VANCOUVER NEW DEVELOPMENT AND PRESALE – THREE HARBOUR GREEN – BY ASPAC DEVELOPMENTS
THREE HARBOUR GREEN - 277 THURLOW STREET - VANCOUVER V6C 0C1
When the first two towers at Harbour Green Place in Coal Harbour debuted, they set a new standard for luxury waterfront living in Vancouver – more spacious, more exclusive, and more luxurious than anything seen in the city to date. Each tower at Harbour Green Place features private, two-and three-car garages, a 25-metre swimming pool, and a virtual golf centre that lets residents practice on the world’s premiere courses at the touch of a button. And it’s host to two Canadian condominium “firsts”: ergonomically designed kitchens by Snaidero of Italy, and a full range of Miele kitchen appliances – from washers and dryers, to convection ovens and warming drawers, to built-in automatic coffee systems that make everything from espressos to lattes.
HIGH-TECH GREENHOUSE PLANNED FOR VANCOUVER DOWNTOWN PARKADE ROOF
UNDERUSED SPACE TO PRODUCE 95 TONNES OF GREENS A YEAR
The roof of a city-owned downtown parkade will be converted to a high-tech vertical growing space capable of producing 95 tonnes of fresh vegetables a year.
Vancouver-based Valcent Products has entered into a memorandum of understanding with EasyPark, the corporate manager of the city’s parkades, to build a 6,000-square-foot greenhouse on underutilized space on the roof of the parkade at 535 Richards Street, in the heart of the downtown core.
VANCOUVER CONVENTION CENTRE – SIX-ACRE LIVING GREEN ROOF
SIX-ACRE LIVING ROOF IS NOW A THRIVING ECOSYSTEM
It’s been a record-breaking year for the Vancouver Convention Centre in more ways than one. Apart from being the most successful convention year ever, the Centre’s six-acre living roof has had an unprecedented year of growth.
“We’re excited to see that the living roof is truly flourishing in a short span of three years; and what’s more, doing what it was intended to do,” said Bruce Hemstock, landscape architect of the Vancouver Convention Centre’s living roof and partner at PWL Partnership Landscape Architects Inc. “The growing condition on top of the convention centre is very well suited for the planted coastal plants and grasses. The aster, in particular this year, is thriving beyond our wildest imagination with some up to eight feet tall. It provides the rooftop honeybees with an incredible source of food.”
BOWEN ISLAND HOUSE – BAI ARCHITECTS
BAI ARCHITECTS BRING A CRISP EUROPEAN MODERNISM TO CANADA’S WEST COAST
Burgers Architecture’s approach is that there is no limit to what can be bettered through design. Projects range from furniture to industrial facilities and planning. They oversee all phases of a projects development, and are often responsible for the construction. Over the life of the firm, Burger Architecture has completed community facilities, offices for BC Hydro, industrial facilities, and a number of a single-family residences. Their approach to design can be summed up as global ideas, local knowledge; meaning that ideas and products come from all parts of the world while the local offers unique opportunities for a distinct expression. The synthesis of these two forces is the dynamic upon which their architectural expression lies.
VANCOUVER PARKS – 450 BEACH CRESCENT – GEORGE WAINBORN PARK
GEORGE WAINBORN PARK …. YALETOWN …. AND THE OCEAN BEYOND
This beautiful 2.49 hectare park was announced Vancouver’s newest jewel of waterfront parks. The George Wainborn Park is located downtown, off Pacific Boulevard at the foot of Richards Street and boasts formal and informal spaces, expansive lawns, a dramatic water feature and spectacular views of False Creek and the city. The park is named for Vancouver’s longest serving Park Board Commissioner, George Wainborn. George Wainborn contributed to the City’s parks and recreation system for 33 years between 1956 and 1990. Among his many accomplishments he was a leader in the creation of Stanley Park’s Miniature Railway, played a key role in starting the Carol Ships program, and initiated lighting of the magnificent grove of elm trees on Beach Avenue at Bidwell each Christmas season. A recipient of the Freedom of the City in 1991 and Order of Canada in 1999, he died in September 2003. George Wainborn Park opened in 2004 at a cost of $5.1 million.
In July 2006 a 40 foot tall wind sculpture entitled “Khenko” was installed at the bottom of the park. It was designed and built by artist Doug Taylor and was a gift from Concord Pacific Group Inc. dedicated to British Columbia’s former Lieutenant Governor, David Lam. “Khenko” is a Coast Salish word for “heron” and the sculpture celebrates the return of this bird species to the once industrialized False Creek.
