february 2013 | by melissa boettcher | show project

Sea Reach is rounding a corner to completion on the final phase of the new comprehensive wayfinding plan for Hoyt Arboretum. The next phase is to update the existing collections exhibits and add ten more.

When I was given this assignment, I noticed that the old exhibits had a series of undefined "blobs" to demonstrate tree shape and size. I made it my mission to create better blobs with a well-defined shape and structure for each tree family. After a thorough search of the Arboretum's online photo collection - I looked closely at the architecture of each tree. I traced the trunk and branches and removed aberrant or abnormal branches to establish the "typical" shape for each tree type. After the "skeleton" of the trunk and branches is drawn, then a basic, amorphous shape or "blob" is applied to give the tree shape. These help a visitor to identify tree types within a family with just a glance at their basic profile. The exhibits feature up to 6 different shapes and sizes within a specific tree family.

february 2013 | by susan jurasz

There are no roads into Cordova, Alaska. The airport, typical of many of the airports in Alaska, is small and unassuming. This is the gateway into one of the most specular places in the world: Prince Williams Sound, the Chugach National Forest, and the Copper River Delta. The Copper River Delta extends for 700,000 acres (2,800 km2) and is considered the largest contiguous wetlands along the Pacific coast of North America. The delta is used annually by millions of birds, including the world's entire population of western sandpipers; the largest nesting population of trumpeter swans and the only known nesting site for the dusky Canada goose. Over 2 million salmon spawn here each year. And as if that is not enough: two glaciers, the Miles and Child's glaciers calve directly into the river.

Sea Reach is working with Alaska Airlines and the US Forest Service to design, fabricate and install a mural that wraps the interior walls of the Cordova Airport. The mural reflects roughly 100 miles of coastline with fishing boats, past the mountain ranges and glaciers to the Copper River Delta. It highlights the stunning scenery that surrounds Cordova, including the Chugach National Forest and the Copper River Delta.

january 2013 | by linda repplinger | show project

The old brick bank building sits at a crossroads in time - once the site of a train track where pioneer farmers transported hard red winter wheat from the fields to towering grain elevators, it is now the route of the Sheyenne River National Scenic Byway. Seeing the old building surrounded by miles of farmland reminds me of my grandma's stories about growing up in North Dakota.

The building was constructed in 1916 as Kathryn's bank and served as one for many years before going into receivership during the Great Depression. Through the years, the building housed a creamery, a grocery store with a lunch counter, and a furniture store before it was abandoned and began to decline. Today, the building is being restored as a meeting hall and visitor center with new graphic displays. After nearly 100 years, the building still has its original tile work at the front entrance, a state-of-the art 1900s burglar alarm, and a vault with 2-foot-thick walls.

january 2013 | by megan whitaker | show project

Obituaries and interpretive exhibits don't have an immediate connection, but for me, a newspaper obituary can represent the turning point in my quest to find images for an exhibit. At the newly renovated Mahogany Grove Group Campground in the Spring Mountains National Recreation Area each campsite is being named after a person notable in the development of the area. And my current quest is to find photos of a gentleman called B.V. Smith.

I begin my search with nothing more than B.V. Smith-not even a first name! I become the Nancy Drew of obituaries, census records, and Ancestry.com. Fortunately, I knew that he lived in the Las Vegas/Mt. Charleston area during the 1930s. After days of combing the internet, I began to piece together a family tree. Phone calls and messages go out to prospective living family members explaining why I needed to speak with them about their grandfather. Imagine my surprise when I found his granddaughter lives just 20 miles away from me in McMinnville, Oregon and has photos I can scan. The family of Benton Van Buron Smith is pleased to discover that their grandfather is being honored for his contribution to the Mt. Charleston area.

january 2013 | by nicole adsit

On the southwestern coast of Oregon lies the charming beach town of Gold Beach. It's there that the magnificent Rogue River meets the even more majestic Pacific Ocean. The region is defined by the vital watershed of the Rogue and is home to a variety of fish and wildlife that have been a resource for the peoples of Southern Oregon for thousands of years.

