Tunnel Vision
Portland Spaces, Oct 01, 2008 - by Randy Gragg
For all the Grandeur of its setting on Mount Hood's south shoulder, Timberline Lodge was built in a pretty foolish spot. Early proponents of the lodge, like architect John Yeon, envisioned it on a nearby knoll to the east, where the prevailing winds would, as Yeon put it, "scour" the building free of snow. But U.S. Forest Service architects opted for a different site-and snowdrifts there rise so high that the only way to get into the lodge in the winter is through a tunnel.
For 50 years, a military Quonset hut did the job, standing before the regal Arts & Crafts-inspired lodge with all the elegance of a party nose strapped to the face of Sir Edmund Hillary. But this fall, Timberline will get a sleek, high-tech entry that could draw enough heated debate to melt the snow entirely.
Portland architects Ean Eldred and Peter Nylen of Rhiza A + D studio won the Friends of Timberline Lodge's 2004 international competition, edging out 22 mostly woodier entries. Rhiza's design, inspired by an igloo, consists of a series of overlapping parabolic arches made of lightweight aluminum and translucent polycarbonate. The arches easily bolt together from the inside and are lit by a single 150 watt metal halide bulb. The jury included preservation forces like Jeff Jaqua, a U.S. Forest Service archaeologist, and Kingston Heath, head of the University of Oregon's historic preservation program, but Rhiza's simple structure quickly rose to the top-even as Jaqua fretted about the reactions from "the couple up from Kansas visiting for the first time." Egged on by Heath (who likened the design to Joseph Paxton's 1851 glass-and-cast-iron Crystal Palace); Timberline's curator, Linny Adamson; and local artist Henk Pander, Jaqua joined the unanimous jury vote for this avant-garde leap.
Friends now has the $625,000 needed to build Rhiza's design. But the project has at least one vocal detractor: Saul Zaik, the lead designer of the lodge's 1968 addition. Zaik has said the new snow tunnel "looks like an ice hall with a funny light fixture." He has tried to rally the august Fellows of the American Institute of Architects to push the Friends toward something he feels is more suitable to the lodge's architecture, but so far he's had no luck. Indeed - Joachim Grube, Friends president and chief fundraiser for the construction project, who is also an AlA Fellow - likes the snow entry just fine. "I put $22,000 of my own money into it," he says. "Every exciting contemporary design will always have its adversaries." Only time will tell whether Zaik's opposition is just a lonely naysayer's potshot or a taste of reactions to come from some of Timberline's nearly 2 million annual visitors.
"The more people read the snow entry as temporary, the more it will emphasize the lodge's permanence," says Eldred. "What could be more elegant, simple, and coherent than an igloo?"