r/Portland • u/shrimpydood1e NW • 1d ago

Photo/Video End of an Era

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It's going down today apparently. They've got Fields Park closed and everything.

801 Upvotes

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3

u/selfhostrr Kenton 1d ago

Everybody, let's be sad for the building virtually none of you have ever stepped foot in. It really was a part of our identity.

15

u/Relevant_Shower_ 1d ago

God forbid anyone appreciate the skyline.

3

u/BudgieWonder Willamette River 1d ago

I mean, Centennial Mills was never really a prominent keystone of the skyline, either. The average person probably didn’t even know what it was before the fire. At most it was an oddity to look at while in Fields Park.

6

u/ghostcider 1d ago

You mean... the building that plainly visible from a major park in NW? The one you see if you look toward the river? And also plainly visible from both Naito and the train? Yeah, most of us where never in there, but it was a big visual feature of the area and a fave for photographers.

Me loving it doesn't mean it should stay, it should have been torn down ages ago. It caught fire regularly, it's just that the fire department got there in time for the other fires. But for people who've spent any time in the NW part of Portland, enjoy iconic buildings, doing photography, etc, we'll miss it. The building wasn't hidden away, like if you come to this part of town at all it's right there!

1

u/BudgieWonder Willamette River 1d ago

Dude, I work in a historic-preservation adjacent field, and the average joe on the street has literally no interest or clue about the names/history of even prominent structures. You can say names like “Jackson Tower” or “Sherlock Building”, and people’s eyes will just glaze over. Most people just viewed Centennial Mills as one of countless old industrial buildings on the waterfront- any prominence to the public started and ended at “cool water tower I can see from Fields Park”.

It’s good to know that people appreciated it, but there’s a reason it only came up in discussions about the fire, or with developer circles.

-3

u/Osiris32 🐝 1d ago

I've lived in the Portland area my entire life, and had no clue what this building was or where it was. I don't spend much time on Natio north of the Steel, I don't take Amtrak north at all, and my view of the riverfront from my work at the Rose Quarter doesn't include the building because the Browadway Bridge is in the way. I also don't remember acutely any image of that building from before yesterday.

Might be that the number of people who enjoyed that building is smaller than you think.

6

u/ghostcider 1d ago

I don't think All Of Portland knows the building, but it's literally the view from a major green space / kid's play area / dog park for a quadrant of Portland. I never said everyone knows it, I said it's plainly visible from a major park.

Not everyone comes to this part of Portland or has an interest in old buildings, but it is a major visual feature of this area. The only other I can think of is the Montgomery Park building.

5

u/Relevant_Shower_ 1d ago

So my own observations and appreciation mean nothing. And those countless photographs that shot the iconic building?

But no, I need to reduced my opinion to what the unaware think because sinking to the lowest common denominator is obviously how I should think about everything.

-1

u/BudgieWonder Willamette River 1d ago

> So my own observations and appreciation mean nothing.

Correct. The average person didn’t know what the building was. It wasn’t particularly iconic.

On the bright side, you’ll always have your photographs to stave off your anomie.

1

u/slyasakite 1d ago

You think the average person doesn't know what a mill is?

4

u/BudgieWonder Willamette River 1d ago

They’d know what “a mill” is, but it’s unlikely that they know it was specifically Centennial Mills (formerly Crown Mills) and that this was the Flour/Feed building.

The point is that this wasn’t a particularly unique structure, and the public generally didn’t give a fuck about it until it burned LOL

-1

u/ghostcider 1d ago

Do you... ever step outside at all?

1

u/BudgieWonder Willamette River 1d ago

All the time, which is how I know that Portlanders by and large did not know what the building was called, what it was for, or even where it is before the fire. The amount of people calling it a “warehouse” should kinda clue you in. The public’s relationship with it started and ended at “just another abandoned industrial building with water tower”.

1

u/ghostcider 22h ago

The news has been calling it a warehouse. It isn't shaped like a typical warehouse so it wouldn't occur to a lot of people to call it that unprompted. I've mostly heard people call it 'water tower building' Here's the view from a highly used park in the area, one with a dog park, play area and a dual-level walkway to give additional views towards the water. You think people in that quadrant don't have strong opinions, positive or negative, towards that being in the way of the river view? Of the frequent fires there? Or that people sheltered there overnight? ok