BCBUSINESS.CA JULY/AUGUST 2017 BCBUSINESS 51
'It's only every 20 or 30 years you get
a visionary like Ian Gillespie doing the
kind of stu he does.'"
Gillespie is leading the pack, Heeney
asserts. "He's taking what he's learned
here, and he's exporting it to places like
Toronto and Seattle. And he's working
in Tokyo. And what's interesting is he's
now learning from those places and
bringing that back here as well."
Heeney thinks the federal gov-
ernment could do more to support
Canadian architectural „irms' work
abroad. As he points out, many
European countries subsidize their
architects to enter international design
competitions. For instance, France does
so because it knows that those ˆrms will
specify French windows if they win.
"The economic value of architectural
services is profoundly undervalued by
government," Heeney says. "The archi-
tectural fees are just a small percent-
age of the project. But then we bring all
of this in‹uence in terms of what gets
built so these Canadian products can be
exported."
Heeney cites
BTA's innovative use of
zinc cladding on the Canadian pavilion
at Expo 92 in Seville, Spain. Canada is
the world's top zinc producer, and this
work spawned an industry now worth
hundreds of millions of dollars, he says.
"That's the value of architects working
abroad, is they can have this huge indus-
trial impact in Canada."
The broader development and
design community could make the
same case. In our culture, real estate
development doesn't have a glamor-
ous or even a positive image, planning
consultant Larry Beasley observes. "At
UBC, I teach my students not to objec-
tify the development community or
developers, because in a sense they're
subtly being taught that anyway," he
says. "The impact that development as
an industry has on the economy of this
city probably is undervalued."
What can be done to change that atti-
tude? "I guess you could have a policy
approach, and you could have govern-
ment doing some of the things they do
to facilitate, say, high tech," Beasley
says. "But part of it also has to do with
the industry, and the industry ˆnding
ways to tell its own stories and brand
itself dierently."
■
OFFICE SPACE FOR LEASE
10851 SHELLBRIDGE WAY, RICHMOND, B.C.
up to 56,918 sq. ft. available
• AAA "LEED Gold" building
• Convenient North Richmond location
• Award winning 35 acre landscaped park
• Complimentary shuttle bus to and from Bridgeport Canada Line Station
Contact: TIM EVANS
tevans@bentallkennedy.com | 604.233.1009
www.airportexecutivepark.com
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