Portland Business Journal has recognized UO alumnae and architects Melody Emerick and Katherine Schultz among this year’s Women of Influence. Emerick’s firm had been named the Portland Business Journal’s 2014 Small Business Company of Year and Schultz’s contributions to high-profile commercial real estate projects were noted for making a difference locally and abroad. Read more in Around the O.

UO Sports Product Design Program student Irving Perez has one of the best ideas since night baseball: new uniforms for baseball players. Except for newer fabrics, professional players’ uniforms have hardly changed since the mid-1800s. That look — buttoned shirts and belted trousers akin to jodhpurs — seems unlikely to change anytime soon because players like the tradition.

We are excited to share the news that the University of Oregon School of Architecture and Allied Arts' proposal to become the College of Design has been approved following review by the Office of the Provost and the University Senate. The renaming will take effect on July 1, 2017.

The UO Department of Product Design will host the 2017 Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) West District Design Conference April 23-24. This year’s theme is “DESIGN: HYBRID.” Registration will continue onsite.

“When you’re homeless, you get so used to doing what you have to do to survive another day that you’re not thinking about getting up at a certain time or looking for work or taking care of yourself. Those are skills you have to re-learn.”
— Robin Lloyd, resident of the Portland Rescue Mission.

Architecture graduate students at the UO in Portland are designing concepts to provide relief for Portland’s unhoused population that will help ease them back into mainstream society.

A&AA’s Sustainable City Year Program (SCYP) will collaborate with TriMet, the Portland region’s major transit agency, on dozens of multidisciplinary projects focusing on the Southwest Corridor Light Rail Project starting in September. The project aims to bring transit, bicycle, roadway, and pedestrian improvements to communities in southwest Portland and southeast Washington County. Students will explore concepts related to urban mobility, climate change, environmental habitat and restoration, urban design and placemaking, and public outreach.

Since the 1990s, students and faculty in the University of Oregon ceramics program have practiced repurposing used clay and glaze materials to create tiles, rather than mopping the waste down the drain, the de facto method for most ceramics studios.

UO ceramics professor Brian Gillis will demonstrate the sophisticated process later this month at the annual National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts conference in Portland.

The last time you flushed a toilet, you likely didn’t think twice about it, much less about possible ramifications. But a University of Oregon architecture studio is focused on virtually eliminating water waste within urban buildings to help mitigate the effects of climate change.

The National Endowment for the Arts has awarded an Art Works grant of $20,000 to the UO’s Department of Product Design for “Unparalleled Oregon Product Design,” a week-long series of free educational workshops, lectures, and exhibitions in uniquely Oregonian design.

Putting a brand on a sports product or an athlete is big business and requires careful consideration, Associate Professor Susan Sokolowski noted recently in an article on the Adobe Creative Cloud website. “The branding should be strong and recognizable to play up the benefit of being associated with a sports star, but people also should be able to understand the relationship between the parent company and athlete sub-brand,” she said. “Look at athletes who’ve had successful partnerships.