TS:And there were no problems with code? CR: It’s in a fire-rated enclosure. Open grates are actually quite safe. They’re pretty grippy and because you get a solid edge to them, you can see the tread. The nose of the stair is absolutely clear. The problem was never technical, it was perceptual. The back stair before the handrail went on was terrifying. But this is good. You remember it. The guys that built the stairs were great — it’s a beautiful welding job.The stairs don’t touch the sides of the space. In the old freight elevator shaft in the back, you can’t actually touch the walls when you’re on the stair, it’s like you’ve stepped off a four-storey building.
TS:That’s interesting. It’s something that is really removed from most buildings with any height to them at all.You get into an office tower and you have no idea where you are. I used to be a roofer and riding up that exterior elevator was as frightening as any roller-coaster. So it’s nice to see that that kind of knowledge of where you are in the world is expressed, right? CR: Because the schedule here was so tight, the stairs had both a pragmatic reason and a design rationale. We built the elevator outside the building because it was the item with the longest delivery; we wanted to be able to finish the building without having to wait for the elevator to show up. The other reason is that trying to drill a 60-foot hole inside a historic building would have been incredibly disruptive and expensive. TS: So the conditions of the project really supported the disconnection between the new and the old. CR : Projects are made up of a whole series of ideas as opposed to the grand scheme, and if you’re lucky, all the ideas begin to connect.
Architects: Simpson Roberts Architecture Interior Design Chris Roberts - Project Architect Jennifer Wise - Design Assistant Kevin Wilkins - Technical Coordinator Mark Latimer - Technical Assistant Interior Design: Domus Interior Architecture Group Sharon Raycroft, Design Director Mechanical/Electrical Engineer: LEW Engineering Structural Engineer: HMS Landscape Architect: Landplan Construction Management: SMED Construction Client: SMED International
Jennifer Wise is an interior designer with Simpson Roberts in Calgary. She stud- ied building conservation in Rome on a Peter Rice Memorial Scholarship (2000) and did a VITRA Design Museum work- shop in France (2001). Chris Roberts is a partner in Simpson Roberts, a Calgary firm that specializes in historic renovation and restoration.
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