When was the last time the federal government ordered a great building? This has not been the case for half a century in Ottawa, where recent public architecture is unambitious and depressing. That is likely to change with Block 2, a new office complex to be built across the street from Parliament Hill.
Some of the best architects in the world are fighting to lead the design of Block 2 in an international competition held in collaboration with the Royal Institute of Architecture of Canada. Next Tuesday, a 25-member jury of parliamentarians, academics and architects, led by philosopher and novelist John Ralston Sol, will announce the winner of six selected teams.
These teams unveiled their Block 2 designs in a public online presentation last week. While they presented a diverse set of visions, whichever is chosen will become the most ambitious work of public architecture the capital has seen in many years.
However, it will not be blatant. Block 2 will be largely an office complex for use by parliamentarians and civil servants. It is part of a 25-year project to restore the entire parliamentary area, the area on and around Parliamentary Hill. Block 2 is bounded by Wellington, Sparks, Metcalfe and O’Connor streets; this city block currently includes 11 existing buildings and several vacant plots. Two buildings in the middle are reserved for the future space of the indigenous population. The rest will be demolished or included in the new office complex.
The government launched the process in March 2021 with a request for qualifications from the design teams. Twelve of them were invited to develop a detailed design concept. The jury then reduced them to six, using a comprehensive set of aesthetic and technical criteria. These many restrictions, not to mention the challenge of responding to parliament buildings across the street, make it difficult to create an icon.
Instead, the selected projects show complex and diverse solutions to the competition puzzle. Designers include international who’s who of modern architecture. They nod to the materials and details of the triad of parliament buildings; they include bold modernist shaping and articulation; and they involve thinking from local architecture.
It has common features. Several of the schemes make extensive use of engineered wood or solid wood, attractive and low carbon material. All of them meet the requirements of the competition with a combination of office space, meeting rooms and large atriums.
But there are also some key differences in approach. The team led by the London company WilkinsonEyre imagines a C-shaped roof conference space. The team, led by the Paris-based Renzo Piano Building Workshop, is leveraging existing heritage buildings to create a single, monumental façade on Wellington Street. And the team, led by Provencher Roy from Montreal, relies heavily on local design to shape Block 2 itself.
Some of these designs stretch the competition rules, which is appropriate; The main advantage of the design competition is to test different ideas and designers to get an excellent result. Block 2 is likely to achieve this goal. Its public squares and street facades will send two clear messages: that the work of government matters and that public architecture can embody the highest cultural aspirations.
Here are early estimates of the six selected schemes based on video presentations by the architects.
Illustrations: Zeidler Architecture Inc./David Chipperfield Architects
Zeidler Architecture with David Chipperfield Architects
Of the six proposals, this is a clear one. David Chipperfield’s London firm is known for its sensitivity to heritage. This proposal “intertwines past, present and future to create a tapestry of shapes and styles,” Mr. Chipperfield said during the presentation. The scheme, created by a team that includes Zeidler Architecture in Toronto, preserves almost all the exteriors of existing buildings. The new ones have structural systems of solid wood and are clad in panels of recycled copper – a poetic slope to the copper roofs of parliament.
Inside, two large atriums connect existing buildings on site, combining floor levels to provide access, while different meeting spaces and corridors have recycled masonry. The team – incl Mohawk architect Matthew Hickey of Two Row Architect also designed the People’s Square, which is located next to a new indigenous center and in line with the Peace Tower across the street. On a small scale and on the scale of the bloc, this promises complexity and diversity that, as the architects suggest, could represent the country’s diversity.
Illustrations: NEUF Architects, Renzo Piano Building Workshop
Architect (s) of NEUF with Renzo piano construction workshop
This project, in contrast, transforms the facades of Wellington Street into two uniform and finely detailed boxes – the kind with which the Paris-based company of Renzo Piano is world famous. (Its project partners include NEUF Montreal.) Dressed in clear, low-iron and limestone glass, these facades represent the eternal and beautiful face of Parliament, crowned with groves on the roof of large trees. The other main façade, Iskri Street, restores and preserves elements of some heritage buildings, as in other schemes. But this design covers them with precisely carved glass plates and arrays of solar panels. If the jury of the competition wants a statement of uniformity, consistency and precision, there is no proposal more appropriate for the task.
Illustrations: Diamond Schmitt Architects, Bjarke Ingels Group, KWC Architects
Diamond Schmitt Architects with Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), KWC Architects and ERA Architects
This team brings together international BIG stars with established companies from Toronto and Ottawa. His vision includes buildings that are multifaceted, literally: The new Wellington-facing office blocks are irregularly shaped, sloping inward from top to bottom to define new public squares around the future indigenous center. (The thoughtfully planted roof gardens by landscape architects PUBLIC WORK provide added convenience.) The facades arrange Queenston limestone panels in a strong modernist lattice, contrasting with the other restored heritage facades. The windows are dimensioned and arranged to control the gain of light and heat on each facade. Inside the offices and atriums are consistent and quite soft in terms of completeness and spatial qualities. This scheme aims to balance the architectural brilliance with conservatism in Ottawa.
Illustrations: Provencher Roy + Associés Architectes Inc.
Provence Roy
The team, led by Roy from Montreal, is focusing heavily on the core component of the project. Working with local architect and designer Aaron Aubin, he imagines a round tower of truth and reconciliation that stands opposite the Peace Tower and houses the commission rooms. This is trying to meet the main challenge of this bloc: the decision to put a center for indigenous peoples in what used to be the US Embassy in Wellington. This 1932 building by architect Cass Gilbert speaks a language of neoclassicism that has strong negative connotations for many indigenous people. The question is whether Provencher Roy’s design of spaces with a more corporate feel in Block 2 solves this problem in a meaningful way.
Illustrations: WilkinsonEyre, IDEA Inc.
WilkinsonEyre with IDEA Inc.
The London architectural firm WilkinsonEyre, who recently completed a new CIBC headquarters in Toronto, is the Dark Horse. (Her project partners include Ontario-based IDEA Inc.) The team’s design is based on the neoclassicism of the former US embassy building, translating the three-part organization on its facades into an architectural language familiar from modern London. To add Canadiana, structural wood “trees” appear both inside and out. Egg-shaped meeting rooms hang in the large atrium of the building, like fruit on stalks. This design has symbols that are easy to read; however, a busy and polite approach to interior architecture may not age well.
Illustrations: Watson MacEwen Teramura Architects with Behnisch Architekten
Watson MacEwen Teramura Architects with Behnisch Architekten
The German / American company Behnisch is known for its commitment to sustainability and this is reflected in the design of this team, which includes Ottawa-based Watson McEwan Teramura. A complex series of atriums and conservatories at different levels helps control light and ventilation by helping to building complex operates for part of the year without mechanical ventilation. Like most other shortlisted projects, this one divides the office mass into smaller pieces. In his team’s presentation, Stefan Benisch suggested that architecture should “foretell tolerance, inclusion, cooperation and communication”. But it goes further than most, covering the exterior with sloping light shelves that provide shade and capture sunlight with solar panels. The effect inside and out is very subtle. Is finesse the right architectural message? This must be decided by the jury of the competition.
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