Design, Visualization & Photography
Design, Visualization & Photography
The University of Calgary commissioned a new academic building for the Haskayne School of Business, entitiled Mathison Hall, to expand on their existing facilities and create a dynamic, technology rich, highly sustainable and innovative new facility to meet the expanding program needs.
O2 was retained to re-design approximately 2.5 ha of the campus landscape surrounding the Haskayne School of Business to support the functions of the students in the adjacent buildings. Key features of the design include new plazas with social spaces and welcoming building entry points, a flexible event lawn, a reconfigured service road and drop-off loop and green spaces that incorporate rain gardens to manage storm water.
Client: O2 Planning + Design
Role: Visualization
Year: 2020
Location: Calgary, Alberta
Text adapted from O2 Planning + Design.
The project aligns and supports the goals of the University’s Indigenous Strategy. The design embraces Indigenous ways of knowing and being, including how the land’s natural cycles guide the way people move through, occupy and are affected by the seasonal changes.
Responding to campus activity throughout the year, spaces are designed to accommodate activities tied to university life as priorities and the calendar change.
Some of the goals of the project are:
Promote positive social and learning iterations in an inclusive setting;
Create a distinctive character and destination tied to the broader campus and regional landscape;
Improve connectivity across campus; and
Weave cultural and ecological narrative throughout the landscape.
The planting design has been conceived to coincide with the seasonal variation in activity. When certain places are active, plants respond with seasonal interest. Native and adaptive plant species and communities known to the regions are utilized in the planting design and in consultation, species that hold Indigenous significance were selected.