Harvard Club of Oregon and Southwest Washington

No architect has influenced Oregon as broadly as John Yeon.

A planner, conservationist, historic preservationist, art collector, and urban activist, as well as one of the state’s most gifted architectural designers, Yeon was one of the progenitors of the Northwest Regional Style of architecture and stands among the region’s most influential conservationists. Co-curated by Randy Gragg, the Portland Art Museum has mounted a retrospective of Yeon in what is the largest, most comprehensive exhibit ever devoted to an Oregon architect.

During his six-decade-long career, Yeon’s residential architecture influenced a generation of architects and presaged many later ideas of sustainable building; he preserved landmark buildings and influenced the designs for major Portland developments and parks; he single-handedly protected critical coastal landscapes; and, most prominently, his life-long advocacy for the Columbia River Gorge played a pivotal role in creating the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area.

A 2006 Loeb Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, Gragg served as architecture critic and cultural politics writer for The Oregonian for 17 years and as editor-in-chief of the city magazine, Portland Monthly, for four years. He has lectured and published nationally on architecture and urban issues. In conjunction with the Yeon retrospective, he edited and contributed major essays to two books detailing Yeon's architecture and conservation legacies. 

A post-tour cocktail gathering will likely take place at a nearby speakeasy.....TBD.