Over the years, I've had a number of companies as clients that make and install signs. Most of the signs are used for commercial applications (stores and hotels) and they are usually made of metal and plastic but occasionally they'll even make one out of EIFS. Either way, they sometimes ask me how to attach their signs to EIFS walls. If you've ever purchased a custom sign, they are not cheap, so it's not a dumb question. Here are some guidelines on how to deal with signs. These notes relate to design considerations, as well as installation issues.

First, you can go to New Orleans right now and have a good time, at least in the popular tourist areas, which look like nothing ever happened. But if you drive a little way from those restored areas, it's a different story. There are blocks and blocks of abandoned single-story houses and there are shopping areas that look fine, except a lot are not open. These buildings are in the areas that were flooded and stayed submerged.

For a change of pace, I’ve decided to periodically write about contracting and field issues, including case studies of interesting projects. The idea is to offer insights that will help readers deal with aspects of EIFS in their work.

Expanded polystyrene insulation and polyisocyanurate foam polyiso are the two main insulation types used in EIFS in North America. Overseas, many other types of insulation are used to make EIFS, such a mineral wool and “glass foam.”

There are lots of small details and design features about EIFS that can help create a better-completed EIFS project. This month’s column is a list of many known-and not-so-well-known-design features that you should be aware of.

Since when did architects become responsible for ensuring occupant health resulting from exposure to building material ingredients?

An interesting anti-LEED movement seems to be gaining momentum among states that are opposed to the USGBC LEED rating system.

Not too many years ago, hydronic floor heating systems were all the rage with the hip-green crowd.

It’s no surprise that there are less expensive, less complicated alternatives to LEED.

Do embodied energies deserve greater attention now that buildings are becoming “greener”?

Hot water—practically for free.

In December of this year, more than 190 nations will gather in Paris to negotiate a global agreement on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, laying the foundation to save the planet from what many believe will be a catastrophic and irreversible change in the Earth’s climate.

On Oct. 17, American Industrial Partners announced its definitive agreement to acquire PPG’s U.S. and Canadian architectural coatings business, which generated $2 billion in 2023 revenue.

The organisation, which has 160 employees, says it is still trying to understand how staff will be affected

The new members come from a range of charities, including Save the Children UK and Versus Arthritis

Dame Julia Cleverdon spent 17 years as the chief executive of Business in the Community as part of a long career in the voluntary sector

Resolution Engineering Inc., Hudson, Wis.,is a provider of RF/wireless and embedded systems design services, while sister company Resolution Products produces a wide range of common use and wireless security devices. Until recently, “green” qualities weren’t on the radar for these types of products, so today, Resolution Engineering is thrilled to see increased attention focused on sustainability. The company’s products, services and operations have incorporated sustainable attributes for years. John Bergman, one of the founders of the company, is the driving force behind the company’s sustainable practices. 

Columbus, OH — People who incorrectly believe they have “all the facts” may remain overly confident in their beliefs or decisions, a recent study suggests.

Washington — A Federal Highway Administration final rule includes updates intended to improve safety and mobility for workers and drivers in roadway work zones.

TOLI's Mature commercial sheet flooring from CBC Flooring offers architects and designers a beautiful and sustainable flooring product for healthcare, university and retail environments.

Shaw Floors’ divisions Tuftex Carpets of California and Anderson Hardwood have launched the Color Coordinates display system exclusively for Shaw Design Center retailers.

Floyd & Associates has launched its new e-commerce website: www.sampleboards.biz.

Flexco introduces Natural Elements, a new line of wood vinyl plank products available in 4” by 36” formats in 18 colors and a luxury vinyl stone tile available in 18” by 18” sizes in eight colors.

A non-sag polymer fortified adhesive mortar that mixes with just water and provides an ultra white color that is ideal for installations of translucent tile and stone.

Cooperativa Ceramica d’Imola, North America introduces five new programs under the Imola Ceramica brand known for Italian design and artistry, and spanning multiple segments and formats.

Karndean Design flooring has expanded its premium Art Select Woods collection by adding eleven new skillfully-crafted designs that replicate the beauty of natural timber.

Tile Redinow offers Redi Trench, an incredibly exciting marriage of design and function for the commercial construction sector, in particular for the hospitality industry.

Propex will promote Isis, the company’s innovative platform of backings made with woven PCR PET, at FloorTek Expo.

The Carpet and Rug Institute's (CRI) annual meeting in Dalton, Georgia, highlighted an industry balancing success with new challenges, from global growth to mounting regulations.

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These are the FE editorial picks from the past year that best exemplify advances in the alternative protein space, from facilities to flavor.

Enterprise software is going beyond the line in matters of size and scalability; small companies depend on custom tailored software to manage their business rules, and large enterprises with onsite engineers, deal in a daily basis with the challenge to keep their systems up to date and running with the top edge technology.

In both cases the investment made in software systems to assist a given business is elevated, regardless if it was purchased from another company or if it was built and maintained by the own, it’s never going to stop being critical to update the current systems and platforms.

            Any enterprise software owner/designer/programmer must be aware of the market tendencies of operating systems, web technologies, hardware specs, and software patterns and brands; because of the raging nature of the IT industry it takes an eye blink to get obsolete.

Let’s recap about VB6 to VB.NET era, a transition with a lot of new technology, specs and a lot of new capabilities that promise the programmers to take their applications where it seems to be previously impossible like web services and remote facilities, numerous data providers are accessible with a common interface, and more wonders were presented with the .NET framework, however all this features can get very difficult or near to impossible to get incorporated in legacy applications. At this moment it was mandatory to get that software translated to the new architecture.

Initially the idea was to redesign the entire system using those new features in a natural way but this implicates to consume large amounts of resources and human efforts to recreate every single module, class, form, etc. This process results in a completely new application running over new technology that needs to be tested in the final environment, and that will impact the production performance because it has to be tested in the real business challenges. At the end, we got a new application attempting to copycat the behavior of the old programs and huge amount of resources spent.

