We provide
art, architecture and design & build
services to our clients to assist in designing, planning, visualizing, and realizing your project in a collaborative environment.
For over two decades we have worked with a diverse range of clients from individual homeowners to city agencies. Through our design studio and building workshop rhiza A+D offers a rigorous design and development process from idea generation and planning, construction documentation and permitting, digital and physical modeling to full-scale prototypes and products. When designing architecture and public artworks we listen to and work closely with our clients through all phases of the project as needed; initial planning & programming, schematic design, design development, structural engineering coordination, energy analysis with mechanical, electrical and plumbing coordination, construction documentation, acquiring permits, bid & schedule estimating & negotiating and construction administration. When building public art or art installations our process starts with hand drawings and developments through parallel digital and physical modeling. Our workshop is an idea laboratory where wood, metal, plastics, foam, clay and re-purposed materials are shaped into beginning sketches and gestures of an idea. From here we move our concepts from paper, digital and sketch models into fabrication of full scale artworks. Our workshop supports our ability to create and fabricate in a range of scales. From architectural mock-ups & full-scale building components to the production of large scale sculptures and complex structures. The workshop is certified in steel and aluminum welding as well as equipped to assemble a wide array of materials as projects require. Our studio and workshop function in tandem to deliver innovative, efficient, tested and sustainable works of architecture and art.
We are
a design studio & building workshop
founded in 2005 and located in Portland, Oregon. Partners Ean Eldred, Richard Garfield, John Kashiwabara, and Peter Nylen have been working together since the mid 90's designing architecture and building public art, interior and exterior furnishings, lighting, gallery art installations and theater sets. Rhiza stems from the word rhizome- a root system that is collaborative, diverse, and adaptable. For us, bringing together unique and diverse perspectives is the root of creating durable, long lasting and adaptable design solutions.
With our roots in collaboration, we are committed to creating an inclusive work environment. Whether designing an individual client’s house or working with multiple stakeholders on a public art project, we value the unique perspectives offered by one another, our clients and communities. Experience has taught us that successful creative outcomes rely on collaborative problem solving, clear communication, shared goals. We love the world of making and sharing this world with others. We believe it’s a good idea to listen, since a good idea can come from anywhere. Through collaborating and building we realized ideas could be rapidly expanded and assumptions tested, a working process that has sustained us to today. We continue to believe in the physicality of making as integral to idea generation and the design process; where decisions made, become decisions felt. “No ideas but in things.”- William Carlos Williams. Whether designing or building, rhiza A+D’s practice is rooted in a respect for craft and a dedication to site sensitive place-making through the creation of cultural and climate sensitive objects and spaces.
Selected Projects
Soundshell Internatural Station
Camas Basket
Seeds of Orenco
Fishing for Gravity
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