst Architecture will come back Dec. 3 for a third design advice session for a massive redevelopment at 1510 N.E. Multnomah Drive.

Plans for redevelopment of the Lloyd Cinemas and the adjacent surface parking lot include construction of three six-story buildings with 980 residential units, retail with structured parking for 873 spaces both above and below ground, a diagonal pedestrian mall, and open public spaces.

After the meeting, Cassidy Bolger, executive vice president of development with Portland Lloyd Center Community LLC, said he was pleased with the commission’s response.

“We had a really good conversation and gave clarity to the diagonal and how it’s playing a really important role,” he said.

Bolger said it’s exciting to see the huge project finally advancing through the city process.

“We’re really excited about the Lloyd District … it’s finally bearing fruit and it feels so appropriate that this neighborhood is where we are adding housing,” he said.

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