Laura Hill was about 30 years old when she helped create one of Portland’s most-iconic designs.
When the Port of Portland was redesigning Portland International Airport in 1986, SRG Partnership led the project.
Hill retired from the firm in 2008, but at the time she was a principal interior designer for SRG.
The focus of the project, according to Hill, was to create a retail hub in the center of the airport, which ultimately became the Oregon Marketplace.
“Their main goal, the port’s goal, was to make the airport a welcoming gateway to Oregon and to reflect on the Pacific Northwest,” Hill said earlier this month, from her home in Willsonville.
The airport’s carpet, she said, “was a piece of a much larger project.”
The airport is . Renovation is, as Hill pointed out, somewhat of a constant for airports. But this time, as the airport unveils a new terminal, it will feature something old: sections of newly manufactured green carpet, originally designed with help from Hill as part of the renovation that began in 1986.
“I must say, of all of my design work in my career, it was not the one I thought would be still so popular,” Hill said, “and I just wish I had a nickel for every time that the carpet was reproduced.”
Because the carpet has been reproduced again and again. On hats and socks, on cookies and cakes, on yoga pants, and even on people’s skin as tattoos.
While she may not have a jar of nickles, she and the firm do take pride in the reach of the design and the fact that it has become so beloved.
Back in 1986, Jon Schleuning was the SRG Partnerships partner in charge of the project, running the architecture end of the renovation while Hill led the interior design aspects.
“SRG never really distinguished between architecture and interiors,” Hill said. “They saw that every element of design needed to work in unison. It was a joy to work with a firm that had that attitude.”
It became clear through the design process that the goal of the entire project was to represent Oregon.
“The big idea that emerged was the Oregon marketplace,” Hill said. “And it was a unique operational model that was not seen in other airports.”
In general, she said, airports were run by a “big generic national concessionaire.”
“It was the same in every airport,” Hill said, “except the name on the T-shirt changed.”
The Oregon Marketplace was different. All the retailers were Oregon-based and represented the “values of Oregon and the Pacific Northwest.”
Powell’s Books, Nike and Norm Thompson Outfitters were there, among others. It was a risk, Hill said, but the Port was willing to take it.
These were the days when airports were more porous, before 9/11 changed layouts into “before” and “after” security spaces. The Oregon Marketplace ultimately became a destination. Prices were the same at the airport as in downtown Portland and people might come and shop there who weren’t even waiting for a plane or a passenger.
According to Hill, people from Washington would even come to shop at the airport to avoid sales tax.
The design of the Oregon Marketplace also needed to represent the state.
“At the time we started the project, that central area of the main terminal was kind of a dark interior volume with scattered retail and food and waiting areas and automobiles on display down the concourse,” Hill said. “Definitely not much personality that reflected Oregon.”
The flooring was carpet even then, which was not standard at the time and the Port was willing to use it again, since luggage with wheels was quickly becoming the norm.
“There were a few people on the client committee who absolutely hated the sound of rollerboards. Click click click click click click over tile floors,” Hill said. “They were adamant about not having that.”
Hill and her team started touring other airports with carpets. They visited Las Vegas, where people were stealing carpet tiles for souvenirs. In Albuquerque, the carpet reflected the colors of the desert. In Atlanta, the airport was contending with cigarette burns and chewing gum with a drab beige carpet covered in a brown and black pattern meant to camouflage the burns.
“It was not to be our inspiration,” Hill said, of the Atlanta model.
When they finally started designing the carpet, everyone had ideas, she said.
“There was a big proponent for roses, rose patterns, because of the Rose City,” Hill said. “I found that to be more appropriate, perhaps, for a hotel ballroom than the airport. It was too Portland-centric.”
Then, the interest moved to mountains and waves. But even that was too specific to Western Oregon, Hill said.
Another idea was clouds and raindrops, “which for obvious reasons was rejected,” she said.
The concept for the carpet didn’t just have to look good underfoot, but it had to be interesting in a great expanse, out across the concourses and long stretches of floor.
So, Hill said, the team decided to look for things that “were less representational and more symbolic.”
“And as we were looking at those geometries,” she said, “someone said, ‘Gee, that kind of looks like the screens of the control tower where airplanes are X’s and runways were little diamond patterns.’”
“That idea took off,” she said, adding, “I don’t mean that as a pun.”
The final design isn’t anything you would actually see in a control tower, Hill said, but “we were inspired by that concept.” The design became more of a symbol that could be interpreted in many ways.
“We were never intending it to be a realistic pattern,” Hill said, “but one that was interesting and colorful closeup, and created that large scale that worked in huge areas as well.”
The color palette was also a crucial element in the design.
“In selecting the colors, part of it was we wanted it to be warm and inviting, which we consider the Northwest attitude,” Hill said.
They wanted to represent Oregon with the green. And Hill insists the main color of the carpet is green, not teal.
“I kind of cringe when I hear it called teal because, to me, it’s not teal,” she said.
Here’s how she describes the color instead: “It’s not forest green, but I think it’s a green of nature. It’s not a fake green. It’s a green that you might find in leaves and trees.”
The background of the carpet isn’t just green, it is speckled with golds and blues, to help hide spills and stains.
The same speckled background can be found on the dark blue companion carpet that was designed to be at the edges of the green version, to separate the Port of Portland carpet from airline-specific carpets and other flooring.
The blue border was also used in high-traffic areas where sections of the carpet would need to be changed out over time, so new and old parts of the carpet wouldn’t be so apparent.
In the late ‘80s, when the carpet was designed, there was no computer-aided design also known as CAD. Everything was hand-drawn.
“We drew it small, but we also had to draw it at full scale and try to understand what it did in a large scale,” Hill said. “So there were people who spent weeks and weeks drawing patterns and testing ideas.”
They settled on a carpet manufacturer, U.S. Axminster, a company making woven carpets that are more expensive than tufted carpets but last longer.
U.S. Axminster had CAD and it was Hill’s first exposure to the program. It was a “glorious new experience” for Hill and the designer who went with her.
U.S. Axminster also could print out full-scale pattern sheets that were around four feet wide and 10 feet long, Hill said, so now she and the designer could look at the pattern closer to the scale it would be in the airport.
The carpet was . It remained a ubiquitous part of the airport for nearly 30 years. It saw travelers through three vastly different decades, going from the age of waiting at the airport bar for arrivals to posting photos of your feet on the carpet for Instagram.
When the carpet was mostly removed and replaced in 2015, there was a city-wide response to the loss. The old carpet was the hero of the year and was even chosen as.
What made the carpet so legendary? Hill, humbly, still thinks it is because it is part of the whole.
“There’s a warmth and a softness and an inviting feel, I think, to the whole airport,” she said, “and the carpet’s a part of that.”
– covers life and culture and writes Reach her at 503-221-8052, or
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