November, 2011 - The renovation of Old Town Chinatown’s historic Globe Hotel into OCOM's new state-of-the-art campus is well underway. The year-long redevelopment of the 1911 building, a registered National Historic site, is being led by local developer Beam Development and LCG Pence Construction, and will achieve LEED Gold certification. Construction milestones reached to date include:

• Reinforcement of the foundation for seismic retrofit purposes.
• Removal of brick at window heads to expose the steel beams that carry the brick over the windows. Wherever possible, the original building features will be restored and highlighted in the design.
• Pouring of the concrete for floors 1, 2 and 3. The building currently has four floors and construction of a fifth floor suite will begin in November.
• Installment of first feng shui design elements. OCOM’s renovation incorporates a feng shui design by internationally-known Feng Shui Master, Alex Stark. In early October, a blessing packet and quartz crystals were placed on the ground floor at key locations to support the healing intention of the site.
• Building windows, milled to meet historic and LEED Gold standards, have arrived and will be installed in November.
• Framing for the walls on all floors has begun.

OCOM’s new campus will provide the college with advanced academic, clinic and research facilities, double current classroom and learning space, and will expand the number of master’s and doctoral graduates.

“Relocating to this new campus,” says OCOM President Michael Gaeta, “will enable us to train more acupuncture and Oriental medicine practitioners, expand our medical care to the community, and further Traditional Chinese Medicine research. It provides OCOM an excellent opportunity to bring healing into the heart of downtown Portland.”

OCOM will move 129 staff and faculty and nearly 300 students into the new building in time for Fall quarter 2012. Upon completion of the building, OCOM will launch a multi-year campaign to build long-term stable financial support for the college and its students.

Learn more about OCOM's relocation by signing-up for our monthly OCOM Bulletin.