"City architect tasked with war exhibit," Calgary Herald, 1 March 2011

“City architect tasked with war exhibit,” Calgary Herald, 1 March 2011
http://www.calgaryherald.com/search/City+architect+tasked+with+exhibit/4364036/story.html
City architect tasked with war exhibit
By David Parker, For the Calgary Herald March 1, 2011
Parks Canada is to build an impressive exhibit on the history of First World War internments in Canada adjacent to the Cave and Basin National Historic Site in Banff to tell the story of the 24 camps across the country that operated between 1914 and 1920.
The opportunity to design the building was won by Calgary’s Riddell Kurczaba Architecture, and associate architect Peter Schulz was privileged to be offered the challenge to design a structure he says had to be humble, subtle and respectful.
Steve Malins, manager of the Cave and Basin and principal project lead for Parks Canada, says his mandate is to tell the nation the story of what happened in those years. He is conscious of how it may cause people concern, many of whom will be surprised that the camps were even built.
There is little evidence of the camps today, but during the First World War, hundreds of people who had come to this country for a better future had their dreams shattered when immigrants from specific countries were interned for the duration of the war.
In Banff they were kept under canvas behind barbed wire during the summer at Castle Mountain to work on the building of roads and bridges, and in the winter moved to wooden sheds on a site along Sundance Trail, above the town of Banff.
Directly across and above that site is where Schulz has designed a 100 square metre, self-guided educational exhibit space.
He featured a slanted roof that points toward Cascade Mountain with the high point above a large window that offers views down to the original campsite. It is set at an angle to “flow through” canopies at the entrance and exit. Inside, designed in collaboration with Toronto-based Reich and Petch exhibit designers, visitors will be met by a wall of graphics explaining how Canada got involved. Beyond are exhibits that will include a central tower of photographs and graphic information, audio and video explanations, a lifesize model of a typical bunk sleeping area and a model of one of the original buildings by the window looking over to where they were located.
The stark interior will have white walls and use reclaimed wood planking on the floor. The exterior will be covered in vertical strips of a new lowmaintenance thermo wood patterned to look like pine used in building the camp structures. The top portion of the new building will be clad with long-lasting matte-finished zinc panels.
The exhibit may cause visitors to want to reflect on how people were treated, so a bench site is being constructed beyond the exit area where people can sit quietly and contemplate this period of our history.
To be open free of charge during the summer months, Malins says Parks Canada has worked closely with the Canadian First World War Internment Recognition Fund, which represents the different cultural groups affected by our Great War internment policies. Other exhibits will be opened in Halifax and Kingston about their local camps, but the building west of the Cave and Basin is the largest internment exhibit telling the national story.