KPFF is a multi-office, multi-discipline engineering firm. We’re driven by a commitment to our core values of Excellence, Trust, Relationships, Stability, and Passion; defining our professional practice, how we are organized and our commitment to our clients and employees.
Whereas some firms try really hard to feel big-corporate and overly regulated, KPFF is actually a huge organization that tries really hard to feel like small firms – personable, flexible, comfortable – while maintaining its depth and breadth of expertise, and professionalism.
Caleb Finn, Structural Project Engineer
Our core values of Excellence, Trust, Relationships, Stability, and Passion are the foundation for everything we do at KPFF. These values influence our approach to our professional practice, how we are organized, our commitment to our clients and our employees, and how we regard the people who are KPFF. Our dedication to these values has created a culture that is well-defined and unique.
John Gavan, President
Our Beginning: Al Kelly opens one-man office, Albert Kelly and Associates, which becomes the multi-disciplinary engineering firm now known as KPFF.
Cape Canaveral: Structural Design of the 250 ton and 500 ton Bridge Cranes for the Cape Canaveral vertical assembly building.
Albuquerque: Structural Design of the Trestle to military aircraft support, a 115' tall wood framed test stand utilizing trunnels, a combination of oak dowels and wedges to connect members.
Los Angeles: Structural Design of the New Otani Hotel, the first concrete ductile frame building in Southern California, a 22 story, 320,000 Sf downtown hotel.
Western Sudan: KPFF's first international project- Structural Engineer of Record for 150+ Agricultural Research Stations designed using local brick and first use of light gage steel roof framing in Sudan.
Portland: Structural Engineer of Record for Phases I & II of the award-winning 840,000 SF Oregon Convention Center - the first convention center to be LEED EB certified.
Portland: Structural and Civil Engineering for the 200,000 SF Oregon Museum of Science and Industry - renovation of a 1910 power plant including one of the first permitted biofiltration swales.
Los Angeles: Authored the building code language for base isolation analysis and design while providing structural design of the 345,000 SF USC University Hospital, the first base isolated hospital in the world.
San Bernadino: Base Isolated Arrowhead Regional Medical Center Replacement Hospital by the San Andreas and San Jacinto faults. First to combine high damping rubber bearings with fluid viscous dampers in an isolation design.
Southern California: Northridge Earthquake exposes many deficiencies in building codes. KPFF assists the damaged St. John’s Hospital with emergency repairs, completed them in 9 months, including OSHPD approval.
Seattle: Project management, planning and design of the 188-acre Terminal 5 Container Terminal in the Port of Seattle, one of the two largest container terminals on the West Coast.
Oregon: Structural Engineer of Record for the award-winning, one-of-a-kind Evergreen Aviation Museum. The structure clear spans the 320-ft wing span of the legendary HK1 or “Spruce Goose” aircraft and includes a 110-ft tall glass curtainwall.
San Diego: Structural Engineering for the 650,000 SF downtown Renaissance Condominium Towers - primarily post-tensioned concrete with some structural steel, featuring a lateral system consisting of shearwalls stiffened with composite outrigger beams.
Portland: Civil, Structural, Surveying, Permitting and Marine Engineering for all phases of the Vera Katz Eastbank Esplanade, a recovered part of the Willamette River’s downtown East bank for bike and pedestrian use.
Springfield: Sacred Heart Medical Center next to the McKenzie River in Oregon. Detailed hydraulic analysis demonstrates that the hospital is the required 3' above the 100 year flood elevation despite being delineated within the flood plain by FEMA
Portland: Seismic strengthening of the downtown Pioneer Federal Courthouse, the second oldest federal building west of the Mississippi River. Design enables the building to be lifted off its foundation and re-founded on base isolators without disturbing the interior of the building.
San Diego: Palomar Medical Center West, an 800,000 SF, $950 Million landmark hospital with garden spaces on every floor and an undulating green roof. Awarded Autodesk Revit Project of the Year in 2006 and was a pilot project for OSHPD Phased Plan Review
Portland: Structural Engineer of Record for 6 housing towers in the South Waterfront, 130 acre public/private partnership development. Features top down construction techniques including using the excavation shoring steel sheet piling as the finished basement wall.
Portland: Providence Cancer Center, a 480,000 SF research and surgery building straddling the hospital’s existing steam plant. Design allows the plant to remain and be operational during construction and is the first new building in Portland to incorporate steel plate shear walls.
Brewery Blocks Portland: 1.7 mil. SF of upscale retail, housing and office space over three levels of underground parking spanning two-and-a-half city blocks, one of the largest redevelopment and LEED certified projects in Oregon’s history.
Los Angeles: Civil Engineering for the award-winning, sustainable, South Park - the first urban “Green Street” in the public right-of-way. Constructed as a part of the South Park Project by Williams & Dame Development and Gerding/Edlen Development.
Spanning State Route-14, the Vancouver Land Bridge connects Vancouver’s Columbia River waterfront to historic Fort Vancouver and is Vancouver's first bridge to integrate sustainable stormwater features.
Everett: Charles Luke Milam Bachelor Housing project - the first LEED Gold Naval facility in the world. KPFF provided Structural Engineering.
Pomona: Civil and Structural Engineering for the 70,000 SF Harvey Mudd College Teaching and Learning Building - first project in the US designed using bubble deck construction.
Seattle: Appointed Lead Consultant for the SR520 floating bridge project - modifications to the original bridge, a new replacement bridge and a $367 Million design-build 55-acre casting facility and 33 large concrete pontoons.
Portland: Bud Clark Commons becomes the first LEED® NC Platinum public housing project in the world. KPFF provided Civil Engineering.
Lancaster: Structural Enginner for the LEED Certified, 136,000 SF Antelope Valley Medical Office Building, future home of a wind turbine which will make this the first Kaiser Permanente Net Zero building.
La Jolla: Structural and Civil Engineering for the University of California, San Diego J. Craig Venter Institute - the first Net Zero laboratory in the United States.
Portland: Prime consultant for rehabilitation and redesign of SE Division Street, transforming it into one of USA Today’s 2014 Top 10 Up and Coming US Neighborhoods and ranked most comprehensive greening of a main arterial street.
Helsinki: US Embassy Innovation Center achieves LEED Platinum, exceeding original goals—a first for an overseas US diplomatic facility. KPFF was Civil Engineer.
Seattle: Grand opening of the SR 520 Bridge, the longest floating bridge in the world. KPFF is prime - providing design, civil, structural, and mechanical engineering.
KPFF was founded in 1960 by Al Kelly in Seattle, Washington. Since that time, the firm has grown in both size and stature. Today, we are a multi-office,
multi-discipline engineering firm with an international presence. Our unique history has led us to establish a culture that focuses our energy and our passion on our clients, our projects, and our staff.