A WEST VANCOUVER HOME BY “THE OTHER GUY”
THE STAPLES RESIDENCE, WEST VANCOUVER B.C., DESIGNED BY BRUNO FRESCHI, ERICKSON MASSEY ARCHITECTS
“My parents were uncompromising: they never got talked into something they didn’t want,” recalls Kathleen Staples. She is speaking of the late Tom and Nancy Staples, whose architectural masterpiece of a family home is now on the market in West Vancouver. Tom Staples once told his daughter that getting the house built was the most difficult ordeal of his life, yet also the accomplishment of which he was most proud.
AN ISLAND AERIE ON THE B.C. COAST
GALIANO ISLAND, BC HOME DESIGNED BY ARCHITECT JENNIFER MARSHALL OF URBAN ARTS ARCHITECTS
“It’s a privilege to work on a site like this one,” says architect Jennifer Marshall as she drives up from the main Galiano Island Road onto a steep gravel pathway that climbs through three distinct eco-systems. The first one is fern-laden and dark, the next a thick forest of fir, and finally, at the top of the hill where she has recently completed a residence for a family of three, a typical Gulf Island landscape marked by groves of arbutus trees.
SFU WEST HOUSE – THE SUSTAINABLE LANEWAY HOME
WEST HOUSE COMBINES INNOVATIVE BUILDING DESIGN, ADVANCED REVEWABLE ENERGY SYSTEMS AND INTERACTIVE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY TO SUPPORT SUSTAINABLE LIVING
West House is a made-in-Vancouver demonstration of a sustainable laneway home. It showcases leading-edge small footprint residential design, energy efficient, integrated systems and interactive technologies that encourage a sustainable lifestyle.
via sfu
LANEWAY HOMES: A CREATIVE SOLUTION
VANCOUVER’S LANEWAY HOUSING INCREASES AFFORDABLE HOUSING WHILE MAKING TRADITIONAL NEIGHBOURHOODS EVEN MORE ATTRACTIVE AND LIVELY.
Vancouver has grown into a city where the housing market can be tight. Finding rental housing or a home you can afford is often a challenge. One of the ways the City of Vancouver is meeting this challenge is through a creative and green housing alternative – laneway homes. These types of small houses are built by homeowners behind a main house. Adding extra, low-impact housing to neighbourhoods not only provides more living space, but also fits with the City’s goals to be the world’s greenest City by 2020.
ARCHITECT’S URBAN INTERVENTION IN SUBURBAN-STYLE HOUSING
LUCIO PICCIANO SOUGHT TO CREATE AN URBAN VILLAGE WITH HIS HOUSE DESIGNS IN VANCOUVER’S RENFREW HEIGHTS NEIGHBOURHOOD.
As you walk east from Vancouver’s 29th Avenue SkyTrain station, you are met by Renfrew Heights’s familiar mix of seventies-era Vancouver Specials and a few remaining prewar houses. The mix of stucco and brick Specials and fir-clad 1930s houses is what one expects in this family-oriented neighbourhood that borders Burnaby and features stunning mountain views.
But as you approach the intersection of Picton Street and Wellington Avenue, something entirely new meets the eye. A corrugated metal-clad house, set on a long, narrow lot, gleams in the sun, its upper balcony filled with lavender and its green roof brimming with plants. It shares its subdivided lot with a neighbouring three-storey house, clad in Galvalume and cement board, with roses running up a steel trellis. Across the lane, it’s met by a sister house in steel and concrete with a backyard canopied in grape vines.
23.2 – HOUSE BY OMER ARBEL
23.2 IS A HOUSE DESIGNED BY AN AWARD WINNING DESIGNER OMER ARBEL
23.2 is a house for a family built on a large rural acreage outside Vancouver, British Columbia by a Canadian Designer Omer Arbel. There is a gentle slope from east to west and two masses of old growth forest defining two “outdoor rooms” each with a its own distinct ecology and conditions of light; the house is situated at the point of maximum tension in between these two environments, and as such acts at once to define the two as distinct, and also to offer a focused transition between them.
THE CENTRE FOR INTERACTIVE RESEARCH ON SUSTAINABILITY OPENS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
INSPIRING. WELCOMING. UNIQUE. A PLACE FOR WORLD-CHANGING EDUCATION AND RESEARCH. A LIVING LABORATORY WHERE SUSTAINABILITY IS ADVANCED AND STUDIED.
Built in response to the global challenge of creating a more sustainable society, the Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability (CIRS) is one of the most innovative and high-performance buildings built in North America today, demonstrating leading-edge green building design technologies, products, and systems. CIRS is a state-of-the-art “living-lab” in which researchers from leading academic institutions worldwide can conduct interactive research on and assessment of current and future building systems and technologies. Partners from private and public sectors share the facility, working with CIRS researchers to ensure study conducted is connected to real world needs of the community, industry, and policy makers. The outcome of research, product and policy development manifested from CIRS will play a fundamental role in accelerating the path to sustainability.
