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North Vancouver Presentation House Gallery | BCBusiness
A new $15-million building, designed by Patkau Architects Inc., may house North Vancouver’s Presentation House Gallery in 2016. The new gallery space would be just east of the Lonsdale Quay and would be a part of North Vancouver’s Foot of Lonsdale revitalization plan.
“We view the gallery as a critical part of the city’s emerging plans, a point of community pride for its residents and a beacon for North Vancouver,” said Reid Shier, Presentation House Gallery director and curator at a City of North Vancouver council meeting on October 28. The envisioned two-storey, 22,632-square-foot building will have a community outreach and event space, will offer retail opportunities and will have a gallery cafe on the first floor with the second floor being used for exhibition space. The modern gallery will replace the current Cates Shed site, which is slated to be demolished.
In 2010 and 2011 the city created a conceptual land use plan to create more open and public space near the waterfront. In July of last year the City of North Vancouver agreed to advance the goal of creating a new facility at the foot of Lonsdale avenue to house Presentation House Gallery.
Patkau Architects was selected for the new building in December 2012 after Presentation House Gallery interviewed seven candidates, according to Shier. The Vancouver-based firm has also designed the $30 million-dollar Audain Art Gallery in Whistler, which is planned to open in summer 2015. The current Presentation House Gallery is located at 333 Chesterfield Avenue in North Vancouver inside a former school that houses the Presentation House Cultural Centre, which was opened in 1976 by Pierre Elliott Trudeau.
The City of North Vancouver has committed $2.5-million towards the project as well as providing city-owned property to build the facility. Thus far the Presentation House Gallery has raised $3.5 million towards the project.