A Farewell to the Lloyd Center Ice Rink

For 66 years, the Lloyd Center Ice Rink has been where Portlanders laced up for the first time — a place to learn, fall, try again, and maybe discover something you never knew you could do. Before the rink closed its doors, our editor Kel Embry set out to celebrate the people who found their way onto the ice and the community that kept them coming back.

These spots were made to capture the magic of starting something new, while expanding on the idea of what a figure skater looks like. Featuring skaters and coaches from across Portland, the films highlight the rink’s accessibility, its diverse community, and the simple act of deciding to begin.

We’re sharing one of the spots here, but there’s more to see. Head over to Kel’s Instagram, @kellan.edits, to watch the full series — and read on for Kel’s story behind making them.

Shortly after I started skating at Lloyd Center in spring of 2024, I got obsessed with the idea of what makes people decide to start. Figure skating, on the whole, is one of the hardest sports because it takes so much work to just be mid. Almost no one, including Olympic skaters, take to the ice and immediately discover they’re able to jump and spin, or look good doing either.

And yet, that vision of yourself you have in your mind is what motivates you to begin, to struggle through years of really embarrassing skating to get to “fine.”

The Lloyd Center Ice Rink is the place most people start. With the 2nd largest Learn to Skate program in the Pacific Northwest, the tiny, warm oval has served as the jumping off point for most Portland skaters, including Tonya Harding, for 66 years.

So the original concept was to encourage people to start here.

It was important, too, to use different skaters to subvert the expectations of what a figure skater looks like. For too long, skating has been reserved for white, skinny, rich people with nothing but time and money to put towards training. The Lloyd Center Ice Rink, being centrally located, transit accessible, and the most affordable in the area, created a real community of diverse skaters and coaches.

So when it came to casting these specs, I wanted to expand beyond just Alice, a young skater with her whole competitive career still ahead of her. In one, we start with Lydia, the only Black coach in Portland, stepping off of a bus, imagining herself skating while walking home in the sunshine. Lydia speaks candidly about how important it is for young Black skaters to see themselves on the ice, and giving her another opportunity to invite the next generation of kids to enter the sport was critical. Additionally, it was important to at least nod at Lloyd’s transit accessibility, a factor of time and cost that has historically prohibited swaths of people from being able to participate.

I was extra honored that my own coach, Dani, agreed to be the adult beginner, to tell the story that resonates the most with me. We see her in an office, daydreaming about skating. Lloyd has one of the largest programs for adult beginners and a tight-knit community of people who missed the boat to reach their full potential and decided to start anyway.

I didn’t have any firm deadline for when I wanted to make these, but in February we found out that the rink would not be included in the mall redevelopment as we had been told for years. Between nightly meetings with the Save Lloyd Ice Coalition and forming our nonprofit, Bridgetown Ice Skating Collective, I spent my free time coordinating with Shannon Little to get these specs made before the rink disappeared forever.

The copy changed slightly to encourage people to come to the rink before it closed, but the concept remained. Dillon Vibes was the obvious go-to as a leading DP who captures athletes, dancers, and even figure skaters at Lloyd Center.

We shot all four locations in one crazy, jam-packed day, ending on the ice. Despite so many locations, it was such a fun, relaxed environment with so many creative moments cropping up organically. Dillon and I even took some extra time to get some glamour shots of the rink that can be repurposed when we, one day, open a full-size, permanent rink.

Until then, I hope these social spots for the rink make people believe that they can do incredible things, if they just start. Which is something I need to remind myself of when stepping from editing to directing.