Since this practice is exhaustive for the technical resources and for the production metrics, the computer scientists research about the functionally equivalent automated processes were used to create software that is capable to port one application from a given source platform to a different, and possibly upgraded one. During this translation process, the main objective is to use as much inherent constructions as possible in the newly generated code to take advantages of the target technology and to avoid the usage of legacy components. In case that the objective is to include a new feature found in the target platform, the application can be migrated and then the feature can be included more naturally than building communication subprograms to make that new capability to get in touch with the old technology.

This process is widely promising because it grants the creation of a new system based on the previous one, using minimum human efforts by establishing transformation rules to take the source constructions and generate equivalent constructions in the desired technology. Nevertheless, this will require human input, especially in very abstract constructions and user defined items.

All the comparisons done before to measure the benefits between redesign and migration, points to identify the second practice as the most cost-effective and fast, but now another metric becomes crucial. The automated stage is done by computers using proprietary technology depending on the vendor of the migration software, but how extensive the manual changes will be? Or, how hard will be to translate the non-migrated constructions?

 

The quality metrics of the final product will be redefined because a properly designed application will be translated with the same design considerations. This means that a given application will be migrated keeping the main aspects of design and the only changes in the resulting source code will be minor improvements in some language constructions and patterns. This makes the new quality metrics to be: maximize the automation ratio, minimize the amount of manual work needed, generate more maintainable code and reach the testing stage faster.

 As mentioned previously, the migration process is now an ally of every company while attempting to get their software systems revamped. It’s imperative to determine the rules to measure the process throughput, in order to compare all the options the market offers for this purpose, but, how it comes to be described the rules to compare a process where every single vendor employs proprietary technology that contrast from one to another?

After eye-witness the whole process, the ideas impressed in the user’s mind will decide the judgment made to some specified migration tool, and how it performs; but to make sure this judgment will be fair, here are some concepts, ideas and guidelines about how the migration process should be done, and the most important, how it should be measured.

 

<!--[if !supportLists]-->·        <!--[endif]-->Time:

Human efforts are precious; computer efforts are arbitrary, disposable and reusable. An automated process can be repeated as many times as necessary, as long as their design considerations allow the algorithms to accept all the possible input values. Migration processes can be done with straight one-on-one transformation rules resulting in poorly mapped items that will need small adjustments, but regardless of the size of those efforts, those must be human, so these single reckless rules may become hundreds of human hours to fix all this small issues; remember, we are dealing with large enterprise software products, meaning that a single peaceable imperfection can replicate million times. Another possible scenario will be complex rules that searches for patterns and complex structures to generate equivalent patterns on the other side, but as many AI tasks, it may take lots of computer efforts, because of the immense and boundless set of calculations needed to analyze the original rules and synthesize new constructions. For the sake of performance, the user must identify which resources are most valuable, the time spent by people fixing what the tool’s output provided; or computers time that will be employed by more complex migration tools to generate more human-like code.

 

<!--[if !supportLists]-->·        <!--[endif]-->Translation equivalence:

Legacy applications were built using the code standards and conventions for the moment, the patterns and strategies used in the past have evolved ones for good other to became obsolete. During an automated software migration process there must be a way to adapt arcade techniques to newer ones; a simple one-on-one translation will generate the same input pattern and the resulting source code will not take advantage of all the new features on the target platform. A brilliant migration tool should detect legacy patterns, analyze its usage and look for a new pattern in the target platform that behaves the same way. Because of the time calculations explained previously, a faster tool will only mean non-detailed and superficial transformations that will be a poor replica of the original code or in the best scenario a code wrapper will fix all the damage done. Functional equivalence is the key to a successful migration, because the whole concept of software migration is not only about getting the software running in the target platform, it’s about adaptation to a new set of capabilities and the actual usage of those capabilities.

 

With that on mind, a comparison between different tools can be clearer now. Leaving aside the competitiveness of the market, the readers should identify the facts from the prevaricated marketing slogans, and appraise the resources to be spent during a migration process. Saving a couple of days of computer time may become hundreds of human hours, which at the end will not cure the faulty core, will just make it run.

PBOT leaders say they’ve already addressed many of the auditor’s recommendations. They also say the scale of Portland’s traffic violence crisis is too big for just one bureau to address. by Taylor Griggs

The Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) adopted its Vision Zero Action Plan in December 2016, with the goal of eliminating traffic crash deaths and injuries in the city. But in recent years, Portland has seen its highest numbers of traffic injuries and fatalities in decades. Pedestrians have faced a heightened risk of traffic violence in recent years, and parts of Portland with higher low-income populations and communities of color are also disproportionately impacted. 

The daylight between PBOT’s stated Vision Zero goals and the increase in recent traffic crash deaths prompted scrutiny from the Portland Auditor’s Office. A new report from the Auditor’s Office, released Wednesday, says PBOT “partially completed” safety projects identified in its Vision Zero plan, but notes the bureau doesn’t adequately evaluate the outcomes of the safety projects it completes. 

The Auditor’s Office recommends PBOT create a plan to evaluate its projects “to determine which get the desired outcomes and where Vision Zero efforts are most needed.” The office also asks the bureau to install promised speed cameras to help with traffic safety enforcement and recommends PBOT “revisit its equity methodology to ensure it accounts for smaller scale improvements that could have positive equity impacts.” 

“These efforts to collect data, analyze, evaluate, and carefully track which safety projects have the most desired outcomes could help move toward Vision Zero’s goal of zero fatal and serious injury traffic crashes,” the audit report states. 

The audit report highlights concerns about the Vision Zero program that many transportation and safe streets activists have raised for years—though the Auditor’s Office didn’t issue as harsh an indictment of PBOT as some critics may want. Earlier this year, when PBOT leaders presented their 2023 Vision Zero report to City Council, some Portland advocates didn’t mince words about their thoughts on the city’s implementation of the program. 

“There is no question that Portland's Vision Zero Program has been an abject failure,” Sarah Risser, a local transportation safety activist, wrote in public testimony to City Council in April. “Given its abysmal track record, it is reasonable to conclude that it will continue to be a failure.”

The Portland Auditor’s Office didn’t mark PBOT’s Vision Zero plan as a failure in its report, and PBOT leaders ultimately agreed with its recommendations, some of which the bureau says it has already implemented on its own. 

PBOT, too, acknowledges that larger structural changes are needed to save lives on the streets. Bureau leaders say they will continue working on their Vision Zero plans, but they hope the city government transition will break down silos and encourage more involvement in solving the problem of traffic violence on Portland’s streets. 