EVERGREEN – BOWEN ISLAND
EVERGREEN IS UNFOLDING
SIMPLY BOWEN
All too often, our modern lifestyle sacrifices “life” for style. Our families are burdened by the need for two incomes to afford our larger homes, our two cars, our frequent travels and more. Today, we are seeing smaller families living in larger homes with hardly enough time to sit down and eat together. We are surrounded by more roads, more traffic, bigger buildings, expanding to the very edges of their lots. Nature has become a travel destination more than an every day living environment. Our lives are being consumed as we race to pay for all the things we think we need. It’s a home for people wishing to step off the treadmill and come back to life, with time to go slow, to recharge, to connect with family and nature. When you arrive on Bowen, you feel the stresses of the city lifting. At Evergreen you’ll wind along our single lane road through the parkland that surrounds us, with views of ocean and islands, and join a community that retains its tranquility and vitality. Only four lots were released in 2008.
BEIJING-BASED DEVELOPER OPENS FIRST BC PROJECT
YU CONDOMINIUM BY BEIJING – BASED MODERN GREEN
One of China’s biggest green developers is constructing its first project in Canada, and marketers are expecting a quick sale when units hit the market this weekend. The University of B.C. residential project, called Yu, is a Canadian first for Beijing-based Modern Green. The company has so far specialized in sustainable residential development in China and Australia, and is now looking to tap into the North American market. In partnership with UBC Properties Trust, Modern Green is constructing 110 condo and townhouse units on the 99-year leasehold land at UBC’s Wesbrook Village. Prices start at $449,900. Developer Robbie Zhang has been based out of Vancouver for more than two years, and he says plans are under way to set up a permanent research and development headquarters in Vancouver. The company has donated $3.5-million to UBC’s Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability.
ROUNDHOUSE COMMUNITY ARTS & RECREATION CENTRE – VANCOUVER
ROUNDHOUSE COMMUNITY CENTRE – YALETOWN VANCOUVER
This facility’s award winning transformation from the old Canadian Pacific Railway’s service facility for its trains into a modern arts and cultural centre is both splendid in design and appearance. The unique spaces provided in the original building’s layout have yielded a large black box performance centre and a commodious exhibition hall. This centre’s focus on the arts provides for dance, pottery, woodworking and numerous theatre rentals along with a full-size gymnasium for physical activities. The Roundhouse Community Arts & Recreation Centre is adjacent to stunning glass pavilion housing CPR Engine 374 which pulled Canada’s first transcontinental train into the City of Vancouver in 1886. The new necklace of parks around the False Creek basin and nearby to the Roundhouse include David Lam Park, Coopers’ Park and Creekside Park, all within walking distance. An emerging community within the neighbourhood translates into a wide variety of user groups from preschool to seniors. Best of all, the seawall pedestrian/cycle path is just at this facility’s door step offering an assortment of excellent walks, rides or blading prospects.
JOE’S HOUSE – OSBURNE/CLARKE PRODUCTION INC. – BRITISH COLUMBIA
JOE’S HOUSE – BY OSBURNE/CLARKE PRODUCTION
Joe’s house is one of a group of buildings commissioned by the same client for an island off the south west coast of British Columbia, Canada. Prior to this project the island had never been built upon. It remains today completely unserviced and off the grid.
Water is collected from roofs and stored in a series of cistems. Power is generated from an array of roof top solar panels which are augmented by an emergency only propane fired generator. Heat is provided by wood burning fireplaces. Within the overall programme of the compound Joe’s House provides exactly that a place where one or more people can retreat from the circumstances of others. The building provides for all of the requirements of daily living at a very focused-almost monastic-scale. The thought of retreat brought forth the idea of a tree fort.
TIMBER HOUSE – TAMIZO ARCHITECTS
TIMBER HOUSE IN WARSAW, POLAND BY TAMIZO ARCHITECTS
“We act according to the philosophy that ‘less is more’ by one of the inspiring architects named Mies van der Rohe.”
BC PLACE WILL HAVE A NEW LOOK – COMPLETION 2011 – VANCOUVER
THE NEW LOOK FOR OUR BC PLACE
The New BC PLACE, one of British Columbia’s iconic pieces of architecture. It will be the largest cable-supported retractable roof on Earth. It all adds up to a magnetic new home for the biggest games and the brightest events in BC. Coming 2011.
The $450-million casino and hotel complex planned for the property beside BC Place Stadium in Vancouver. It will include a 110,000 square feet of gambling facilities, two international hotels and five restaurants. The new “Entertainment epicentre”
2008 HARBOUR HOUSE BY BLUE SKY ARCHITECTURE
ECO WEST COAST – MODERN VANCOUVER ARCHITECTURE
The inspirational Vancouver living reflects this carefully designed west coast modern architecture enriched in ecological consciousness. The 2008 Harbour House by Blue Sky Architecture is a breath of a beautiful eco modern architecture in a rugged coastal setting.
