Office renovation - Portland OR

"It is an honor and a pleasure for me to write this note.  Insuring that our newly purchased building was structurally sound, adapting it to our use and making it an expression of our personality as a firm, posed a number of daunting challenges.  Laurie Simpson, the architect we selected after interviewing five different candidates, did a superlative job of meeting and overcoming those challenges. 

At the outset, Laurie met with the shareholders to explain how, in general, she went about designing or redesigning a building. She showed us examples of past projects, explained the process she used in gauging her clients concerns, and illustrated how she translated those issues into the design of the final product.  Laurie visited and took photographs of our existing office, as well as the new site, and met with our staff to become familiar with their concerns. In short, she tried to find out who we were, what we did, and how we wanted to present ourselves to the community through the new office site.

Next, Laurie came up with a variety of overall proposals and presented them to the shareholders.  After we agreed upon the overall layout, she made alternate proposals for specific areas.  Again, she presented them to us, evaluating from the standpoint of aesthetics, functionality and cost.  She forcefully argued for her preferred solution to the problems, but she also cheerfully accepted the solution decided upon by the shareholders when that solution differed from hers.

If I were asked to describe Laurie’s three most outstanding attributes as an architect, I would say this.  First: She is extraordinarily creative.  She is gifted. She knows her discipline.  For her, architecture is a vocation, not a profession, and she always, always, has a pencil and scraps of paper to draw on at her side.  Second: She is willing and able to work within the client’s budget. She approaches that task creatively and without rancor.  This was a very, very important issue in the redesign of our building, for we simply did not have the resources to do everything that we, or she, might have wanted to do. Third: Laurie is perspicacious. She has what we call in German “Tischaugen” (eyes for the table). That is, she sees what needs to be done to achieve the client’s wishes and to complete execution of the agreed upon design. Once construction or renovation is in progress, she makes sure the job gets done, ina timely fashion, and as specified by the client.

Needless to say, most lawyers are not architects. We may know what we want in the way our working space feels or looks when it is completed, but we have a hard time conceptualizing or communicating that in special design or construction terms.  On our project, Laurie was a godsend to us in this regard. She worked with us n almost a day-to-day basis to achieve what we wanted and what were able or willing to pay for. Simply put, she did an outstanding job."

Tilman Hasche, Partner - Parker Bush & Lane Law Offices