Auditor’s Office Suggests More Evaluation, Qualitative Data Collection Methods 

The year PBOT adopted the Vision Zero plan, 42 people died in traffic crashes on Portland’s streets. In 2019, when the bureau updated the plan to emphasize transportation system safety and focus more on actions within PBOT’s control, 48 people were the victims of traffic violence. In the last three years, more than 60 people have died in traffic crashes in Portland each year, with 69 fatalities in 2023. 

When PBOT leaders presented the 2023 Vision Zero report to City Council earlier this year, they acknowledged the rise in traffic fatalities since the program was adopted. But they said the program is successful in areas PBOT has been able to invest in, and said the bureau’s budget woes have curtailed its progress. The audit report suggests PBOT could get more out of the projects it does complete by improving its evaluation processes, which have historically been lacking. 

“Without systemic evaluation of safety outcomes, the Bureau is missing the opportunity to create more alignment between the work they do on safety projects and the overall goal of Vision Zero,” the report states. “A more systematic approach would allow trends to be identified and analyzed to better understand the outcomes of completed projects, and which may need to be altered or dropped. As traffic deaths continue to increase it is vital that the Bureau consistently evaluate completed safety projects so they can see which are working best at shifting the trend towards the intended goal of zero traffic deaths and serious injuries.” 

The second major recommendation the audit report suggests is that PBOT “do more to enforce speed limits” by following through on its promise to install more speed cameras throughout the city. Despite research showing the effectiveness of enforcement cameras as a way to reduce speeds and increase traffic safety—without involving the police—PBOT has been slow to install them. The bureau has blamed its camera vendor for the lag in speed camera implementation, but says it now has 37 cameras in operation or construction, and current contracted cameras will be online early next year. (By March 2023, PBOT had only installed nine cameras in the prior eight years.) 

The report also states despite PBOT’s attempt to prioritize and fund safety projects equitably—based on both crash data and neighborhood demographics—it may be missing “smaller safety projects with possible equitable outcomes” if they aren’t located on high-crash corridors. The Auditor’s Office recommends PBOT use more qualitative data to determine the projects it carries out. 

In response to the auditor’s recommendations, Public Works Service Area Deputy City Administrator Priya Dhanapal and PBOT Director Millicent Williams said while they “largely agree with the recommendations in the audit,” it’s a bit outdated. Last year, PBOT issued a Vision Zero Action Plan update for 2024 and 2025, which addresses many of the issues outlined in the audit report. 

“Our current Vision Zero Action Plan includes priorities directly tied to evaluation, delivery of the camera program and speed management as well as equity objectives,” Dhanapal and Williams wrote. “The audit was conducted on work and commitments outlined 3-5 years ago and work that took place during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.” 

Dhanapal and Williams also said PBOT needs help from other city bureaus to solve the crisis of traffic violence. 

“Eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries in Portland is possible [and] PBOT can lead the way,” Dhanapal and Williams wrote in a letter responding to the auditor’s report. “However, Portland will not reach Vision Zero with street design alone…. A societal commitment to meet basic human needs and implement strategies to change current conditions are necessary to reach many of our shared goals, including Vision Zero. These changes require leadership, investment, and commitment from partners beyond PBOT.”

PBOT leaders say they hope that collaboration and commitment will be easier due to the upcoming changes in Portland’s government. 

“Eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries is a City commitment and goal, but as a City we have focused the discussion on what PBOT does to change streets,” Dhanapal and Williams wrote. “We believe the City transition provides an opportunity to reengage City bureaus in Portland’s Vision Zero commitment and integrate the Safe System approach to traffic safety as a comprehensive prevention strategy to save lives.” 

The newspaper asserts that Ranked Choice Voting "cratered" voter engagement. That's bullshit. by Wm. Steven Humphrey

Starting in January 2025, Portland will have the most diverse, and politically balanced City Council in the history of our city. Full stop.

The reason why we’re able to celebrate this indisputable fact is thanks to charter reform and ranked choice voting, which allowed citizens from every demographic and Portland neighborhood the opportunity to serve their city (and the rest of us to vote for them). 

But despite those two objectively correct statements, local media continues to platform the dishonest cynics who have been fighting charter reform and ranked choice voting from the beginning. The Oregonian, who loves writing intellectually dishonest headlines like this, really outdid themselves with this recent post-election article: Portland’s ranked-choice debut causes voter engagement to crater; 1 in 5 who cast ballots chose no one for City Council. 

Let’s break it down, shall we? Using the word “crater” to describe Portland’s voter engagement, and attempting to lay the blame on the doorstep of ranked choice voting, is not only an unethical choice, it’s factually incorrect. While overall voter turnout wasn’t what it was in 2020 (79%), Portland engagement still reached 74.5%—that’s still three-quarters of our total population. Does that sound like overall engagement “cratered” to you?

 And perhaps it’s true that one-out-of-five voters chose not to rank any candidates for City Council and mayor—though, as a reasonable person, I might wait until that number got a little bit higher before labeling it as “cratering.” And yes, it is absolutely correct that a historically large group of candidates ran for City Council this year, which probably stunned some voters who aren’t used to doing a lot of research. BUT! And let me say this loud and proud so everyone in the back can hear it: Having a lot of candidates who love their community and want to serve it is A VERY GOOD THING. (And it’s even better for democracy.) And while we can definitely do more as a city to make sure minority and low-income communities have the information they need in future races, according to the Oregonian’s own numbers, four out of five Portlanders successfully filled out their ballots without their brains exploding. So actually, I’d call that a big win. 

And that’s my problem with this poorly headlined article: The main thesis seems to be that just because one-in-five Portland voters chose not to cast votes in two races, this is somehow the fault of ranked choice voting. That’s bullshit. And here’s why: Let’s imagine ranked choice voting never existed, and Portlanders were still choosing just a single candidate for every office. Thanks to the general ineptitude of the current City Council—which inspired so many people to run against them—a huge number of candidates would’ve still been on that ballot. And if that had occurred, voters would have been confronted with the exact same conundrum.

