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Woodward's Building

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The "backside" of the Woodward's building in June 2005, as seen from Cordova and Cambie Streets.

The Woodward's building is a historic building in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The original portion of the building was constructed in 1903 for the Woodward's Department Store. At one time, this was the premiere shopping destination in Vancouver. The building was famous for its Christmas window displays, and the "W" sign at the top of the building is a distinctive landmark on the Vancouver skyline. Since the bankruptcy of Woodward's in 1993, the building has remained vacant. Developing this building is seen by some as a key to revitalizing the Downtown Eastside.

History

The building was built in 1903 by Charles Woodward, as the second location for the Woodward's department store. Woodward's pioneered the concept of one-stop shopping; the store included a food floor, household items, men's and women's fashion, and provided cheque cashing, travel booking and other services. The store was well-known for carrying a large variety of goods that were not available anywhere else. The store soon became a feature attraction in Vancouver, and it expanded over 12 separate phases to a final size of 12 storeys. It currently occupies approximately 2/3 of the city block. The popularity of Woodward's attracted many other businesses to the area. In 1944, the landmark "W" was installed on the top of the building on a 25 metre replica of the Eiffel Tower, replacing a pre-war searchlight-beacon which had until then been the building's hallmark. The beacon, which was visible at night from as far away as Abbotsford and Mission, was shut down at the beginning of World War II because of its potential use as a landmark for aerial attacks.

Woodward's fortunes declined as customers gravitated to more suburban malls, but the Vancouver location was also greatly impacted by the transfer of the Eaton's department store from its location at West Hastings and Richards (a few blocks away), to the uptown location of Pacific Centre kitty-corner from The Bay, which signalled the demise of West Hastings Street as the central retail district in the city. In the 1980s, Woodward's sold the food floor - long known for its quality and its line of unusual specialities - to Safeway. During the same time, the area around the Woodward's building started to decline socially and economically. In 1993, Woodward's went bankrupt and closed its doors. Many of the store's suburban locations were sold to the Hudson's Bay Company for conversion to Zellers and The Bay stores, but there was little interest in the historic downtown building. The closing of the Woodward's store precipitated an even more rapid decline in the area, and soon the Downtown Eastside became "Canada's poorest postal code".

Structure

The building was designed over a number of phases, so the structure varies significantly over the building. The main portion of the building uses massive heavy timber construction from the old growth forests that were available near Vancouver at the turn of the 20th century. Much of the square footage of the building was not retail space; mazes of stockrooms comprised the bulk of the building's space, outside the view of customers.

Redevelopment

The "backside" of the Woodward's building in July 2006.

In 1995, the building was acquired by Fama Holdings. The firm developed a plan to build private housing in the building. However, many of those in the neighbourhood strongly objected as it was felt to be important that the project incorporate social housing. The provincial government of British Columbia decided to fund some social housing as part of the project. However, Fama and the province could not come to an agreement, and the project died. The building stood largely vacant, except for the occasional film shoot.

In 2001, the province bought the building from Fama for $22 million. A variety of options were pursued to develop the building. In 2002, the building was occupied by an organized squat that demanded that the building be developed into social housing. Eventually, the city was able to convince the squatters to leave.

In 2003, the City of Vancouver purchased the building for $5 million, and began a unique public consultation process, asking the community what they wanted from the redevelopment. After a competition between three developers, in September 2004 the city selected Westbank Projects/Peterson Investment Group to develop the building. The plan includes 700 housing units, shops, community and public green space, a daycare, and a new addition to the SFU downtown campus: the School for Contemporary Arts. The oldest part of the complex (built 1903-1908) will be restored, and will serve as non-profit community space. Construction is scheduled to begin in summer of 2006, with a completion date of spring 2009.

See also

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