Opinion: Vancouver Art Gallery building needs redesign Vancouver Courier September 30, 2015

While I didn’t know what to expect, it was definitely not what I was expecting!

This was my initial thought when I first saw a drawing of the wood clad pagoda-type structure proposed by the Swiss architectural firm Herzog & de Meuron for the new Vancouver Art Gallery. As a former VAG trustee and a member of its Expansion Committee, I had been eagerly awaiting the plans. While I previously went on record as preferring an expansion on the existing site, I accepted that this was no longer the game plan.

Having left the Board of Trustees a decade ago, I had not been involved in the subsequent planning, nor the architect selection process. However, I was not a fan of the firm chosen, having recently visited their very unusual and over-budget philharmonic hall in Hamburg, and austere Tate Modern gallery in London.

Nonetheless, many of my friends are great supporters of the VAG and as a city resident, I want to see the new gallery project succeed. As Board Chair Bruce Munro Wright said at the unveiling, we must all be positive.
There are a number of aspects of the plans that please me. I am happy the architects have not designed a contrived geometric shape that would be expensive to build and difficult to use. I am also pleased to see a large, public outdoor space, although I do not like how the building design cuts off this plaza from all the surrounding streets.

More importantly, I do not like the massing and appearance of the building as viewed along Georgia Street, nor the unrelenting exterior wood cladding. 

I love wood, especially when it is new, or like my outdoor deck, allowed to gracefully turn silver (before turning dirty and black). Travelling around Europe I have seen wood used on a number of large, new buildings. However, when it is not properly maintained, it fades and looks quite unpleasant.

Architects are increasingly using wood, and wood-like products on new buildings around Vancouver quite successfully. However, the new art gallery has 12 storeys of wood cladding, with a lot more wood inside. I worry how it will wear over time.

I attended the architect’s presentation at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre last Tuesday evening and left feeling disappointed. The senior partner, Christine Binswanger (sadly neither of the firms founding principals thought it important enough to attend) seemed rather vague as to how the wood cladding would be detailed, noting that in the past it had been burned or painted. Surely neither would be contemplated here.

Following the unveiling, as the design was debated on social media, one of my former colleagues now living in London UK, offered some interesting observations. He noted it is difficult to design an art gallery that fits well with its surroundings since it is by its very nature an internally-focused structure. However, in evaluating this proposal one might ask some questions: Does the building honour its urban context? Does it do an outstanding job of integrating ground floor uses and connecting them to the life of our streets? What will it feel like to be there at all hours of the day and night? How will the building age? Does it reflect our West Coast design culture? And does it approach the excellence of some of our other gallery-like buildings such as Arthur Erickson's Museum of Anthropology?

Having viewed the detailed plans, I believe aspects of the gallery layout could be very successful both day and night, including the many covered outdoor spaces. However, while the architects said the building design was inspired by its context and the city, I do not think it honours Vancouver. Nor do I think it will age well.

More importantly, I do not think this is a beautiful public building, like the one that was universally admired when first unveiled in the early 1980s-the first Vancouver Trade & Convention Centre with its ship-like design and sails. It belongs here. If this building is built, and I worry the design will not help raise the necessary funds as many hope, the building will need considerable redesign.

Otherwise, it will never meet my expectations.

Michael Geller

NOTE: since writing this column, a couple of comments have appeared on the Courier website that I thought were worth reprinting here:

Lysenko's Nemesis • 20 hours ago

As a member of the VAG I am very disappointed but I'm not surprised. Herzog & de Meuron adapted the Tate Modern. It was already there, they designed the reno., yet even that has a streetscape that is completely unfriendly - just walls. As is their de Yong museum in San Francisco, with stark rusted steel walls all around and a tiny dark and utterly dismal entrance. In Barcelona their Forum is surrounded by impenetrable metal and panel walls and is unlike just about the entire rest of Barcelona, it is devoid of people because it's completely unwelcoming.
All these are 'destination' buildings. They stand alone and blatantly do not blend in to their surroundings.
The streetscapes of all of them are ice cold and people avoid them. I don't think this is what Vancouver needs or wants.
As for the stacked wooden boxes; they look like a silly cliché. Irregular boxes are currently trendy in architecture but this will pass. Wood exteriors do not age gracefully and require expensive maintenance to upkeep in acceptable condition.
I'd like to be positive but I am completely underwhelmed and fear for the cold streetscape this designer repeats on building.

Constance Rite • 2 days ago

I'm 100% in agreement. This looks very tacky. I feel as though contemporary designers have fallen into incorporating cliches into their art gallery design. Maybe the design will grow on me, it's hard to know, but my first instinct when looking at this is to shake my head in disappointment.