Insights

Honoring Indigenous People’s Day

by | October 8, 2021 0 News + Announcements

In honor of Indigenous People’s Day on Monday, we want to recognize and show our respect for Native People that have understood for generations how to live in harmony with the land, water and all other living things. SERA has learned so much about tribal culture and world views from working with the Affiliated Tribes […]

Combating Climate Change: A Study of Embodied Carbon

by | September 27, 2021 0 Architecture, Ideas, Sustainability

The design and construction industry has spent two decades promoting net-zero energy buildings by combining operational energy efficiency and onsite renewable energy generation, but now the goalposts are shifting.  There is a growing awareness that buildings generate massive amounts of carbon through “embodied carbon” emissions during construction, creating huge spikes in carbon emissions and undercutting […]

Henry Building Receives Oregon’s Top Honor for Reuse and Revitalization

Historically significant, seismically upgraded building houses some of Portland’s most vulnerable populations The newly renovated and seismically upgraded Henry Building in downtown Portland is among 11 historic projects across Oregon to receive a 2021 DeMuro Award for Excellence in Historic Preservation! The 112-year-old Henry Building presented a variety of challenges for the client Central City […]

Tackling the Low-Rise LA Design Competition

by | August 20, 2021 0 Architecture, Ideas

The American Dream of single-family homeownership is growing increasingly inaccessible. To explore new paths to affordable homeownership, the City of Los Angeles’ Chief Design Officer and the Mayor’s Office created the Low-Rise LA design competition to promote housing affordability, paths to homeownership and innovative models of sustainable residential architecture. With a growing housing portfolio in […]

Our Greatest Rooftop Decks — Ranked!

by | July 12, 2021 0 Architecture, Ideas

Inspired by Archinect’s recent list, “10 Green Rooftop Spaces We Liked This Week,” for which one of our projects claimed a spot, we looked back at some of our own favorite rooftop spaces from projects past. And what better timing? Summer is here and the spotlight — err, sunlight! — is on all the great […]

Chapel Renovation Wins Palladio Craftsmanship Award

by | April 6, 2021 0 Interior Design, News + Announcements

For two decades, the national Palladio Awards has recognized traditional design that enhances the beauty and humane qualities of the built environment. Our team’s renovation of Providence Academy sought to do just that when taking on the project in 2019. On Monday, Traditional Building Magazine announced this year’s winners, recognizing the Providence Academy Chapel with […]

#12: The Sweet, Sweet Conference Suite

by | March 30, 2021 0 Ideas

Welcome back to the SERA Workplace series Silver Linings. We took a few months off to fully soak in the new year. And now that 2020 is officially in the record books and vaccines are available, we have nothing but a glorious, sunny, post-pandemic future to look forward to. Right? (gulp.) Rest assured, we will […]

Post-Covid Possibilities: Exploring Hotel-to-Housing Conversions

by | February 24, 2021 1 Architecture, Ideas, Interior Design

The pandemic has disrupted the typical supply-and-demand dynamic in many industries. In the short term, this is especially true for Hospitality. Thus, the topic of converting “distressed properties” to other uses is receiving a great deal of attention lately. While speculation around opportunities for distressed hotels will likely diminish with economic recovery, there will continue […]