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The floor of my bathroom has this awful 70’s style tiling. It is maroon and cream in color and looks horrendous, but I love the pattern of the hexagons and squares combined. Have to take the good with the bad.
My kitchen is the size of a small shoebox. It is too bad, because I love to cook. My countertops are that same maroon and cream color (have to maintain that color scheme!) from the 70’s. They are tile with deep grout. It is a pain to clean, but makes a good rubbing!
Taking the train to school is so much less stressful than driving into downtown and trying to park. The nearest station to my place is NE 60th, about a five-minute walk. While waiting for the train to head to class, I captured the texture of the concrete slab the station rests upon.
TRIMET added a new train design to Portland’s light rail system a few years back. They are sleek and modern. The inside is filled with more light because of the added windows. The isle of the seating area has small channels running perpendicular to the seats. I am guessing they drain the water people bring on board here in the rainy Pacific Northwest.
Most of my least favorite classes at Portland State have been hosted here in Neuberger Hall. Neuberger has some of the worst classrooms on campus. My current classroom doesn’t have any windows, like some oversized jail cell. They use brown, thin carpet on select walls around the building. I had to capture some.
One of my favorite things about going to Portland State University is the beautiful SW Park Blocks that sit in the middle of campus. There is always something happening on the park blocks. It is the best spot on campus to eat your lunch and people watch, weather permitting. You can also bring your pieces and sit down for a game of chess.
I have a friend on a diet. We had plans to get dinner, and she recommended the Veggie Grill. Not my first choice, but the food wasn’t bad. They did have beer, Automatic bonus points. The restaurant also had wonderful fake wood flooring. It was dark in color, but smooth to the touch unlike a real wood floor.
While eating my fake chicken tacos, which were quite delicious, I discovered this awesome paneling on the walls. It was like someone cooked a bunch of spaghetti in red food coloring, then put it in a mold and compressed it. They layered the panels at different distances from the wall, giving the wall depth and a rad texture.
I don’t appreciate the bus as much as I do the MAX, but they do venture to more places. At off peak times they are often faster than the train as well. The bus stop is a couple blocks closer to my house, which cuts down on travel time even more. The bus shelter at 4th & West Burnside is where I caught my ride home.
The beer scene in Portland is amazing, one of my favorite parts of living here. A friend invited me to join her at a small taproom on SE Stark, called “Beer”. I had never been to the place before. We sat at one of the picnic tables outside and enjoyed a couple Fort George IPAs (one of my favorites). If you haven’t tried one, you should.
My garage is attached to the basement. The driveway is short and very steep. Not ideal for parking a car on. It is especially bad for things like changing the oil or detailing. The driveway looks to be original from the original house, but the sidewalk concrete is relatively new. I wanted to capture the contrast between the two.
I spend a good amount of time at my workspace in my basement. I made my desk out of my parent’s old kitchen table. Makes for a perfectly sized workspace. On top of the table is a collection of stickers that I have acquired throughout the years. There is no order to the sticker collage, just a colorful chaotic smorgasbord.
I lucked out when I moved into this place. My landlord refinished the hardwoods right before I moved in. They are gorgeous. Only problem is that now I have to be extra careful not to scratch them up. No roller derby in this house! I tried to grab a rubbing of the floor before hitting the sack, but the finish is so smooth it didn’t turn out like I thought.
My last house had an awesome gas range with five large burners. My current place has an electric range with two small coils and two large coils; a sad downgrade, but worth it for the space that I live in. After making some Eggs & Bacon and cleaning up the kitchen I grabbed a rubbing of the heating coil.
Morning work sessions are the best, a hot cup of coffee and a fresh brain. I was hoping to get my homework done for advertising class later in the day. You can often find me jamming out to some old school hip-hop while putting in work. This is another rubbing of my chaotic sticker mishmash on my desk.
Along with the beer scene, Portland has an amazing disc golf scene. There are a plethora of gorgeous and challenging courses within a stones throw of the city. Pier Park in St. Johns is home to a wonderful course. The course wanders through a majestic forest of Doug Fir, Giant Sequoia, Pacific Madrona, Dogwood and Cedar Trees.
After two hours of throwing Frisbees down tree-filled fairways, hoping not to hit a tree or shrub, we finished the round. The only saving grace to my round was my putter. We were in sink that round, slamming the chains from 30 or 40 feet out. After a round like that, it was necessary to grab a rubbing.
As an aspiring designer, I feel like I spend a lot of time in front of my computer. If I am not working on something, I am on the web searching for inspiration or going on a YouTube binge. If I lived in a town where it wasn’t so easy to get out into nature and explore, I would most likely go insane. Luckily I live in the beautiful city of Portland.
PDXTURE started as a week long documentation assignment. I decided to document my days by exploring the textures of my daily life. I started by snapping photos with my phone and writing a short summary of what I was doing at the time, why I liked the texture and where I was at that time. After a couple days I realized that the photos weren’t as tangible a medium as I was hoping for (these are textures, after all). I then decided to start making rubbings of the textures, while maintining the same info system. This allowed me to have a tangible piece of that texture to take away, and I feel like Indiana Jones when I am doing so. I carried around a pad of various papers, some GRAPHITE, crayons and markers to explore how to capture these textures best. I made this site to share these awesome textures with you, they are all available for download. Feel free to use them wherever you would like. Stay tuned for more textures. Enjoy!