320 Granville Street

Posted on May 19, 2013 by

320 Granville 2013320 Granville is another Downtown office rezoning proposed for an ageing parkade at Granville on the south side of Cordova. Designed by VIA Architecture, the first design followed the recent trend of an angled element on the facade to add some interest without compromising the potential for the greatest floor area. That version was not supported by the Urban Design Panel in 2012, so nearly 18 months after we first posted, they are about to see this new design.

It still has 32 storeys, totalling 380,000 sq ft of space. It initially proposed a daycare on the top floor, but that idea was dropped quite early in the process. The project now has a more fluid feeling, especially on the Cordova and Granville corner, so it will be interesting to see if the Panel are more supportive.

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855 Granville Street

Posted on May 17, 2013 by

855 Granville

Here’s a development proposal that briefly appeared on the City’s website, and now seems to have disappeared again. It’s the redevelopment of the Granville (formerly Odeon) cinema complex, which will return to being three separate buildings.

On the left (south) end of the site there’s a heritage facade for the Palms Hotel, dating back to 1898. It only got that name in 1913 – before that it was the home of the MacKay and Almond Creamery, an ice cream manufacturer. It was consolidated into the cinema in the mid 1980s. The most recent building, the contemporary cinema facade in the middle, will get a completely new articulated glazed look. The third building has a notable windowless art deco heritage facade from 1938 when it became the Paradise Theatre. It was built originally in 1912 as the Globe. After 1965 it became the Coronet, until it became part of the Odeon in 1986.

Studio One Architecture have proposed to restore the plaster facade and reintroduce a vertical sign on the face of the building, with a slim vertical window to allow some light in, without significantly compromising the facade. Skylights will introduce natural light into the upper floor.

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New Jubilee House

Posted on May 17, 2013 by

New Jubilee HelmckenJust as City Council approve a rezoning for a privately built 13 storey non-market housing project, details of another similar project appear. This is a development application for the replacement of Jubilee House, to be built in conjunction with a tower on the existing Jubilee House.

There are no renders around (that we’ve seen yet) but there are elevations – here’s GBL Architects design for the Helmcken Street facade. GBL have designed some of the best non-market buildings in the city, so if approved, we expect this will also be a positive addition to the streetscape.

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1300 Richards Street

Posted on May 16, 2013 by

1300 Richards newThis rezoning proposal for the southern end of the Downtown peninsula was just approved. DIALOG’s proposal for a 258 unit 43 storey tower at the corner of Richards and Drake Street includes retail space at the base of the tower, and 12 townhouses. It first appeared on the City’s website in January 2012, went to a March Urban Design Panel as a first step in the approval process and received  unanimous support.

Wall Financial are the developers, and unusually (but not uniquely) the rezoning was accompanied by an offer to build $23.5 million worth of non-market housing on another Downtown South south site.

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1107 Seymour Street

Posted on May 16, 2013 by

1107The details of this Downtown South proposal first showed up in August 2012. It’s a 15 storey rental building on the corner of Seymour and Helmcken Street. It’s just been approved for rezoning to build 81 residential units and nearly 20,000 sq ft of office on a small (75′ foot wide) corner site behind the Chateau Granville hotel.

What makes this project unusual is that it will be privately developed non-market housing designed by Endall Elliot for Wall Financial. The scheme is intended to use the Community Amenity Contribution from a tower at 1300 Richards Street to subsidise the development of the non-market units, with a small top-up contribution from the City’s non-market housing fund. There’s a proposal for another Endall Elliot designed building that’s also shown on this new model.

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231 East Pender Street

Posted on May 14, 2013 by

231 E Pender

The development activity in Chinatown continues to grow, and here’s the latest proposal for a new apartment building. For almost 25 years the site has been a parking lot, but in 1931 Shell Oil built the Lion’s Gate Super Service Station here, and the remains of the repair bays are still just about standing at the back of the site. Thomas Chang, the son of early Chinese merchant Chang Toy ran the service station until the 1950s when it became H H Leong’s ‘Henry’s Service Station’. Now Bingham Hill have designed a 60 unit residential building for Porte Developments (who built Ginger on Main Street nearby). There will be retail on the main floor, filling in a gap in the retail continuity that has been there for decades.

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215 W2nd Avenue

Posted on May 4, 2013 by

215 W 2nd

Another Southeast False Creek condo project? No – another of the City of Vancouver provided sites for BC Housing. DYS designed this 147 unit 11 storey project that started construction in July 2011 and as we expected, it fits in just fine in design terms with its surrounding condo neighbours. (Actually, like the other non-market projects recently completed - it looks a little more interesting than some of the neighbours down the street) And like them all, it is LEED Gold certified and connected to the Neighbourhood Energy Utility.

215 W 2nd revisedHere’s the image from the site board for comparison. the finished building is a bit darker than the render – and we’re not sure if the vertical fin is still going to be painted yellow, but it came out close to concept.

As the site was cleared the painted sign on the building to the west revealed the original industrial use of the site – a truck factory for Hayes Anderson. It’s still visible for now, although probably not for long.

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