Granville Street Redesign

Vancouver, British Columbia | 2007-2009

At the centre of Vancouver’s downtown, we led a multidisciplinary team in the redesign of 10 blocks of iconic Granville Street as a means to revitalize Vancouver’s entertainment district. Coined as the ‘Great White Way’ in the 1950’s at the height of neon’s popularity, our team rekindled this image of the street by introducing a cadence of vertical light columns along the entire length of the street corridor.  Another key unifying device was the concept of an undulating ribbon expressed in the ground plane with integrated furnishing elements that appear to emerge seamlessly from the ground plane.   

Our vision was to create a street that could inhale and exhale as crowds fluctuated. We revitalized this high-traffic entertainment precinct by creating an expanded pedestrian realm and a series of outdoor “rooms” with infrastructure elements that could accommodate special events and as well as impromptu street parties, art installations and performance. Flex-parking zones allow parking on the edge of the sidewalks at certain times of the day, but can be used as a wider paved sidewalk in the evenings as pedestrian traffic intensifies. The redesign aimed to create a clearly identifiable brand for the entire downtown area while also responding to the varying needs of each city block.