The Lovejoy Columns are an interesting little piece of Portland's history. There are many articles available if you want to read the full story of the columns. Once upon a time the Lovejoy Columns supported the Lovejoy Ramp which was a viaduct connecting NW 14th Ave and Lovejoy Street to the Broadway Bridge. This viaduct ran above railroad freight tracks in the area that is now known as the Pearl District. From 1948-1952 a Greek immigrant, who worked as a night watchman for the railroad, drew wonderful pictures on the columns in chalk and later painted them. When the viaduct was demolished in 1999 to make way for all the condos and businesses that make up the Pearl District, several of the original columns were saved and stored beneath the Fremont Bridge. Two of those original columns have been restored and relocated here. The columns are beautiful to behold and definitely worth visiting. read more

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Everyone deserves to pursue their dreams. Carpe diem. Athanasios Efthimiou Stefopoulos is not a name that rolls off the tongue unless you're a cast member of "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" nor unfortunately is it a name you'll see in an art museum as much as he must have dreamed of that. Early in the last century, he was a railroad watchman who happened to be a talented, proto-graffiti artist. He went by the name Tom to his friends and painted the Broadway Bridge Lovejoy overpass columns with fanciful images of mythical gods and wild animals. Several endured over the years though most are in some abandoned lot awaiting funding for restoration. Two of them have been refurbished and placed in a courtyard on NW 10th Avenue near Everett. If you're walking into the Pearl District from the western part of the city, it's likely the first landmark you'll see. Check 'em out. RELATED - Going to Portland? Here are the places I visited and reviewed: bit.ly/2B0haJD read more

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This is a little piece of Portland history. It's the work of architects, who usually are building things. Instead they saved them from being made into gravel. Yelp is expanding the scope of its reviews and this fits in with bridges (no longer here). Northwest Portland where the Pearl District is today had rail yards and warehouses. It was the part of town where no one bothered campers and artists rented studios where they could make a mess and make as much noise as they wanted without disturbing sleeping Portland. In particular the warehouses along 11th were notorious in a good way. Where NW Lovejoy joined the Broadway Bridge was a long viaduct over the railroad tracks, much longer than today's, extending to about NW 13th. Greek immigrant and folk artist Tom E. Stefopoulos worked in the yards as a night watchman. In his spare time, he drew with chalk and painted figures from Greek mythology on those bridge supports. In a way, he may have been Portland's first recorded street artist, working between 1940's and 1952. When the City decided to tear down the viaduct to build condos in late 1990's, a group of architects organized a project to preserve intact 10 of the columns with the least graffitied paintings. Two have been restored and stand in the courtyard at the address above. You can search around the Interwebs for more on the "Lovejoy Columns" which appear in the opening sequence of Drugstore Cowboy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtX03U-jt7A. They are also the background for a short film which Elliot Smith (1969-2003) did some songs for: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1aLTnCja9Q in 1996. Or check https://web.archive.org/web/20120525222742/http://myweb.msoe.edu/~westr/pdxlovejoycolumns.htm for some pre-Pearl photos and the architect's story at http://www.metropolismag.com/html/content_0200/observed.html and http://jamesmharrison.com/work/info_lovejoy.html So I guess this is a review of a bridge that is gone, an artist who is gone, a music video by a musician who is gone, a local film - before the director gone great, railroads that are gone, artist spaces that are gone. But also of the symbol of all that, which is very much with us. read more

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super pretty artwork The Lovejoy Columns, located in Portland, Oregon, United States, supported the Lovejoy Ramp, a viaduct that from 1927 to 1999 carried the western approach to the Broadway Bridge over the freight tracks in what is now the Pearl District. The columns were painted by Greek immigrant Tom Stefopoulos between 1948 and 1952. In 1999, the viaduct was demolished but the columns were spared due to the efforts of the architectural group Rigga. For the next five years, attempts to restore the columns were unsuccessful and they remained in storage beneath the Fremont Bridge. read more

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I sometimes miss driving the Lovejoy Ramp. Remember? you could drive across what is now the pearl without stopping. no stop lights, cross streets....you were above all of that. It connected the Broadway bridge to the Alphebet Nieghborhood. OK it looks better now but the traffic... Anyway these two columns used to help support the ramp. When the decision to demo the ramp was made the powers that be decided to save these two columns as their decoration deserved it (see other reviews for the details) The columns eventually ended up here. I like them as art, as history.... It is nice with all the history that is going away that there are these glimpsess that are being saved. read more

Anna B wrote a beautiful review of the Lovejoy Columns and got the history entirely correct, so I'm not going to cover the same ground. I was just thinking about the columns and my dad as we are so close to Thanksgiving. My dad was a Portland native and history buff. And I was introduced to them at an early age while they were still under the Broadway Bridge. If we were anywhere nearby, we always visited them, and he always told us a lot of stories about our Portland history during those times. He always worried what might happen to them between urban renewal and the rain. He was elated when they were placed in their current location. The Lovejoy Columns are as dear to me as say The White Stag sign. They're the kind of landmark that can be privately cherished but equally collectively loved by a whole city. If you've not visited them, do so soon and start your own personal Portland history with them. read more

Cool reuse of old building structures, however, i don't understand why they are listed as being Architects...

My late father worked for the SP&S Railroad as Chief Electrician. His shop and office was right by the Lovejoy columns, and he knew Tom quite well. Every time I went to his shop I marveled at the various artwork Tom created, and always wondered as a kid why he did it? I remember asking my dad, and him telling me that Tom worked the night watchman's job and helped pass time doing them. It's great that these columns have been saved, and I hope they don't end up being another neglected or unappreciated example of Portland's history, as some things have. read more

''These drawings are quite iconic and were under the old Broadway Ramp before being moved to their present location! And drawn by a Greek fisherman back in the day or so I was told? How long ago in anybody's guess But I was told a short time after the end of WW11? which could date them 1948 or so? But moving on before my retirement from the Hoyt main street post office in 2002 I worked the night shift and walked thru that way in the mid 80's to early 90's with the morning sun to greet me and just loved the solitude! and the drawings I discovered quite by accident then there were 7 or 8 drawings. I don't know why all were not kept for posterity by the powers in control at that time? I remember Neil Goldschmitt when I discovered them and later Bud Clark who was entertaining and were the Mayors in that order? then later Vera Katz a terrible woman the worst of the lot!'' But oh well this was a nice shortcut to the NW Neighborhood where I kept an Apartment for myself. before leaving the state in 92. I really need give these 5 stars *****! for the way they were ? But 1 star * because only 2 drawings survived? so I will split the difference with 3 stars***! But what do you expect? Portland has some very nasty people in control there? ''Thanks !'' read more

Cool history before the Pearl became what it is today, a train yard/industrial area. The history of this neighborhood is interesting!