Wallpaper 5

ABOVE, LIKE THE REST OF THE

HOUSE, OBERLANDER’S STUDY

FEATURES GLASS WALLS WITH

VIEWS OF THE SURROUNDING

LOCAL FLORA, WHICH HAS

GROWN TO FORM A THICK

GREEN MANTLE SINCE THE

HOUSE’S COMPLETION IN 1970

BELOW, THE ELONGATED

PAVILION FEATURES A

POST-AND-BEAM FRAME CLAD

IN LOCALLY SOURCED CEDAR,

AND MIES VAN DER ROHE-

INSPIRED CUBIST OVERHANGS

I’m talking about’, and that she could discern that

‘simplicity’ is ‘not plain-ness’. In spite of the early

1980s vogue for busier plantings, Oberlander heeded

Erickson’s advice that ‘there are many shades of green’.

Using a less-is-more economy of planting varieties at

Robson Square, says Oberlander, resulted in a simple

palette that was ‘very efective and therapeutic’.

Indeed the complex’s subtle interplay of variegated

levels, use of berms that grew into buildings, and

roofs into gardens, united landscape and architecture

in a singular, elegant form.

But Vancouver today has come a long way from the

heady days of the 1970s, when the building blocks for

Vancouverism – the forward-thinking green city model

that became the darling buzzword for international

urbanists in the 1990s – were formed. Vancouver in

2018 is in the grips of a housing crisis, and increasingly

an ecological one. Oberlander has used the $50,000

she won from the 2015 Margolese National Design for

Living Prize to fund a study on how overdevelopment,

lack of afordable housing and dwindling green spaces

afect people’s mental and physical health. In spite

of several public lectures on the topic, City Hall, she

says, has yet to respond. But Oberlander remains

a true believer in the power of landscape architecture

to save the world, and sees an innate connection

between social justice and good design. ‘Beauty is

important,’ she airms. ‘It unites people and makes

something meaningful to the user.’

She ultimately sees her calling as a kind of healing

art, and like the concept of ‘invisible mending’

expressed in her Inuvik school in the Northwest

Territories, which reintroduced native plantings after

nurturing them in nurseries, she also helps to heal

cities. ‘My design is therapeutic for busy people in the

city who use only electronic devices,’ she pronounces.

‘Just look out at my garden. You can’t even see the

street. Isn’t it peaceful?’ And with that, Oberlander

is of to preach her gospel of enlightened urban design

to City Hall, where the mayor’s oice would do well

to pay heed to the wise landscape architect who helped

build a city that still dreams of being truly green. ∂ Cornelia Hahn Oberlander fonds Canadian Centre for Architecture, gift of Cornelia Hahn Oberlander, © Cornelia Hahn Oberlander

Architecture Icon

134 ∑

OBERLANDER’S LANDSCAPES

Landscape plan of the Canadian

Pavilion playground, Expo 67, Montréal

Student project for a state park

camping ground, 1946

Site plan of the Museum of

Anthropology, Vancouver, 1977