The Bull Run Powerhouse was one of the first hydroelectric projects in the state of Oregon to mass produce electricity. Understanding how construction could be achieved without the convenience of an electrical grid to plug into, architects and workers combined ancient building techniques with the newest materials available to create the historic structures that mark our property today.
A major concern was keeping these expansive buildings from caving under the pressure of gravity. So architectural designs and techniques straight from the Middle Ages were employed – with tons of industrial support.
For instance, a matrix of twisted rebar (a relatively new invention at the time) created the skeleton for all walls, floors, and ceilings of each building. These steel webs spanned distances of fifty feet or more and could spread over a foot thick in places.
Once the rebar was set, the framework was sandwiched between wood planks and cement was then poured to envelop the matrix. This was how buildings at the Powerhouse Center were raised from the ground – layer by layer – with wide grain imprints still visible on exterior walls like textured testaments to the old-growth planks that formed them.
But rebar and cement weren’t enough to keep the massive structures from collapsing under the force of gravity, so a series of high arches were incorporated in both Turbine and Transformer Building walls for extra support. More than half the arches were outfitted with glass window panes, allowing light to pour in the buildings well before the first spark of electricity was ever generated on site.
While it’s been said touring the Powerhouse Center can feel like exploring an industrial cathedral, an abundance of high windowed arches aren’t the only structural elements to make such an impression. For example, retaining walls all over the property were assembled through a patchwork of cut boulders and stones that fit together like a geometric puzzle – a technique more related to the construction of medieval castles than the construction of modern industrial enterprise.
Architectural forms recalling scenes from medieval times are also visible in the basement of the Turbine Building. Resting in this subterranean space are sloping walls that range from three to ten feet thick – but harnessing foundational girth was a building technique that had been used for millennia before it was ever applied to our Bull Run basement.
Such is how – well over a century ago – architects and builders meshed ancient construction techniques with the newest materials available to create these proud structures that dominate our site today.
