Anne Lissett
anne_lissett@lycos.com

 Nuu-chah-nulth Coastal Resort
 Thesis Advisor: Richard Klopp

thesis

My thesis research considers two main questions: how to learn from and design with a specfic First Nations group in a meaningful and respectful way, and how to design an ecologically, socially, and economically “sustainable” coastal resort.

The relationship between Canadian aboriginals and other Canadian communities is evolving. First Nations peoples are finding increasing success in reclaiming their traditional territories and recovering their right to self-governance. Furthermore, many First Nations people are working to ensure that their oral histories are included in the province’s history by working with western-trained historians. In British Columbia especially, the art of the numerous Nations in the province defines a large part the province’s iconography. (For example, see its influence on the current Vancouver Canucks’ logo.) I would suggest that in many cases, aboriginal art and artisanal work is one of the first means of cultural contact between aboriginals and other British Columbians. I would further suggest that architecture might be the next means of cultural contact, both as an art and as a a venue for interaction. Some groups have found government funding to build new schools and community centres (some of these buildings have received international acclaim), and many are looking for new ways to develop economically. Because there are few aboriginal architects in Canada, they turn to local architects to design their buildings. These architects learn from from their clients so they can design in keeping with the group in question’s traditions and values, and thus create excellent contemporary architecture while avoiding empty pastiche.

The concept of sustainable development aspires to balance issues of environment, social equity and economy over the long term in locally appropriate ways. Though its earliest definition was published in 1987, and the adjective “sustainable” is often (and incorrectly) used interchangeably with “green” and “ecological” to describe relatively environmentally responsible buildings, actual sustainable architecture remains beyond reach at the moment because the impacts of building are complex and difficult to both identify and address in today’s western building context. Nonetheless, finding a holistic, sustainable design methodology should be possible: changing the design process to one of interdisciplinary and inclusionary collaboration is the first step in this direction.

My site is a First Nations reserve on the west coast of Vancouver Island near Ucluelet and Tofino, where the Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council (which encompasses all the bands along Vancouver Island’s Pacific coast) has proposed to build a resort to diversify local income sources and increase its people’s skill sets. (The Council is still seeking funding for the project.) The specific context of this project has inspired explorations into means of placemaking that takes into account the wild landscape and temperate marine climate of the site as well as the architectural and material culture of the Nuu-chah-nulth First Nation in BC.

My thesis questions consider the following: how do I, as a white, western-tradition-trained architect learn from a specific First Nations people to design meaningfully with them in the 21st century? How do I avoid the typical “us-and-them” paradigm, while respecting differences between distinct First Nations groups’ and western values and experience? Can a site of enormous natural beauty be improved (instead of degraded) through constructed human intervention and what constitutes that improvement? How can architecture contribute to environmental, socio-cultural, and economic sustainability simultaneously, given that we cannot yet build sustainably? What would a sustainable design process be? Can the design of a resort that celebrates its responses to issues of culture and environment then contribute to its own economic longevity and thus the economic wellbeing of the people who run it and work there?