At the outskirts of campus, groups of students have slowly been designing and assembling a structure that is both artistic and utilitarian.
For the past three years Stephen Duff, an associate professor in the architecture department, has been leading groups of students to build a giant wood structure around the Art Department’s two Japanese wood-fired kilns on Riverfront Parkway near the Eugene Millrace.
“The point is to get students involved in a real project in the design and the construction all the way through the entire process from conception until you get the occupancy permit,” Duff said.
Currently, the lattice walls have been completed, and the trusses of the roof were put in place Sunday with a crane. The design is partially inspired by Japanese architecture because of the Japanese kilns the building will house, which are the only kilns of their kind on the West Coast.
The structure, which is made entirely out of Douglas Fir timber and stained a golden amber color, isn’t made with standard-size lumber either, said Colin Hedrick, an architecture undergraduate who has been working on the project for roughly two years.
Everything is oversized, Hedrick said when they moved the lattice walls out of the workshop and into place, players from the football team came out to help them lift the walls, each wall weighing more than a ton.
“They were so ridiculously heavy,” he said.
A lot of the massive lumber was donated from places in Canada, and also purchased by the architecture department.
“Finding big pieces of wood like this is very expensive and very hard these days,” Hedrick said. “We have a unique opportunity being students and being a University to put the kind of money and resource towards it. It wasn’t so much the materials that make it prohibitive in the outside world but the man hours and the experience. No one in the outside world can do it for a reasonable amount of money, but we’re students and we’re paying to do it.”
The Art Department’s ceramics studio uses the kilns each year for several weeks to fire their ceramics. The architecture students are working on the building for their own experience, but it also helps out the ceramics program because it gives them a place to hold their events, Hedrick said.
“It’s almost like our gift, like what we can give to the experience and more people can come here and be part of the experience when they have some where they can come and actually do it,” he said.
Hedrick said the shed that used to cover the kilns was so dilapidated it was dangerous.
“There was literally the shadiest shed roof you’d ever seen in your life,” he said.
Now they will be covered by a sturdy wood building, said Hedrick. The thick, latticed walls allow air to pass through the area under the roof.
Hedrick said the type of structure they are building is very unique because the framing is inspired by Japanese-style timber framing.
“I don’t want to say it’s a lost art, but it’s something people just don’t do anymore,” he said. “Every piece of the building literally has hours of detail work in just how it’s going to be build and how it’s going to be put together and how it’s going to be detailed. That level of craftsmanship you just don’t really find anywhere.”
Graduate student of historic preservation and architecture Jennifer Flathman said the project wouldn’t be possible without Duff’s driving force.
“Steve is the reason why this project (is happening),” she said. “He’s had a lot of optimism and faith in the students being able to do this where a lot of people would have been frustrated.”
Hedrick agreed, and said Duff has inspired student creativity.
“Just about anyone can do just about anything as long as you feel comfortable and you’re willing to give it a shot, he’s willing to let you try,” Hedrick said. “He has a lot of faith in our ability to design individual small elements of the building.”
Duff modestly agreed.
“That’s what this whole thing is about is to get students involved,” he said.
Flathman said that while it has been a student effort, people from the community and Facility Services have also aided the project. She also said Facility Services allowed them to use their workshops, volunteered their time and gave suggestions on how to make working safer and more efficient.
“People like that have really made it possible,” she said.
 

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