Pumpkin Carving Tradition lives on

Lauren and Greg carving

The Boss making an architectural pumpkin

Izzo and Knepley's creation, good enough for #2 place!

Jen and Sam's porcupine, a tie for second.

Dave and Katie's owl, the grand champ.

It wouldn't be October if we didn't have our annual pumpkin carving contest in the office. This year was sort of the exception. Technically, we did our pumpkin carving this year in November due to some big deadlines, but that didn't stop the fun. To be fair, partners were randomly selected from a hat, and each team had an hour and a half or thereabouts to complete their creation.  Some were good, some were better.  This year Katie Robinson and Dave Urffer stole the title for best pumpkin from last year's reigning champ Katie Brill.  If you didn't already know, Katie Robinson is the new Katie Brill.  (marriage) Check out some of this years pumpkins on our Facebook Page.

Tired of CANstruction yet?

Tim concentrating on his old fashioned oats

Blast off

You can't be tired of CANstruction yet! We are just beginning! Last night we did a little practice build in our conference room.  Lots of success, and no CANtastrophes.  Tim lead the show with his amazing grace (not the song, but I am sure he could sing it well in his booming low voice) in stacking the cans on the upper levels.  It helps being over six foot tall.

Breaking Ground at Cottman & Castor!

Dave and Elisa with their golden shovels.

all the people that make the projects happen

Clover in the mid 80s?

bringing the site into the 21st century

1954... the original

Dave, Elisa, Katie and Mike Schmitt have been working diligently for the last few months to get the Cottman and Castor job off the ground for Kimco Realty. This morning, ground was sort of broken for the project, if you count just holding a ceremonial golden shovel as breaking ground.  Other than no ground actually being broken, it was your typical celebratory event complete with all the local politicians and deal makers.  There was a ceremonial sledgehammer to take down some of the existing building.  Although this particular project isn't the most glamorous, it is a pretty big deal for the Great Northeast. What was once a Lit Brothers store eons ago, then a Gimbels, and then a Clover store, and then JC Penny for a short while, then just a vacant building for a long time, is now going to be given new life as a Burlington Coat Factory, a Bob's Discount Furniture and a soon to be TJ Maxx if everything goes as planned.  So the site has a long and storied history as a retail anchor in the Bustleton neighborhood.  This is a game changer for this area, which believe it or not happens to have the highest concentration of retail in Philadelphia outside of Center City.

JKRP 2013 Softball Season Opener

Blake here - After coming off a dominating performance in the preseason JKR Partners took the field last evening for the 2013 season/home opener.  They couldn’t have started it off any better scoring runs in every inning leading to a team record high of 32 runs and the most deliciously sweet taste of victory.  Maybe it was the life force in those bats, maybe it was the heart of each player combining like Voltron into one really big team heart, or maybe it was the fact that they actually looked like team in their fresh new jerseys, whatever the reason it doesn’t really matter.  At the end of the day the team’s spirit and enthusiasm reached a new high after last year’s winless season.  Thanks to the swinging power of newcomer Cory Slahta, the exponentially increasing skill level of the returning Miss Katherine “Katie” Brill, and those great looking new uniforms the future is bright for this squad.  The shock and awe campaign has just begun.    

   

    

Spooktacular 2012

Batman eagerly awaits his guests, atop his pumpkin castle.

Nichole here!  A few weeks ago Katie and I participated in the 2012 Spooktacular charette.  We volunteered at the wee hours on a Saturday morning to create props for a Halloween "street-scape" for young children.  The Spooktacular charette gets volunteers from firms and local universities and pairs them with CHAD students to create these props for the young children at the Children's Crisis Center in Philadelphia.  The props get used to create a safe Halloween environment for the kids to treat-or-treat in.

Katie, busy making magic!

We put our heads together and came up with a very detailed scheme for our boards.  We created a spooky night scene background with a winding path that lead to a pumpkin castle.  We even added some marvel super heroes to our design, including Batman, Iron-man, and the Incredible Hulk.  All of the materials were donated wall coverings, upholstery samples, etc. from local firms.  At the end of the charette, our boards were a colorful collage of patch work backgrounds, trick-or-treating super heroes, and towering pumpkins.

Presenting our final boards with our CHAD students.

Winner winner, chicken dinner...

Farinella here - After being kept in suspense all week about our mystery outing, the first annual JKRP Scavenger Hunt was a huge success. From the Art Museum to Independence Hall, I think I saw more of Philadelphia in 3 hours than I have in all my years of being in the city…Lead by our fearless captain Bob, our team of Katie, Izzo, Sam, and myself got off to a blistering start and never looked back. With bragging rights (and very desirable prize on the line), the team’s planning, hustle, and last minute heroics were enough to edge out the competition and become the first OFFICIAL winners. After an exciting and exhausting day, Victory tasted sweet and I am looking forward to defending our team legacy come next year. 

Kate Joins JKR

We are pleased to announce that Katherine Brill joins JKR Partners as the newest member of the design team. She is a recent magna cum laude graduate from Syracuse University School of Architecture. Kate played polo in the water not on a horse during her five year college adventure. Supposedly the quickest, strongest, smartest and best conditioned athletes play water polo. Perhaps those skills translate to her architecture talents. She happily escaped the tundra-like environment of upstate New York to return to the comforts in her favorite hometown of West Chester, PA. Kate has enjoyed globetrotting around the world, including studying abroad in China and Italy. Although she hasn’t achieved master chef status just yet, Kate claims to make a mean plate of mashed potatoes. Hopefully the food critics can get a taste test at the next JKR Potluck Event. From portraits to illustrations, painting is one of her favorite hobbies. Some of her prized artwork was even auctioned at charitable fundraising events.