The west wing: Eskasoni, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia
Florian Jungen
i f as Canadians our identity is tied to the landscape, then we remain remarkably naïve about vast portions of ourselves. For many of us the North floats adrift in our consciousness, a homogeneous white expanse only occasionally coming into focus as a source of social problems, threatened wilderness or economic opportunity. The politics of neglect and exploitation towards Canada’s colonies* extend to the less settled northern regions of various provinces as well as to native communities, either physically or psychologically isolated from the rest of the country. We could consider the North as much a state of mind for Canadians as a precise geographic position, but a vague one none the less. The West Wing is a project we built as students under Richard Kroeker on the Mi’kmaq reserve in Eskasoni, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia as part of the design/build component of Dalhousie University’s summer term. This studio addition is the Oval Office of elder Murdina Marshall’s house, where she gives counsel on spiritual matters to others in the community and which reduces the amount of time she has to spend travelling. The project continues a line of enquiry by Richard Kroeker which pursues a deeper understanding of Canada’s hinterlands and of the technological knowledge inherent in native cultural artefacts. Under the guidance of Mi’kmaq elders, students carefully replicated the construction of a traditional birchbark canoe and of several bent sapling lodges, both of which are indigenous to this part of North America. The birchbark canoe is the result of centuries of interaction between the wooded landscape of eastern Canada and the people moving along its shallow rivers and frequent portages. It makes use of sophisticated technological principles to produce an impeccably refined piece of Canadian design.
We are only beginning to understand the complex relationship between the environment and our own society. The decline of the Atlantic salmon fishery, for example, and the many communities in which it plays a central role, is a result more of irresponsible forestry practices that disrupt hatching streams than of over-fishing. The forestry industry continues to put intensive demand on large trees to meet the needs of various international production industries. Small diameter trees — one of the most readily available and underused forest resources in Nova Scotia — are considered a nuisance to efficient harvesting. Starting from crude experiments bending trees in the forest with a winch and making use of indigenous concepts of material use, Kroeker sought to determine uses for these undervalued forest resources. Over numerous experiments with the material, a configuration emerged that takes advantage of the structural resilience of the uninterrupted fibres in an unsawn trees. Two peeled spruce timbers (about 6” diam - eters and 15’ long) are bent and pinned at the ends to form a rigid banana truss. Webs made from off-cuts from the wood are attached at 2’ intervals with industrial stainless steel strapping. A series of improve- ments were made to connection details and to the manufacturing jig to increase the predictability of the truss’ geometry and performance. Structural analysis and refinements were made by specialised engineers from Buro Happold. The West Wing makes clear the poetic potentials of the bentwood truss and its resonance in a native cultural context. A project for an early childhood development centre has been planned using the same structural system at a larger scale and projects with more mundane programs (a one car garage) have tested its viability as an alternative to current wood use practices.
On Site review 11
22
Spring 2004
Architecture of the Circumpolar Region
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