Oh, and if you do happen to dip into the O’s article, here’s a little media studies trick: While most news outlets claim objectivity as their guiding star, if you want to spot potential bias, head to the final paragraph of just about any article, and see who gets the last word. In the case of this Oregonian story, the last word was given to a failed conservative Council candidate, Bob Weinstein, who freely admits he was never in favor of charter reform in the first place, and issued this damning indictment of ranked choice voting: “It’s very anti-democratic, to me, to have a result like this.”

I’m curious: Which of the following results is the most “anti-democratic”? Was it three-quarters of the population voting? Was it the large number of candidates who, after 100 years of being shut out of elections, were finally given a chance to fairly compete? Was it the actual result, which was getting (as mentioned before) the most diverse and politically balanced City Council we’ve had in the history of our city? Or was it “anti-democratic” simply because he lost?

Unfortunately, we’ll probably be reading a lot more thoughtless headlines and hearing a lot more anti-Charter Reform language from Portland’s conservative business class. Frankly, the old system worked GREAT for them, giving the wealthy an outsized voice and control over policy in City Hall. And even though the new council will have conservative voices who will fight valiantly to ensure the rich continue getting richer, that’s not good enough for those who want absolute power. In short, if you like what conservatives did to Measure 110, keep an eye out on what they’re planning to do to Charter Reform.

For the rest of us, there’s an old saying: “Progress, not perfection.” We’re sorry to break the hearts of the Oregonian headline writers and the bad actors who have dominated Portland politics for over a century, but new, vital forms of government—like any new plan or system that regular folks like you put into action every single day—will NEVER be perfect from the start, and need time and grace in order to operate at top proficiency. That said, if one-in-five voters refusing to choose a candidate in two races is the worst thing to happen in an election where we make sweeping changes for the very first time? I’d say democracy continues to be in pretty good shape. 

But that’s just my opinion—from deep in the “crater.”

After 20 years, Oregon's largest anime convention is still volunteer-led and bursting with enthusiastic energy. by Corbin Smith

More than twelve thousand fans descended on Portland last weekend to celebrate 20 years of Kumoricon, Oregon’s largest convention for appreciators of anime and the content world that surrounds it.

From Friday through Sunday attendees competed in video game tournaments, stood in as chess pieces in human-sized games, browsed the works of hundreds of artists and vendors in a massive market, and even waited in line to meet the person who voiced Shamir in Fire Emblem: Three Houses. But primarily, they wore cosplay, looked at cosplay, repaired cosplay, and plotted future cosplays. 

Compared to other conventions, like a big sports trading card convention I attended earlier this year, Kumoricon carries a softer, cheerier vibe. The fest is still proudly volunteer-run, despite its longevity and steady growth. While that trading card event was driven by the thrill of the exchange—the dream of something exploding in value—Kumoricon seems driven by the thrill of giving and receiving cosplay costume compliments.

You see the exchange often: cosplayers stopping others to say, “I love that, amazing job.” The complimented might mention something about the character or the other person's costume. It’s quick; everyone keeps walking on, but with a new little miniature bond sitting in their back pocket—forged from a pop culture connection and some light kindness. It’s all very earnest, and enthusiastic; a gentler world for gentler people. 

We photographed some cosplayers in attendance, and they told us why they attend conventions and a little about what goes into their costuming.

Jay is dressed as an original character, a Chinese moon moth named Uei. photo corbin smith

Jay showed off a cosplay of an original character—a Chinese moon moth named Uei—saying, "moon moths are from Asia and southwest China, so I tried to base her on an ancient Hanfu style. I bought a traditional Hanfu skirt from a reputable source called NewMoonDance. I’ve been cosplaying for fifteen years, and I’ve never been able to make anything that is my own. I made the top, handmade the wings, and painted them myself."

“Being in a con space when I was 13 was very supportive," Jay continued. "Everybody was always hyping each other up; there were silly little dances everywhere. It’s where I met my current fiancee, and all of my long standing friends. Cons were where you found your people."

Wesley as Lelouch from Code Geass. photo by corbin smith

Dressed as Lelouch Lamperouge from anime show Code Geass, Wesley expressed a love for Lamperouge's character arc—"going from a morally gray character, to pure evil, but for the good of good things. He’s just interesting. And also, I love big cape." Asked about the cape, Wesley clarified, "I love how it gets caught on things."

Hannah as Theodore from the rodent-led pop band 'Alvin and the Chipmunks.' Photo by corbin smith

Hannah's choice to dress as Theodore—of the virtual band Alvin and the Chipmunks—was based on the character being "fun and silly… we just munk around.” The costume's large black contacts are from Uniqso. "These are actually the mini-sclera, I’m afraid of the big normal sclera that covers your entire eye... I’ve seen them get stuck, so you can’t get your nail under there to pull them out."

Bonnie dressed as Anya from the indie horror game ‘Mouthwashing.’ photo by corbin smith Niko Suits dressed as Xie lian from 'Heaven’s Official Blessing.' photo by corbin smith

Niko Suits competes at the Master level of cosplay competition because they are actually a professional costumer, working in theater. "Pretty much anything—opera, ballet,” they explained. "If you’ve been [to a local show] in the last three years,  I’ve probably worked on it.”

Suits' mother encouraged them to take up sewing when they were young. “I have ADHD, so my mom was like, 'You need to have a hobby that is cheap and can keep you kind of quiet and sat for a bit," they recalled. "When I was 10, I was looking up Fullmetal Alchemist, and I found the cosplayer Reika—she’s kind of The Cosplayer. I found her, and I was like ‘YOU CAN DRESS UP LIKE THEM?' and it went from there.”

Tyler as Wirt from 'Over the Garden Wall.' photo by corbin smith

Tyler busked, tooting out videos game melodies and other popular tunes on a wireless electronic wind instrument, for all three days of the con. The activity worked well with cosplaying Wirt from Cartoon Network's Over the Garden Wall, who plays clarinet on the show. "I’m pleasantly surprised by how kind people have been," Tyler said. "I’ve been to Kumoricon the last five years, and I always see musicians out here play. So I finally decided to do it, and I’m glad I did. I’ve made over two hundred dollars so far."

