P+W Canada - Vancouver Projects

The reinvention of 1220 Homer Street is certified as LEED Gold.

The Bayview at Coal Harbour is a mixed use project that includes a 30 storey rental residential tower, 11 live/work townhouses, and 32,000 sf of commercial space. The site is the sole connection between the water-oriented Coal Harbour area and the Pender and Georgia Street corridor. Each of the development’s three elements maintains a unique identity, while a shared palette of materials unifies the project. The commercial component and the entrance to the residential tower face Pender, while the townhouses face Hastings Street, where traffic is restricted.

The tower has been oriented to maximize the number of units with views; all of the upper units have at least a partial view of the water and mountains. The units are predominantly small one bedroom suites with common laundry facilities on each floor. The slightly stepped façade is broken by vertical structural elements, emphasizing the height and slimness of the tower.

The townhouses facing Hastings are live/work units incorporating an entry level, small office component (165 sf per suite) that is accessible from the street. They feature two floors of living space above (2 bedroom units), and direct access to underground parking below. Commercial spaces include at grade retail space on Pender, with office use on the second floor facing both Pender and Hastings.

The exterior revitalization was realized as an open, layered and sophisticated new ‘skin’ enveloping the old building shell. A doubleglazed, fritted and frameless glazing system with operable windows—powered by photovoltaic strips embedded in the outer layer of the glazing—is suspended from the existing building face, providing opportunities for a highly effective natural ventilation system and eliminating the need for artificial ventilation altogether. This second skin created the first double-wall/triple skinned green building solution in Canada. Because of business requirements, the building had to remain largely occupied while the refit occurred, and sensitive equipment located throughout the building necessitated a particularly cautious approach to construction.

By not demolishing the existing building in favour of new construction, 16,000 tonnes of landfill and 15,600 tonnes of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions were saved. Yearly energy consumption has been reduced by 45-58% by using waste heat from an adjacent building, and efficient building systems operations will save an additional 39,000 tonnes of GHG emissions over a 75-year building lifespan. In recognition of its innovations in environmental performance, the TELUS House revitalization was one out of three projects selected to represent Canada at the Green Building Challenge in Maastricht, Netherlands.

To accommodate the needs of a growing membership and diversified range of programs, the Architectural Institute of British Columbia (AIBC) purchased 440 Cambie Street with four development partners.

Previously used by the Vancouver Province newspaper to house their printing presses, the 1910 heritage building was in need of significant renovation. The project also encompassed a civic contribution to the revitalization of the Victory Square area.

In conjunction with Robert Lemon Architecture, Perkins+Will upgraded the building, converting it to Strata Titled office spaces. The AIBC occupies the first floor, while their development partners occupy the second and third floors.

The design subdivides a typical floor plate into a maximum of 10 strata office suites. Common facilities provided on each floor include washrooms, stair access, elevators, and individual electrical metering and mechanical servicing.

The building design also embodies many principles of sustainable building design: use of natural ventilation to all suites; recycling of existing building components (exit stairs, wood structural components); and passive solar control (louvered canopies and sunshades). The design reinforces a sustainable development approach with the use of innovative practices, procedures, products, services and standards, all of which serve to educate fellow professionals, clients and the general public about the critical importance of sustainable design.

In 2002, the City of White Rock engaged Perkins+Will to renovate the 25-year-old Centennial Arena. The building had received a number of additions over the years, but maintenance was performed only on an as-needed basis. The structure of the building consisted of long span tapered glulam beams, pinned at the ridge and tied together under the ice surface by a steel tension cable. The condition of the underground tension cable after 25 years was poor, ridge vents along the roof were closed in and clerestory lights and vent panels along the perimeter of the building were boarded over. Dehumidification had never been installed, so over time the high humidity in the building created rot in the wood structure, a problem for several years.

The scope of work included: replacement of the roofing assembly (roof membrane); repair of any damaged wood; a structural upgrade to the entire arena structure, including wall upgrades and conversion of moment frames to composite wood and steel trusses (roof structure); installation of a new ice surface and boards; replacement and rearrangement of fixed seating; replacement of a control room and coaches’ perch; reorganization of the change rooms to more equitably distribute the area; and renovations to the building lobby to better integrate it with the ice surface.

Construction of this extensive renovation project was fast-tracked and completed in five months during summer break. Innovative and effective solutions were identified through an integrated design process, which allowed our team to remain focused on the budget and schedule parameters. Building details were fine-tuned and project components tendered separately during construction as the site conditions were revealed, allowing significant time and financial savings.