With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/1181452
PORTRAIT: ADAM BLASBERG NOVEMBER 2019 BCBUSINESS 11 T hey started showing up in my Van- couver neighbourhood a couple of years ago. Condo developments, great herds of them, in two to six sto- reys of boxy blah. Don't get me wrong: I'm all for density. But this stuff? With its beige tile exterior, one new building around the corner from our house resembles the men's room writ large. If there's no accounting for taste, there's also no excuse for the lazily conceived and just plain ugly structures that some local developers keep planting in the ground. But Vancouver's built environment used to look a lot worse before Ian Gillespie, whom I profile on page 28, decided to do something about it. Through his internationally active firm, Westbank, Gillespie has collaborated with top architects from here and abroad. Together they've produced unique and beautifully designed residential towers, office buildings and hotels that do much more than coast on Vancouver's stunning natural backdrop. Thanks to Gillespie's lead- ership, other developers have raised their standards, giving me hope that the future doesn't look like my neigh- bourhood. Now he's stepping further into the role of city builder by trans- forming Oakridge shopping mall into its own community. While Gillespie pushes the bound- aries of urban architecture and design, Greg McDougall aims to lead the way in aviation. The CEO of Vancouver-based Harbour Air is taking steps to make his seaplane company the world's first all-electric airline. As McDougall tells associate editor Nathan Caddell in "Electric Avenue" (p.38), achieving this goal would yield financial as well as environmental benefits by banish- ing fuel bills and driving down mainte- nance costs. Good luck to him. Speaking of boundaries—and taste—for some it's still a deal breaker, but what's wrong with eating insects? In "The Bug Picture" (p.44), Melissa Edwards checks in with local entrepreneurs who are turning crickets and other bugs into food for people and animals. If you're serious about shrinking your carbon footprint, give the critters a try. Squeamish? As I can attest, insects aren't that bad, even in whole form. By the pool during a recent trip to Mexico, where people have dined on them for centuries, I enjoyed a bowl of guaca- mole garnished with plump roasted chapulines. I wouldn't call the grasshoppers delicious, but they added a pleasant crunch and saltiness that went down well with beer. Better than the view from my place, for sure. Nick Rockel, Editor-in-Chief bcb@canadawide.com / @BCBusiness ( editor's desk ) Our sixth annual Best Cities for Work in B.C. list ranks 46 communities I N DE C E M B E R /JA N UA R Y Building Character C ON T R I B U T OR S "I live for food," says Vancouver writer Abby Wiseman ("Cracking Success," p.17). The founder and editor of online magazine Small Batch Vancouver is a big supporter of local food culture and passionate about sharing made-in-B.C. stories. When Wiseman started researching the destruction and resurrection of the province's hazelnut industry, she had no idea it would turn into a tale about land cost, cross- border relations and politics. Born and raised in Eastern Canada, photographer Mark Gibbon ("Cracking Success," p.17) was drawn to B.C. by the ocean and mountains. Halfway through a mechanical engineering program at the University of Waterloo, he decided to switch to photography. "I thought, I'm pursuing one dream, which is my dream career; I may as well pursue my dream of where I want to live as well," he recalls.