April as Pumpkin Gal from 'Over the Garden Wall.' Photo by corbin Smith

The pumpkin head on April's costume—Pumpkin Gal from Over the Garden Wall—was much lighter than it looked, as it was crafted with an expanding foam, instead of papier-mché. April explained: “It's got a hard hat to hold it all together, cardboard on the inside to make the frame, and you just cover all the holes, spray it on, shave it, and boom."

Elee as Gyokuyō from 'The Apothecary Diaries.' Photo by Corbin Smith

“I actually learned to sew before I got into cosplay," Elee recalled. "My friends were like: Hey, you wanna come to this con, you wanna dress like silly little guys? And I was like, heck yes! It’s so fun to plan your outfits, spend all this time making your cosplay, and making everything for your outfit. Everyone is very excited to see what character you chose, and you have a fun time seeing what everyone else dressed up as—it’s just a very fun and positive experience."

Adrian as Isabelle from 'Animal Crossing.' Photo by corbin smith

Goblin as Maomao, also from 'The Apothecary Diaries.' Photo by Corbin Smith

Goblin is part of a cosplay collective called Too Broke for Cosplay, with fellow crafters Elee and Adrian, and credits Elee with teaching them to sew. At first, Goblin just did "tasks [Elee] didn’t like, like seam-ripping." Now they're working with furniture or upholstery fabrics on a heavy-duty Singer sewing machine. "When I hand make stuff, it lasts WAY longer than stuff I would buy online," they said. "There’s stuff I bought online that dies within one use and it cost $50-$70 dollars. This is my fourth time wearing this costume; I’ve only added to it, and it’s stayed as good."

Local brewers describe the secret ingredients that put their beers in the holiday spirit. by Joe Streckert

Every year around November, beer aisles and bottle shops get seasonal. Winter ales appear on the shelves right around the time frost starts appearing on the ground. 

Winter beers aren’t any one thing. Holiday brews are more of a feeling than a prescribed list of ingredients or techniques. The closest thing the beer world has to “official” rules about beer styles is the Beer Judge Certification Program guidelines. The most recent version of the guidelines advises beer judges to “think more about the declared concept than trying to detect each individual ingredient. Balance, drinkability, and execution of the theme are the most important deciding factors” when evaluating winter beers.

In other words, when professional beer judges evaluate a winter beer, they go by vibes.

“For me it’s a cozy beer,” says Jess Hardie, the head brewer and co-founder of TPK Brewing Company. “Something you want to snuggle up with like a blanket.”

“Seasonal beers can range greatly,” says Lee Perry, the event director for the Portland Holiday Brew Fest. “It can be a real mix of whatever brewers are feeling.”

That being said, there are some common features that give a beer that wintertime feeling.

“For me a winter beer is a bigger, maltier, warm-you-up style of ale. They tend to be a little bit darker and a little less hoppy and higher in alcohol,” says Jake Elder, the brewer and co-founder of Lazy Days Brewing. 

For Elder, beers that focus less on hops and more on malt give him an opportunity to break out the spices and get creative with flavors beyond just hops.

Winter is when beers get loaded up with spices, however adding Christmastime spices and flavorings to beer isn’t some kind of craft brew innovation or cute novelty. According to Edler, adding flavor to beer with whatever brewers had available is a long tradition. A tradition that’s even older than adding hops to beer.

“Hops have been a relatively new phenomenon,” says Elder. “Relatively new” here means only a few centuries. Elder estimates that hops only go back about three or four hundred years. Prior to that, spice blends were more popular for adding bitterness or other flavors to brews. Elder specifically names nutmeg, allspice, and mace as common and longstanding flavorings to beer, all of which are popular in holiday brews to this day.

“Pretty much anything that was used in a spice rack was used in a beer,” says Elder. Maltier beers, says Elder, can taste unbalanced or unfinished on their own. Adding additional flavoring agents can round the beer out and make it more palatable. Darker, maltier wintertime beer provide a ready template for brewers who are ready to evoke wintertime feelings with whatever flavoring agents they have on hand.

Kora and Hardie go beyond the spice rack for their wintertime flavors. Kora adds palo santo wood to one of his porters to create a woody, aged flavor that he says “tastes like a thin mint.” He notes that it’s one of his more popular beers and he makes it available year round. Hardie will add ingredients like Belgian candi sugar, cinnamon, and Mexican cocoa to her beers to make them sweeter and more distinctive.

That being said, hops aren’t entirely absent from the holiday parties. Oregon’s favorite (or maybe most divisive) beer style, the IPA, still shows up plenty in the winter, and other hoppy beers make appearances at seasonal brew festivals. 

Hardie made a black rye IPA that she sees as a wintertime brew. “I would still consider that a winter beer because the rye was so forward,” she says. It clocked in at about 68 IBUs and 6.5% ABV, which Hardie puts on the lower end of the alcohol spectrum for holiday ales. But: “It still had that roasty-toasty flavor that I want in a winter beer,” Hardie says.

According to Elder, winter IPAs tend to lean on hops that give the beers what he calls “Christmas tree flavors”: Notes of spruce and pine needles can make a hoppy beer feel like a holiday one, and he calls out Sierra Nevada’s Celebration IPA as a good example of popular beer that gets its holiday flavors from hops rather than spices. It’s pine-forward and is marketed as a seasonal beer while also retaining the ever-salable identity of IPA.

Perry notes that several of the beers at the Portland Holiday Brew Fest are fresh hop IPAs. December is at the very tail end of the fresh hop season in Oregon, but it’s close enough that juicy, fruity IPAs can just barely be in season when snow begins to fall.

Winter beers also aren’t strictly limited to ales.

“Winter ales are a lot quicker to turn over and get into the market,” says Kora. Lagers generally take longer to brew. That means they also take more planning, take up space in a brewery for a longer period of time, and are more of a logistical issue for brewers. But Kora notes that it is possible to brew lagers like bocks and pilsners that include holiday flavors.

Kora also notes that lagers have a reputation for being not as flavorful, interesting, or high in alcohol as ales. But, he says, that’s a misconception. “Lagers can be just as formidable as ales,” he says. According to him, an enterprising brewer can create a lager that evokes holiday feelings just as much as a smoky, barrel-aged porter might.

