Award

June 2012

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Three Harbour Green by Robin Brunet ROBERT STEFANOWICZ hree Harbour Green in downtown Vancouver's Coal Harbour is a showcase in several ways. Design-wise, it distinguishes itself from its slightly smaller sister towers, One Harbour Green and Two Harbour Green, which are landmark residences in and of themselves. The 256,400-square-foot, 32-storey tower is also ownerdeveloper Aspac Development Ltd.'s pinnacle achievement of luxury living. But perhaps most signi icantly, Three Harbour Green sits on the last available space for residential development in Coal Harbour. "We've spent the last 20 years building a legacy in this region of the city, and our goal with Three Harbour Green was to really pull out all the stops," says John Ryan, Aspac's vice president of development. Raymond Li, Aspac's senior vice president, adds, "We've put all sorts of amenities in these towers, and we wanted to make this project the masterpiece and grand inale." Each tower at Harbour Green Place features private, twoand three-car garages, a 25-metre swimming pool and a virtual golf centre. Interior appointments for the third tower include two Canadian condominium ' irsts': ergonomically designed kitchens by Snaidero of Italy, and a full range of Miele kitchen appliances – from washers and dryers to T Three Harbour Green p.46-49Three Harbour Green.indd 47 convection ovens and warming drawers. The rooms are large and designed to low into one another, and each suite has loor-to-ceiling views and expansive outdoor balconies with gas ireplaces. Ryan says that because Three Harbour Green sits at the junction of Vancouver's inancial district to the east and luxury residences to the west, "It was our intention to borrow from both to give the tower a unique appearance, and we chose IBI/HB Architects to turn our vision into reality." IBI/ HB's solution was to design the eastern side of the building as a simple, clean form of curtain wall and stone mimicking the simplicity of the nearby of ices. The western side is made of more complex forms: a series of stone boxes that hang from the building to create sky garden spaces. Townhomes and public art at the tower's base seamlessly integrate with Harbour Green Park to the north, the large public plaza to the east, and the city fabric to the west and south. IBI/HB principal Jim Hancock describes the tower as "two massive halves that come together but retain a distinct split personality. Another distinguishing feature is that while the irst two towers have reddish/cream-coloured limestone and granite components, we went for dark green granite whose colour really intensi ies on sunny days." Hancock says of Three Harbour Green, which he began working on four years ago, "This was a dream come true because Aspac not only wants the best but is also willing to pay for the best. We had a productive partnership, and every single detail of the tower was worked out meticulously." This includes the common areas, which IBI/HB was also responsible for designing. When pressed to disclose any discord, Hancock replies, "We had a false start involving a compound curve we had proposed for one part of the tower, which Aspac nixed. Otherwise, nothing was forced on us. Our ideas were very similar to those of John Ryan and his colleagues: for example, we both wanted a big-scale entry, so my team created a double front lobby off the motor court JUNE 2012 /47 5/25/12 11:54:12 AM

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