Apple has started work on a major overhaul of its downtown Portland store, with a new design that appears more resistant to vandalism. But people familiar with the company’s plans say work won’t be done until sometime after the holidays.
Apple’s downtown store has been obscured by imposing metallic fencing since February 2021. The fences protect the store’s signature tall, glass panels from vandalism but have become a symbol of Portland’s inability to restore normal functions after the upheaval that accompanied the pandemic and the protests that rocked downtown in 2020.
Apple unveiled the planned facade in a meeting with the Downtown Neighborhood Association in May. It features a “storefront security enclosure” that consists of dozens of clear, polycarbonate panels that form a barrier in front of the store’s glass walls.
The smaller panels are stronger than the store’s main glass enclosure, the company told neighbors, and can be obtained from a local supplier. That means Apple can replace them more quickly if they are broken.
Apple declined comment on the construction work that began last week downtown. Two people familiar with the company’s plans, though, said work will proceed in stages over at least a few months.
In the meantime, the metal security barrier will remain in place.
Fencing surrounds the downtown Portland Apple Store on May 13, 2021. Many downtown storefronts remain covered in plywood, while other business have shut down entirely, nearly a year after large-scale protests began following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police.The Oregonian
Rioters broke through the glass door of Apple’s downtown store and looted it on the night of May 31, 2020, the first night of protests continuous protests that lasted through that summer following the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
Apple’s store remained closed for several months after the protests. Apple didn’t say why but many Apple stores in other cities were open during the period and the company spent at least part of the time repairing damage to its Portland store.
During that period, the storefront became a canvas for murals reflecting on the racial justice movement that emerged in Portland following Floyd’s killing. Portland artist Emma Berger painted a distinctive mural of Floyd on the boarded-up storefront, soon augmented by other art calling for social change.
A pedestrian walks past a boarded-up Apple store that’s been covered in street art in downtown Portland, Ore., Monday, July 13, 2020. (AP Photo/Gillian Flaccus) APAP
As Apple removed the plywood and reopened store last year, it donated the mural to Portland civil rights organization Don’t Shoot PDX.
— Mike Rogoway | mrogoway@oregonian.com | twitter: @rogoway |
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