Winter ales tend to stay drinkable long after the Christmas decorations have been packed up. Alcohol is a preservative and the higher ABV in a lot of seasonal brews means that the flavors can stick around even into the next holiday season and beyond.

“Winter ales age really well,” says Kora. He notes that as long as high ABV beers are kept at fifty degrees or lower they stay drinkable and can develop in interesting ways.

“Winter beers can change over time and age out really well. They can be really different beers in six months or so and become quite tasty.” Long after the holidays are over, a little bit of Christmas can linger on in your beer fridge, ready with holiday cheer any time of year.

Four  Festive Beers To Try

• The Spice is Right from Lazy Days Brewing: A 6.7% spiced chocolate porter with flavor notes that wouldn’t be out of place in a pumpkin pie or spiced eggnog. 

• Nightfall of Diamonds from Zoiglhaus and Ecliptic: This 7.6% imperial porter is a collaboration between two breweries, blending toffee and coffee flavors with orange and chocolate. It’s not marketed as a seasonal beer per se, but it tastes a lot like one of those chocolate oranges sold around the holidays.

• Yippee-KI-PA from Baerlic: A winter IPA based on everyone’s favorite Christmas action movie. This 7.2% seasonal offering is less about overwhelming bitterness and more about a rounded, roasty flavor that goes well with Christmas trees or exploding office buildings.

• Peregrin Palo Santo Porter from Montavilla Brew Works: A dark porter aged in Peruvian Palo Santo wood with hints of minty sweetness.

A roundup of the best holiday sweets and snacks for your festivities. by Martha Daghlian

Throughout centuries of human civilization, people have sought out ways to combat the darkness and cold temperatures of winter: from ancient temples that aligned with the rising solstice sun to the ceremonial burning of symbolic fir trees, we have devised many strategies to brighten up the longest season. But perhaps the best solution to the winter doldrums is to have a little treat? Cultures all around the world have invented their own special cookies, cakes, and sweets to be enjoyed at this time of year, and we’ve rounded up some of our faves that are available right here in Portland!

Fancy Cake Thinks it’s a Tree

Arguably the most iconic of Christmas desserts, the bûche de noël (or yule log) predates current “is it cake” fads by well over a century. Traditionally made with light sponge cake rolled around a rich filling and adorned with cute meringue mushrooms, this whimsical faux tree echoes the ancient Celtic tradition of burning a ceremonial log at Winter Solstice and really amps up the classic holiday aesthetic. Don’t have a spare 57 hours and a background in French pastry? Let the professionals at Pix Patisserie take care of all your bûche needs with one of their glossy high concept stumps, available to order through December. Pix Patisserie, 2225 E Burnside, pixpatisserie.com

Baklava URCU ATALAY TANKUT / GETTY IMAGES

Baklava Just Like
Grandma Used to Make

Within the Armenian-American side of my family, baklava—a buttery, syrupy nut-and-phyllo pastry popular across the Mediterranean, Central/West Asian, and North African regions—is a mandatory holiday treat. I grew up on my grandmother’s recipe, which calls for walnuts only (no pistachios, thank you), an entire pound of clarified butter, NO cinnamon (how dare you even suggest it!), and a sneaky splash of bourbon, presumably a modern twist added by grandma. But TBH, I haven’t met a baklava I didn’t love, and there are a few particularly strong ready-made contenders here in Portland: World Foods Market, with locations in the Pearl and on Barbur Boulevard, makes a few varieties of baklava and similar pastries, all of which are exquisite (even with pistachios). 

Sophisticated Citrus

It’s a serendipitous fact that winter is not only a season for feasting on rich foods, it’s also the time of year when bright, refreshing citrus is at its peak. Who doesn’t love a bowl of oranges at a holiday party? In addition to enjoying fresh citrus fruit straight up (my favorite is the dekopon or sumo mandarin), there are all sorts of fancy things you can make with the help of our zesty friends: fresh grapefruit mimosas, traditional pomander balls (that’s when you poke a ton of little holes in an orange and shove a whole dried clove in each one, creating a spicy little air freshener that also kind of looks like a medieval weapon as it slowly dries up throughout the winter), hot toddies with tons of lemon. If you really want to impress your friends, try making your own candied citrus peel—it’s like a grown up version of those fruit slice gummy candies! 

Candied Citrus Peel

Cut the peel from a bunch of citrus fruits (make sure not to include any of the white part!) into strips. Blanch them three times (that means placing them in a saucepan, covering with water, and boiling for five minutes, then you’ll drain and boil them for five more minutes in fresh water, then do the same thing one more time). Then, cover them with a 1:1 mixture of water and granulated sugar. Bring to a boil, then simmer for 40-60 minutes over low heat. They should become soft and a little translucent at the edges. Drain and place on a drying rack until cool (put some foil or parchment underneath to catch any drips). Once they are dry, you can toss them in sugar for a sparkly and crunchy coating.

Candied citrus peel makes a super classy garnish for fancy desserts, and can also be used in cake and muffin recipes. Or just snack on them in between all the cookies for a “healthy” treat—it’s fruit, isn’t it??

Sticky Sweets for Lunar New Year

Lunar New Year may still be a little ways off, but I’m already planning what I’ll bring to the annual party our friends throw to celebrate this traditional East Asian holiday. A lot of the foods associated with Lunar New Year celebrations symbolize some specific kind of luck that one might hope to attract in the coming months. Noodles, dumplings, fish, and citrus all connect in some way to ideas including longevity, wealth, and unity. But in my humble opinion, treats featuring sticky rice are the star of the show. This time around, I plan to visit Li Min Bakery at 81st and SE Division, and Shop Halo Halo on 50th and SE Woodstock, for traditional nian gao (sticky rice cakes) and moon cakes filled with sweet bean paste. Lin Min’s Bakery & Bistro, 8615 SE Division; Shop Halo Halo, 4981 SE Woodstock, STE 2, shophalohalo.com

