Major skyscraper by Holborn on former Dunsmuir Hotel property Dan Fumano May 12, 2025

Foreign investment and highrise buildings were again in the news in this May 2025 story by Dan Fumano which examined a major new proposal from the controversial Vancouver-based Malaysian developer Holborn Group. Readers of this blog may recall it was the company that allowed the Dunsmuir Hotel to become so dilapidated and so-called danger to the public that it had to be urgently demolished. Coincidentally, or should I write fortunately, Holborn already had plans ready for the now-vacant site. 

When the Vancouver Sun's Dan Fumano called me to see if I wanted to comment, I referred him to former Director of Planning Ray Spaxman who many years ago had undertaken a skyline study for the city. I also suggested he speak with James Cheng, since he had designed the city's tallest buildings. As you can hopefully tell, I bit my tongue when discussing Holborn's proposal.

Here's Dan Fumano's story

When Vancouver’s Marine Building was completed on Burrard Street in 1930, it was derided by some as a “modern monstrosity.” At nearly 100 metres tall, it towered over everything around it.

Now revered as an art deco gem, the 19-storey Marine Building is today dwarfed by neighbouring glass skyscrapers.

The evolution of Vancouver’s skyline is on the minds of many, after a developer unveiled a proposal last week for three skyscrapers that would transform the downtown peninsula.

The towers, designed by Henriquez Partners Architects, are being pitched by developer Holborn Group for a parcel of almost two whole downtown blocks.

In illustrations of the proposed buildings, they stand out both by virtue of their size and shape. At 239, 271 and 315 metres, they dwarf most neighbouring buildings, including recently built towers. The 315-metre hotel would be B.C.’s tallest tower, 55 per cent taller than Vancouver’s tallest existing skyscraper, the Shangri-La.

The three towers feature a distinct, curving design, with a “sculptural exoskeleton” which the architect says are inspired by the rare and ancient glass sea sponge reefs found off the B.C. coast.

“It is worth talking about because city skylines are symbolic,” Michael Geller, an urban planner and retired architect, said.

“That’s not to say that this particular proposal shouldn’t go ahead. I don’t have any views one way or the other on this proposal, but I do feel that it is time to have a discussion about the relative importance of the appearance in the city, whether it’s the skyline or just the look of new buildings,” Geller said.

“I think this is prompting what will hopefully be a conversation, so we can hear what people think about the skyline.”

Geller pointed to the Eiffel Tower in Paris, which was hated by many when first unveiled in 1889, but went on to become the city’s internationally renowned — and beloved — landmark.

Back in the 1990s, Vancouverites were complaining that the city’s skyline was “flat, uninteresting and dominated by 1970s bank towers,” Vancouver Sun reporter Frances Bula reported in 1997.

City council hired consultant Ray Spaxman, who had been Vancouver’s director of planning from 1973 to 1989, to complete a “downtown Vancouver skyline study.”

Spaxman said he recalls discussions about how the city’s skyline should — or should not — change, dating back to the 1970s.

Cities around the world have to grapple with various versions of this question, Spaxman said. In European cities, for example, building heights might be limited to preserve views of a historic cathedral, he said.

“Each community sort of looks at its assets and says: ‘How do we want to allow development to occur around what we consider our assets?'” Spaxman said. For Vancouver, he said, some of its most important “assets from prehistoric times” are the mountains to the north of the city and the views of them.

Coming out of Spaxman’s study, city staff recommended increasing building height limits in the central business district to 183 metres from 137 metres, while still ensuring building heights would not intrude into protected view corridors, including those of the North Shore mountains.

Over the following decades, the city continued to update its “higher buildings policy.”

A big recent change under the current ABC-majority council was to loosen the rules protecting some public views, including mountain vistas. This paved the way for taller buildings on Holborn’s Georgia site, as well as other major proposed development sites such as the former Expo lands.

Former Vancouver city planner Michael Gordon helped lead the city staff work on the skyline study in the 1990s.

Gordon said it will be important to see more illustrations of how Holborn’s proposal would alter the skyline before offering an opinion on the project. This consideration matters, he said, because one thing that makes Vancouver special is how its built form connects with its natural setting.

“Really, the skyline is three lines. It’s the water’s edge, it’s the line of when you connect the dots of the buildings, and then it’s the mountain ridges. … There’s a balance between the three lines, and you’ve got to be careful,” Gordon said. “It’s a Zen thing.”

Illustrations showing a development proposed for downtown Vancouver, from Holborn Group and designed by Henriquez Partners Architects Photo by Norm Li

Gordon has heard, over the years, from people who say: “There’s no view crisis, there’s no heritage crisis, there’s no shadow crisis, there’s a housing crisis.”

The argument is that those other considerations should not prevent tall buildings that contribute significantly to the supply of homes, or hotel rooms, or other priorities.

Gordon is not so sure.

“As Joni Mitchell sang: ‘You don’t know what you’ve got ’till it’s gone,'” Gordon said. “I’m not on board with just saying: ‘It’s a housing crisis, let’s just let ‘er rip.'”

Vancouver architect James Cheng has had a hand in shaping the city’s skyline, designing some of its tallest buildings including the Shangri-La (200 metres) and the Stack office building (162 metres).

Cheng said he is not interested in superficial “beauty pageant” discussions about which big buildings are attractive or not, or how tall they should be. He does, however, spend a lot of time thinking about what he calls “the role of highrises in Vancouver in historic, social, cultural, economic, and artistic terms, as a barometer of our city’s health.”

Some people may be nostalgic for the way Vancouver’s skyline looked before Expo in 1986 and the ensuing development boom.

But, Cheng says: “If we do not have an evolving skyline, it’s a barometer showing our economic health is weakening. … highrises will not happen if there is no economic justification for it.”

“The downtown skyline is the crown jewel. And that has to constantly be polished.”