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DECEMBER 2018 | 57 Residences at Acclamation RENDERINGS COURTESY ROQUE LAND DEVELOPMENT Residences at Acclamation by NATALIE BRUCKNER LOCATION 181 James Street North, Hamilton, Ontario OWNER/DEVELOPER Roque Land Development PLANNING CONSULTANT UrbanSolutions Planning & Land Development Consultants Inc. ARCHITECT Kathryn Vogel Architects CONSTRUCTION MANAGER Schilthuis Construction Inc. STRUCTURAL/CIVIL CONSULTANT Lanhack Consultants Inc. MECHANICAL CONSULTANT ARC Engineering Inc. ELECTRICAL CONSULTANT Seguin Engineering Ltd. TOTAL SIZE 148,875 square feet TOTAL COST $30 million W hen Manuel Roque moved to Hamilton, Ontario from the Portuguese Azores in the 1960s and rented an apartment on James Street North, he knew that despite the many boarded up buildings on the street, he had stumbled upon something special. And so in 2002 he decided to invest, purchasing a few properties on the street and opening up a Portuguese fusion restaurant called Acclamation. "The original idea was to build a large banquet hall next door to our restaurant. My family is a big part of the church community, so as a family we were always cater- ing for our Portuguese church feasts to raise funds for our church," says Patricia Roque, COO at Roque Land Development and lead on this project. So how did the Roque family end up building an eight-storey, mixed-use development on the site? "Through the planning process, which started in 2013, we discovered we were unable to meet the parking requirements of the City, so we had no choice but to remove the banquet hall from the plans. By removing the banquet hall we were able to add 11 more units, and ended up with eight storeys with 71 apartments, and five commercial units." says Roque. The site itself was a little chal- lenging for the team. Not only due to its location (surrounded by his- torical buildings in a dense urban neighbourhood), but the soil conditions on this brownfield site were less than favourable. Working alongside Urban Solutions, Roque was able to obtain the first Conditional Foundation permit issued in Hamilton. This was key to the project's schedule. "There was a lot of water under- ground, so extensive planning had to go into the foundation work to prevent flooding. We were fortunate that con- struction was happening up the road, so we could see what we were dealing with," says Roque. "The redesign of the parking, which resulted in going down one level of parking instead of two definitely helped overcome some of the chal- lenges of the water table and the soil conditions," adds Henry Schilthuis at Schilthuis Construction. Once the foundations were laid, construction of the boutique luxury condominium could begin. The original architect on the project was John Mokrycke, however Kathryn Vogel of Kathryn Vogel Architects Inc. had purchased a unit in the building, and mentioned this to Henry Schilthuis of Schilthuis Construction Inc. "We had a working relationship with Henry on several projects and he mentioned they were looking for an architect to com- plete the project," says Vogel. "We met with Schilthuis, the Roque family, and the sales group, and there seemed to be an instant rapport between the team." This rapport in what resulted in being a mainly female-led team, along- side a love of the area, is reflected in the design itself. "We worked to respect the original design intent of the exterior, while modifying certain exte- rior materials, selected balconies, and various exterior windows," says Vogel. Initially, the project was designed as an entirely cast-in-place concrete structure, however, Giancarlo Lancia at Lanhack Consultants Inc. says the pricing showed the product costs were rising rapidly. "When the owners hired Schilthuis Construction they decided it would be far more cost effective to design and construct the building using cast-in-place concrete for the lower level [footings and foundation walls], and pre-cast concrete for the super-structure," says Lancia. 9:11 AM

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