Rugelach Nataly Hanin / Getty Images

Rad Rugelach

My first encounter with rugelach was at an elementary-school friend’s house, where her mom taught us to make this classic holiday cookie, originally dreamed up hundreds of years ago by Jewish bakers in Poland. Wait, is it a cookie? Or is it a pastry? You know what, I don’t care… all I know is it comes in lots of different flavors (Apricot! Raspberry! Chocolate!) and its twisty little crescent-moon shape really spices up a cookie plate. Like many delicious wintertime snacks, they do take a bit of effort to make at home, so if you’re short on time you might want to check out Henry Higgins Bagels, which contrary to their name, also serves up rugelach, babka, and challah on the regular. Henry Higgins Boiled Bagels, multiple locations, hhboiledbagels.com

Scandinavian-Style Snacks

If this list of festive treats still isn’t enough for you, mark your calendars for the 40th annual Scan Fair! This massive event, hosted by Nordic Northwest at the Oregon Convention Center December 7 and 8, is inspired by traditional Scandinavian Christmas markets. Think traditional singing and dancing, cozy knitwear, and tons of delicious sweets, snacks, and drinks–basically a massive party to brighten up the dark wintertime with some serious hygge. My most trusted Scandinavian treat advisor suggests loading up on Æbleskiver (little round pancakes, often served with lingonberry jam), pickled herring, and glögg (spiced wine punch). Scan Fair runs Dec. 7-8 at the Oregon Convention Center, 777 NE MLK Jr, get your tickets and find more info at nordicnorthwest.org/scanfair 

In Portland even our airport presents are thoughtful, lovely, and local. by Suzette Smith

At 10 pm on Christmas Eve you could generally find my father at an office supply store; the chains used to stay open late (for corporate reasons) even on holidays. The next morning we’d pull thick squares of Post-it notes out of our holiday socks and know it was from Dad, even if he’d signed it “P. A. Perclip.”

Last minute gift buying is a fine tradition. Some may see the practice as thoughtless; I would argue it can be rooted in sweetness. After all, a last minute present is still a present. And now that flying has made it increasingly difficult to travel with gifts—airline luggage charges, unrelenting TSA clerks—you may as well just grab that stuff when you arrive, if you happen to be flying into Portland. 

Visitors may not know that our airport requires shops to maintain “street pricing,” so you won’t pay more for goods at PDX than you would in town.

If you’re flying out, you’re still sitting pretty—provided they’ll let you on the plane with ten boozy advent calendars sticking precariously out of a Powell’s tote. 

Portland airport has seen to it that even last minute presents from PDX are—by nature of the shops onhand—thoughtful, lovely, and local.

Pre-security

No one is suggesting you make a trip to the airport just to shop—well, other than the Port of Portland; they would probably support the idea—but those arriving at PDX have their pick of both concourse and “the garden” shops. 

In keeping with our love of last minute office supplies, you’ll want to check out Paper Epiphanies, which packs an impressive variety of journals, art books, design periodicals, and a rainbow wall of markers (!) into a cute corner shop. The woman-owned business specializes in femme-empowerment messages, so you’ll find trendy books about feminist philosophy, art, and activism. On a practical level, this shop also has an entire wall of greeting cards. Pro tip: Want to hear more from someone who lives far away? A stationary set is a sweet incentive.

Paper Epiphanies suzette smith

Orox Leather is an epicenter of cool in this area. Not only does it sell handmade leather goods ($250 purse for when you’ve really pissed someone off; $10 leather coasters for the uncle who wants you to put one under your drink), but the people behind Orox also invited their fellow Latinx and Oaxaqueño makers from the Portland area to sell items there as well. So you can get dreamy little half-pints of Nico’s Ice Cream from a freezer in the back, and sampler packs of HAB hot sauce from shelves in the front. It’s about community, but it also appears to be about having amazing taste.

Just next door, you’ll find the delicious and vegan AND gluten-free goodies of Missionary Chocolates. They have a lot on offer, but we’ll vouch for the chocolate-covered sandwich cookies. Further in, the deeply basic, but super crowd-pleasing Hello from Portland store carries THE THING YOU NEED when basically any Portland-y / Oregon-y present will do. A “Keep Portland Weird” mug it is.

Concourses B and C

Post-security shops have an obvious advantage because whatever you pick up after TSA’s disrobe/re-robe challenge doesn’t have to meet its dogmatic restrictions. That means booze! 

The GENIUSES at Straightaway Cocktails have created a craft cocktail advent calendar that has seemingly no attachment to any particular religion or any assigned set of dates. It’s just a nicely designed box with 12 mystery doors, and behind each is an alcoholic drink in a can. This is the present very good adult siblings give one another to weather the hard times of visiting family. If it helps, it’s of a similar size and shape to an oversize Bible (wink). Straightaway already has these little masterpieces available at their kiosk.

Cocktail advent calendar straightaway cocktails

Concourse C has a lot going for it because it’s also where you’ll find the PDX Powell’s Books pop-up. The selection has nothing on City of Books, but there’s always some interesting titles selected by staff, showcases of local authors, whatever nonfiction book everyone is mad about, a variety of card games, and the new Stephen King in stock.

Now, your gate dictates what concourse you’re flying from, so some concourse options simply won’t be available, depending what side you’re on. However, if your mother sternly warned you “not to come home again without a Pendleton wool blanket”—they have booths in both C or on the way to D and E. Similarly, Westward Whiskey also put down roots on either side of security (C & E).

Concourses D and E

Stronghold of cute, local, and punk Tender Loving Empire manifested two locations as well, in both D and E, on the same side of security. TLE has a long history of reliably solid care packages, tailored to foodies, self-care softies, and even people who just like Jacobsen Sea Salt. They’ve got a basket for it, and if they don’t, they can make you one.

While I am in no way related to Smith Tea founder Steven Smith, I do frequently receive his company’s tea as a gag gift, and I love that. Please continue this very funny joke, because the tea is a little on the spendy side. The full-leaf flavors are perfect for splurges and special occasions, though, and the company always has interesting collabs in the works. This fall, they brought back a Westward Whiskey team up, Ode to Whiskey, where black tea is aged in wet whiskey barrels to convey tasting notes/vibes—it’s perfect for your moody, lettered cousin.

That’s your winter gift gauntlet handled! We hope this list helped; it’s not really just for the holidays, because there are plenty more times throughout the year when you’ll want to take along a gift to say, “I’m sorry I didn’t get a hotel,” or “so it turns out we both have the same dad.” Life can be messy, but a last minute present is still a present.

