GESAMTKUNSTWERK

Westbank has built a practice around long-term commitments to artistry, sustainability and city-building. These commitments underlie an orientation towards projects like Woodwards, Vancouver House, Mirvish Village, Telus Garden and Oakridge – catalysts for larger change that go beyond the borders of the projects themselves. We are here to create. To provoke. To ignite. We are the vehicle for a new movement of cultural expression.

As the practice matures, we have become more ambitious. With every new project reflecting our commitment to the philosophy behind Gesamkunstwerk, or in our recent work the Japanese philosophy behind layering, the net effect is that our work becomes much more complex and far-reaching.

The core of Westbank’s mission is to create a body of work with a high degree of artistry that helps foster more equitable and beautiful cities. Westbank is active across Canada and in the United States, with projects including luxury residential, Five Star hotels, retail, office, rental, district energy systems, affordable housing initiatives and public art. Established in 1992, we are one of North America’s leading developers, with offices in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Seattle, Shanghai, Beijing, Taiwan, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shenzhen and over 25 billion dollars of projects completed or under development.

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Philosophy
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November 26, 2015
Image: City of Vancouver Archives

BIG improvements win World Architecture Prize

Architect Kai-Uwe Bergmann explains how Vancouver House is designed to transform a site that had, for a long time, been dominated by a motorway flyover into an attractive neighbourhood.

The Danish architecture firm’s Vancouver House, which was named Future Project of the Year 2015 at World Architecture Festival earlier this month, will be situated adjacent to an overpass at the base of Vancouver’s Granville Street Bridge.

“We’ve tried to make the most of the site with all of its challenges,” Bergmann says. “So we started out small and then moved up to a larger top.”

“The site is similar to a lot of cities,” says BIG partner Bergmann, who was filmed in Singapore by Dezeen for World Architecture Festival. “The prime locations of the cities are built, so architects now deal with a lot of the residual spaces.”

The 49-storey residential tower’s distinctive twisted form was a direct response to the limitations of the site.

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