Built to Do

There's a particular kind of pressure that comes with photographing a building before the it opens to the public. The building is done, mostly. The boxes haven't been unpacked. A subcontractor is still somewhere down the hall putting on final touches. And in 24 hours, hundreds of students are going to walk through the door. You get one shot at clean, and you take it.

That was the situation at Douglas Davis High School's new Career Tech building in NE Portland, designed by BRIC Architecture and built by Pence Contractors. This isn't a traditional classroom building. It's a working space. There's a fully equipped car repair garage, a 3D printing lab, an EMS training room, and a main hall anchored by stadium seating that ties the whole building together.

Floor-to-ceiling windows line the main level, pulling in natural light in a way that makes every room feel generous and open. Tucked throughout the space are small bench nooks, a quiet counterpoint to the high-energy labs around them. One of the builders mentioned that aligning the large exterior steel panels was one of the bigger challenges on the job. Standing in front of the finished building, you'd never know it was hard. It looks exactly like it was always going to look that way.

Matt Swain Photography is based out of the Pacific North West and serves Portland, OR and the West Coast with quality architectural and drone photography.