Christmas came early for these city bureaus and agencies. Let’s see what ‘Taxpayer Santa’ brought them! by Courtney Vaughn

What you do with your money is nobody’s business, but what the government does with your money is everyone’s business. 

At a time of year when parents across the nation get suckered into splurging on pricey, short-lived toys (sorry, but your kid is never gonna learn to play that keyboard and there’s a good chance that Easy-Bake Oven will burn your house down), we set out to see which public agencies and city bureaus received the biggest, coolest, and most expensive toys—thanks to you and your tax dollars. 

While these agencies may have been blessed with many of the toys on their wish lists, we know austerity measures are coming. The Portland mayor’s office recently offered a budget preview that reveals city bureaus will likely need to cut another 5 percent from their budgets in the upcoming fiscal year. If that sounds like a bone dry way of explaining the city’s money sitch, imagine if you already had to cancel all your streaming services and lower your grocery bill last year, and now you have to cut even more expenses, to the point where you’re considering canceling your internet service and just stealing the shoddy WiFi signal from that coffee shop down the street.

And though the government shopping sprees may be coming to an end for now, let’s take stock of some big-ticket toys, tools, and trucks that taxpayers recently bought for our public agencies. Show this to your kids to explain why “Santa” had to scale back this year.

Courtesy PPB Portland Police Bureau

Body cameras

What they are: small video cameras roughly the size of a credit card that clip onto officers’ uniforms. In December 2023, Portland City Council authorized police to spend up to $10 million on body-worn cameras over the next five years. The end-of-year purchase was a bit of an impulse buy. The council approved the expense in an effort to save the bureau $1.5 million by approving a contract with camera manufacturer Axon before the new year. This feels like the equivalent of springing for a new washer and dryer during a Presidents Day sale because the deal is too good to pass up. 

Estimated cost: $10 million

Courtesy PPB Portland Police Bureau

Drones

What they are: small, aerial cameras also known as unmanned aircraft systems, which record video and images from the vantage point of a bird or an insect buzzing above your head. PPB started using drones in 2023 as part of a pilot program. This year, the City Council coughed up nearly $100,000 for the bureau to buy more devices. Police mainly use them to help get images at major crime and crash scenes. 

The bureau says the high-flying cameras allow officers to “monitor critical incidents from a distance, assist with search and rescue, and provide evidence of crimes.” Recently, PPB has deployed drones at crisis scenes involving uncooperative, potentially dangerous subjects, to try to peer into windows or gain a view of other hard-to-reach spaces. Police swear they’re not using drones for any type of facial recognition efforts. 

Estimated cost: $166,000

Portland Police Bureau

Crowd control weapons; armor

What it is: tear gas, riot shields, and impact munitions. Earlier this year, the Portland Police Bureau revived its crowd control specialists, formerly called the Rapid Response Team. Crowd control officers responded to large-scale protests over the spring at Portland State University and now, the bureau is preparing for demonstrations and potentially violent protests following the November election. The city didn’t skimp on PPB’s shopping budget, authorizing $1.1 million for the purchase of 100 shields; 350 tear gas canisters; 350 kinetic impact projectiles; 300 impact munitions with chemical irritants; 100 flash-bang incendiary devices, and munitions training. 

Note: Since they’re spending your tax money, all of these weapons will be used on you, dear readers… which gives new meaning to the phrase, “You get what you ask for.”

Estimated cost: $1.1 million

TriMet

Articulated transit bus,
AKA “bendy bus”

What it is: a long, 60-person public transit bus with an accordion-like middle section, allowing the long bus to maneuver around tight roads while carrying more passengers. The buses are diesel-powered and allow TriMet to expand capacity on select, highly-used routes. Frequent service and more seats = more fentanyl traces, baby!

Estimated cost: $935,000

Courtesy Portland Fire & Rescue Portland Fire & Rescue

Tractor-drawn aerial truck

What it is: a big-ass fire engine with superpowers. Tractor-drawn aerial trucks give firefighters extra maneuverability and include an aerial ladder for reaching tall and tight spaces. They also have independent rear steering, so the trailer attached to the truck can be angled even when the cab isn’t. These behemoths typically range in length from 55 to 65 feet. 

Estimated cost: $1.7 million

Portland Bureau of Transportation

Street sweeper

What it is: A heavy-duty truck that sweeps and vacuums. The latest street sweeper purchase by PBOT was a 2023 Elgin Eagle. The model boasts a conveyor that won’t jam, a variable height lift system and a high-capacity dump feature (paging Sir Mix-a-Lot!) As the manufacturer notes, the Eagle sweeper can maintain highway speeds and ensures “dumping is a breeze.”

Estimated cost: $424,500 

Courtesy PBOT Portland Water Bureau

Snow plow 

What it is: A SnowDogg plow attachment for heavy-duty trucks that can scoop snow and debris off roads. You probably thought PBOT was the only bureau to come to our rescue during a snowstorm. Not so! The Water Bureau is also responsible for keeping roads clear during crummy weather, while responding to water main breaks and other crises. The Water Bureau recently bought two plow attachments and even opted for discontinued 2019 models to save some dough. The latest purchases weren’t meant for general use around the city. Instead they’re mostly meant to secure watersheds, clear access paths to the Water Bureau’s own facilities, and other bureau-specific responses—but still, it never hurts to have more of these puppies available during the next snowpocalypse.

Estimated cost: $5,600

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October 17, 2014 Democrat Martha Coakley and Republican Charlie Baker are in a dead heat in the Massachusetts governor's race. The margin of error in the polls for both candidates is slim, but can voters in communities of color fill the margin with a victory, sending one of them to the governor's office? Are the campaigns of the independent candidates resonating with black, Latino, or Asian voters? This week on Basic Black, we look at how the candidates for governor are delivering their message to communities of color in the race to the finish line on November 4. Panelists:
- Latoyia Edwards, Anchor, New England Cable News
- Phillip Martin, Senior Reporter, WGBH News
- Peniel Joseph, Professor of History, Tufts University
- Marcela Garcia, Regular Contributor to the Boston Globe's Editorial and Op-Ed Pages
- Paul Watanabe, Director of the Institute for Asian American Studies, UMass, Boston