News - Mayer Reed

Community Helps Shape New Vancouver Park

A Mayer/Reed landscape architect stands with an east Vancouver community member, pointing at the large multilingual display boards at a community engagement event. The boards feature images different types of programming and park uses. Participants marked images they are drawn to with red dots.

Mayer/Reed is designing a new 14-acre community park within the Vancouver Innovation Center mixed-use development. The large, wooded parcel was privately owned and fenced off from the public for decades, and now neighbors are helping shape its future. Together with our partner JLA Public Involvement, we hosted a series of multilingual in-person and virtual open houses that have garnered ideas from across the community. We asked participants: What do you want to see at the new park? How do you want to play and exercise? How do you want to experience and connect with nature?

An image of the undeveloped wooded parcel within the Vancouver Innovation Center. Large fir trees filter dappled sunlight onto a small, grassy meadow.

The input shared so far is informing design options that will be presented to the community in October, with a master plan anticipated in December. We look forward to transforming this long-inaccessible landscape into a welcoming public park for east Vancouver.

Jumping for Joy at Frog Pond Neighborhood Park

Beneath a bright blue sky on August 27, families and community members celebrated the grand opening of Frog Pond Neighborhood Park in Wilsonville, Oregon. Children enthusiastically explored the new playground, winding trails and cast their votes to name the park’s signature green frog.

Beneath a swatch of mature evergreen trees, children play on the new, bright green playground equipment at Frog Pond Park. A concrete frog sits proudly amongst the play equipment, both as the park's mascot and a place to play and climb.

Mayer/Reed designed Frog Pond Neighborhood Park to reflect the personality and desires of the neighborhood. Shaped by community engagement, the 2.8-acre park features places to gather and play, and the meandering pathway system creates an important connection to the adjacent primary school.

An aerial photo of the lily-pad inspired playground of Frog Pond Primary School — Frog Pond Primary School

The neighborhood has another reason to celebrate this week. Just a short walk from the newly opened park, Frog Pond Primary School (designed by Arcadis with landscape architecture by Mayer/Reed) welcomes students for the first time on September 1. Although the park and school are two distinct projects, they were designed with a shared vision for a connected community open space. Together, with their nature- and water-inspired landscapes, Frog Pond Park and Frog Pond Primary School establish a welcoming new destination for play, discovery and gathering in the growing Frog Pond neighborhood.

Mayer/Reed Gallery Artist Profile: Fred Stiber

Our in-studio gallery recently featured works by Mayer/Reed designer, Fred Stiber. This sculptural series represents an early chapter in Fred’s experience as an artist. Created during the summer after his graduation from Duke University where he focused on art and sculpture, these inventive pieces explore form, material and the space around them.

A detail image of a wall-mounted sculpture made from steel, wood and acrylic

While working for a professor in the sculpture studio, Fred spent his free time creating art of his own from the studio’s discarded materials. He combined and modified steel, wood and acrylic using welding and bolts, sometimes painting the finished pieces and other times leaving the materials in their raw state. The three works displayed are titled: Summer of ’95, The One with a Tail and I-beam of Genie.

An image of a sculpture sitting on a table made from steel and painted yellow.

More than three decades later, Fred credits this early exploration of three-dimensional composition and construction as an important influence on his current work in signage design.

Colorful Wayfinding Leads the Way at PacSci

The newly opened courtyard at Pacific Science Center, framed by the historic 1962 World's Fair arches. Wayfinding banners with maps and directional signage are mounted at the entrance to the courtyard stairs.

After three decades behind a ticket gate, the courtyard at Seattle’s Pacific Science Center (PacSci) is open to the public. When the gates came down, a new colorful wayfinding system by Mayer/Reed went up—just in time for PacSci’s busy summer season and the bustling World Cup crowds.

(Left) A family enjoying a free water play exhibit in the courtyard beneath a wayfinding banner that reads "Water Works." (Right) Children and adults explore a hands-on exhibit in the lobby of the Pacific Science Center. A green wayfinding banner on the wall marks the entrance to the East Exhibits. A directional banner points down the stairs to the Maker & Innovation Lab.

The bilingual wayfinding system includes new maps and banners that take a subtle cue from the palette of the 1962 World’s Fair, for which Minori Yamasaki designed the iconic arches, fountains and reflecting pools. The bright, inclusive signage, scaled with young explorers in mind, makes navigation part of the experience and provides a fresh sense of welcome and discovery for the newly public courtyard and the many programs and exhibits within PacSci.