Product Design

A&AA is wrapping up its 100th anniversary this month after a full year of events, exhibitions, and celebrations. The school is now embarking on a capital campaign to imagine the future of art and design education and facilities for the next 100 years. In envisioning the school’s future, the A&AA Building Project Work Group in January issued a request for proposals (RFP) from student teams for a competition to design a transformative learning environment for A&AA. In May, the finalists were announced.

In fall 2008, the University of Oregon completed its move into the White Stag Block (WSB), a refurbished facility that merges parts of three historic buildings in downtown Portland. The move culminated efforts—compressed into just two years—to adapt three vacant historic buildings into the interconnected high-tech complex that today comprises the School of Architecture and Allied Arts’ most urban presence. The building project is owned, managed, and leased by Venerable Group, Inc.

Product Design Program Director Kiersten Muenchinger will spend the 2015-16 academic year researching design innovation and teaching at Hong Kong Polytechnic as a Fulbright Fellow in Teaching and Research.

Product Design Program undergraduate Sonja Ellicott will be awarded the Ray Hawk Award at the University Awards Presentation on Saturday, May 16, in the EMU Ballroom.  

The University of Oregon’s Product Design Program has teamed up with furniture company Groovystuff, of Dallas, Texas, on an education-to-industry cross-cooperative partnership in “The Groovystuff by Design: Connecting Education with Industry Challenge.” Groovystuff is cosponsoring thirteen UO students for the challenge, which takes place at the High Point Market at the Suites at Market Square in High Point, North Carolina, from April 18-23.

Collaborative works by Assistant Professor Trygve Faste, in the UO Product Design Program, and Instructor Jessica Swanson, in the Department of Art, are featured in an upcoming exhibit at the Bellevue Arts Museum featuring young designers in the Pacific Northwest. Faste and Swanson’s studio, "Something Like This Design," is an experimental studio that creates thoughtful, functional designs and ceramic work.

Two Product Design Program bachelor of fine art candidates were honored recently for their work by the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA), earning invitations to the Western District Conference April 10-11 in San Jose, California.

The A&AA community continues to take steps toward creating its future home on University Street. The location of the Phase I A&AA building is on the site of the current McArthur Court. To help keep interested constituents and stakeholders informed, a blog has been created to follow the progress of the “Phase I A&AA Learning and Innovation Hub” capital project. Here you can view documents and design studies that outline the design process, including reports, timeline, and correspondence. 

Twenty-three firms looking to hire A&AA graduates participated in the three-day 2015 Recruitment Fair sponsored by the Office of Professional Outreach and Development for Students (PODS) in Lawrence Hall recently. Recruiters lined up along two floors in the halls of Lawrence, meeting students where they live and learn.