With degrees in environmental systems, city planning, and landscape architecture, Portland, Oregon-based Anyeley Hallová didn’t travel a conventional path to real-estate development. But, during her nearly two decades in the field, she has used her education in design thinking to advance sustainability, mass-timber construction, and architectural ambition. With the development firm project^, she worked on Framework, an office building in Portland. Though never built, it was, in 2017, the first wood high-rise to be permitted in the U.S. and opened the door to future tall wood buildings. Also at project^, she developed the Meyer Memorial Trust Headquarters in Portland’s Lower Albina neighborhood. The mass-timber LEED Platinum building was constructed with 47 percent minority- or women-owned business participation (both Framework and Meyer were designed by LEVER Architecture). In 2016, Hallová was named one of Urban Land Institute’s “40 under 40” and, earlier this year, honored as a 2022 Grist 50 “Fixer.” Hallová sits on the U.S. Green Building Council’s board, consults with Amazon’s Puget Sound housing-equity accelerator, and chairs Oregon’s Land Conservation and Development Commission (LCDC), the powerful overseer for the statewide land-use system.

Hallová, 46, recently started her own development firm, Adre, to advance equity and wealth-building for BIPOC communities. She spoke with RECORD about her new venture.