Events

As Portland’s elite built mansions ever higher on King’s Hill above booming downtown from the 1880s through the 1920s, they showed off not just their wealth but their great taste in the latest “modern” designs – hiring the area’s most notable architects. Through the strenuous efforts of preservation advocates starting in the 1970s, this treasure of gorgeous homes now survives in the King’s Hill National Register Historic District despite early losses to high-rise development. Every house has a “story” – of both rogues and heroes who shaped the city’s history. Learn about this area and how “the other half” once lived!

Stroll through the beautiful trees in some of the city's oldest parkland, now listed on the National Register of Historic Places, all while learning about the rich architectural heritage of the neighborhood.

Explore some of the commercial and residential sections of this former streetcar suburb.

Portland’s myriad architectural styles are a showcase for dramatic and beautiful geological stories. From lava floods and volcanos to tropical seas and billions-of-years-old mountain building events, the geology of building stone has shaped 150 years of Portland’s architecture.
Paul Edison-Lahm, Communications Director for the Geological Society of the Oregon Country, will present this virtual tour.

Explore 70 years of architectural controversy and acclaim in downtown Portland.

Join Volga German historian Steve Schreiber and Professor of Architecture Tom Hubka as they guide you on a 2-mile walking tour highlighting some of the remaining churches and homes that tell the story of this ethnic group.

Learn about some of the oldest buildings in the city and the people who built them in this tour of Portland’s only National Historic Landmark District. The area also contains the highest concentration of cast-iron fronted buildings on the west coast and much of the iron was cast locally.

Explore this vibrant east side neighborhood noted for its landmark theater

See a variety of buildings types and styles in this one-time streetcar suburb on the east side of Mt. Tabor.

Explore this gem of a residential neighborhood tucked in between Sellwood, Milwaukie, and the Waverley Country Club.

Explore the tree-lined streets and beautiful early 20th century architecture of this uniquely planned neighborhood.

Mary B. Hansen has a passion for using archival documents to reveal hidden, lost and forgotten histories, and she will bring her knowledge and insights to Architectural Heritage Center. Mary will talk about her work as a Certified Archivist with an MLIS as well as about her two published books – The Traveling Archivist and Blood in the Archives – and how she uses archival research in writing her novels. Books will be available for purchase and signing. Free Event

A Walk in the Market (2026) documents daily life in Seattle's Pike Place Market between 2019 and 2026 through sketches created on location. Inspired by Victor Steinbrueck's "Market Sketchbook" (1968), this volume carries on the tradition of drawing from life in this dynamic and special place. It's part walking guide, part art book, part documentation of Pike Place in this era.
Echoing the "meet the producer" mission of the Market, the book itself was self-produced as a small run of art books, using all Seattle-sourced materials and makers.

Eleanor Doughty

Eleanor Doughty is a Seattle-based illustrator with a focus on drawing from life on location (aka Urban Sketching). Her mixed media work captures realistic subjects and imbues them with significance and character.
Doughty has been traveling internationally to teach on-location sketching since 2019. She writes the newsletter Hand to Paper on Substack, in which she shares stories accompanying her visual art. Outside of urban sketching, Doughty works as a freelance illustrator, specializing in large format works up to two stories tall.

Take a walk through a stunning neighborhood on the west side of Mt. Tabor Park.

Explore one of the city's oldest neighborhoods, situated on the edge of downtown.

In Search of Portland reveals the stories behind the built landscape, the people, and the history that have created modern Portland. Six excursions exploring Portland’s downtown, Old Town, and Pearl District not only focus on the city’s important landmarks and hidden gems but showcase an evolving city’s resilience and heart. Alongside his own experiences, Libby reveals how luminaries like Humphrey Bogart, Mark Rothko, Gus Van Sant, Vera Katz and Bill Walton appreciated the City of Roses. From Pioneer Courthouse Square to the Crystal Ballroom, each location in the book celebrates the spirit of place in addition to its architecture.
Free Event

Explore some of the commercial and residential sections of this former streetcar suburb.

A walking tour of Native American public art in downtown Portland will go from a Rick Bartow statue near Pioneer Courthouse to the Portland Building to several PSU buildings (including the Native American Student and Community Center, which is filled with Native art).

Like many Northeast Portland neighborhoods, Beaumont-Wilshire was carved from orchards, open fields, and patches of forest. As a young Portland sprawled across the river, the rural landscape of the eastside was replaced by a grid of neighborhoods, a busy streetcar system, and tens of thousands of new residents.

Using early maps, documents, photos, newspaper accounts, and memories he’s collected from past residents, local historian Doug Decker will explore the early years of of the Beaumont-Wilshire neighborhood to examine connections between past, present, and future.