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| The Pictou Landing Health Centre. |
Dalhousie architecture professors have garnered international prestige for their design of a health centre in a Miākmaq community.
The Chicago Anthenaeum Museum of Architecture and Design and the European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies awarded the team, Piskwepaq Design Inc., the International Architecture Award for 2010.
Professors Richard Kroeker and Brian Lilley and Halifax architect Peter Henry collaborated on the project, the Pictou Landing Health Centre. The elegant building was designed and built using traditional Miākmaq expertise.
Next month, the building will be featured in a special exhibition at the symposium, The City and the World, in Madrid, Spain. After Spain, the exhibition will travel throughout Europe.
āI think itās wonderful that this building in a small Miākmaq community thatās had a lot of struggles gets this kind of international recognition,ā says Prof. Kroeker. āThe awards are significant in that they affect how people think about design.ā
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| Interior shot, Pictou Landing Health Centre. |
Housing clinics, consultation rooms and a community meeting space, the Pictou Landing Health Centre is a relatively modest structure compared to the other winners, which include museums, performing arts venues and embassies.
It was built out an appreciation of young spruce trees as a strong yet pliable building material, explains Prof. Kroeker, acting director with the School of Architecture, Faculty of Architecture and Planning. The trees were shaped while still green by members of the community in providing the frame of the building.
āThe bent frame, used in lodges and conical wigwams, creates a shell structure that is very strong but uses less materials.ā
As part of the Schoolās Cities and Environment Unit, Prof. Kroeker and a group of Dalhousie students recently returned from a build in Saskatchewan. They collaborated with community members from Kinistin Saulteaux Nation to create an arbour.
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