Sea Reach is working with the Lower Rogue Watershed Council to give new life to a series exhibits we produced nearly twenty years ago, on display outside the Lower Rogue Watershed Council Building. The new design emphasizes the vitality and fluidity of the watershed - full of soft greens, yellows, blues and purples. The panels will showcase information on the wetlands, wildlife, plant life, early peoples, fish found in Lower Rogue and information on the scenic byway route.

january 2013 | by heather julius | show project

My friends and I are out at dinner trading war stories. Er, work stories. I've got a good one: "Imagine," I say, "a giant ice dam blocking a river in the panhandle of Idaho around 18,000 years ago. A glacial lake containing 10 times the flow of all the rivers in the world forms behind this dam. Then, the dam breaks, and the resulting flood, filled with boulders the size of houses and 60-ton icebergs roar at speeds of 65-miles-per-hour over16,000 square miles, across four states, including Oregon, in a thick slurry of mud. Gouging and scouring the land as it speeds by."

My friends don't believe it. But it's all true! And that's not all! This all happened during the time when Ice Age mammals, like 10-foot-tall sloths, roamed the area.

Our challenge is to connect people with a past too wild to believe - one that took place in our backyards. The Tualatin Ice Age Discovery Trail, designed to be a local and pedestrian-friendly complement to the National Park Service "Ice Age Floods Geologic Trail," is in the planning phase. As Sea Reach's research and writer, I am becoming a believer.

december 2012 | by susan jurasz

Our second trip to Amman, Jordan, is really productive. After nearly 24 hours of travel, Peter and I are blurry-eyed but excited to visit our brand new bus at the Toyota dealership with our project partners: Suha, Ruba, and Natasha. We have all waited a year for this!

The new passenger bus will be converted into the Eureka Science Bus. The mobile lab will feature solar panels, a green roof, a wind turbine and a biodiesel generator. All of the seats will be removed to make room for student workstations, storage cabinets for lab equipment, and educational/interpretive exhibits.

By the end of the week, we have the measurements we need to finalize the interior design and are engaging three Jordanian businesses to assist us with the transformation-a large format printer, Sama Jordan Signs, who will be printing our bus wrap design on vinyl and applying it to the exterior; the young entrepreneur and owner of TAQETNA who will be outfitting the bus with solar panels and his newly patented wind turbine, and JMSS, part of KADBB, who will be removing all of the windows and seats.

By this time next year, students throughout Jordan will be conducting hands-on experiments and making scientific observations from the bus!

december 2012 | by ben speidel

Sea Reach recently developed signage for the beautiful and historic Goodpasture Covered Bridge, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Goodpasture Covered Bridge was built in 1938 and was named for Benjamin Franklin Goodpasture, a pioneer farmer who had settled near the bridge site. At 165 feet long, it is the second largest covered bridge in Oregon and can be found two miles west of the community of Vida, spanning McKenzie River.

In 2010, Lane County received $2 million in a federal transportation grants to renovate the bridge to its former glory with work beginning in 2012. OBEC, the engineering firm contracted to define the bridge rehabilitation, hired Sea Reach to design and fabricate exhibits portraying the history of the bridge.

november 2012 | by megan whitaker

Usually a job in the print shop involving 140 signs will also involve the use of a respirator during some point in the project. However, the quick, clean and scent-free application of vinyl letters makes 140 signs a nice daylong project with a variety of music playing in the background.

The most stressful part is the initial set-up to make sure that all will be centered correctly and as a bonus, a sequentially numbered job erases any fear of misspelling errors! After the set-up and wipe down of the panels-you are 140 signs from being done with the project and sent to a happy client.

october 2012 | by ben harrison

The "Friends of Minidoka" Society asked Sea Reach to reproduce an historic sign that listed the names of all the members of the camp who had served in World War II. The Minidoka Relocation Center in Jerome County Idaho was one of 10 relocation centers where Japanese and Japanese-Americans living on the West Coast were moved in August 1942, eight months after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The Center operated for more than 3 years, closing in October 1945. The Friends of Minidoka educate the public about the internment experience and the center is now a National Historic Site managed by the National Park Service.

Approximately 1000 of the Minidoka Center internees served in the U.S. Army during World War II. Their names were painted by hand onto the original wood sign. Over time, the wood deteriorated and the paint faded.

The Friends of Minidoka wanted to reproduce the sign with materials that would endure time and withstand weathering. Our efforts to replicate the original sign with complete historical accuracy proved challenging, but everything worked out with a little detective work.

How would we accurately reproduce a sign from just 3 photographs? That's all we had to go on, as no one had measured the original sign, nor did an independent list of the names exist-we had to pour over the photographs of the old sign to recreate the list of names.

Then it was up to me to recreate all of the pieces and make them fit into these dimensions while keeping them easy to read, visually appealing and as true to the original as I could. The final product turned out great and as a designer, it was nice to have a positive influence on an important piece of American history.