Kevin Cavenaugh

Kevin Cavenaugh has been designing and building innovative infill and adaptive reuse projects in Portland for the last 15 years with the motto “Changing Portland 3,000 square feet at a time.” His developments have ranged from the Box and One to the LEED Platinum Burnside Rocket. Most recently, he transformed a former Dodge dealership into the foodie paradise The Ocean and an empty Sandy Boulevard triangle into The Zipper. He was a 2008 Loeb Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Cavenaugh speaks not only to the design aspects of his current projects, but also to the sociopolitical, socioeconomic, and myriad lasting effects of his work and of the larger developmental trends. Deeply aware of his complicated role as a gentrifying force, he also discusses his efforts towards equitable investment through crowdfunding, current plans for internally subsidized affordable housing, and innovative solutions for systemic issues of discrimination and displacement.