May 4: Law Courts, Robson Square, & SFU

As a student of landscape architecture, I’ve spent much of my UBC Vancouver education – rather unsurprisingly - wrapped up in the works of Cornelia Oberlander, including that of Robson Square. So much so that only last year I produced an entire geospatial assessment of the distribution of prospect refuge on site. For nearly three weeks I analyzed the site in extreme detail; the placement of trees, the height of shrubs, the allocation of view cones and site furnishings, even going so far as to produce a 3D model with seasonal sun studies to better understand the success of the project from a psychological standpoint. Yet, in all that time, not once did I consider or give a second thought to the law courts within.

I suppose much of this can be attributed to my uninformed, non-architectural eyes, in that the law courts have always seemed rather unpleasant on approach. A Toronto transplant and Kitsilano resident, I have yet to arrive on-site from any direction but the southwest corner, where it sits dark, gloomily, and overbearing in all seasons. But of course, just as the original design for the provincial tower was flipped on its head with a change in government, so was my understanding of what a law court might look like from within upon my first visit.

Walking in felt transcendental – like being transported into an alternate universe awash with greens and blues. If I could compare it to any earthly experience, years ago I spent a summer in Spain, and it reminded me somewhat of the Palacio de Cristal found in Madrid's Parque de Retiro. As a student of Toronto Metropolitan University during my undergraduate education, I frequented Allan Gardens often as well, and it brought me back to that time just the same. As if I was in a greenhouse or solarium, bright and full of light, planting, open-air, bathed in greenery - this once undesirable protrusion instead felt much like a dream.

And while I still don’t necessarily align with or enjoy Erickson's brutalist stylings or excessive use of exterior concrete (Arthur Erickson Place or parts of the SFU Campus come to mind for example), I can absolutely appreciate this work as one of the most alarmingly beautiful examples of non-residential coast modern design, particularly in the case of the inside-outside connection.

The form and material language employed throughout Robson Square, of angular concrete softened with frequent and dense planting, was equally existent within – continuing the park setting to the interior. Even before speaking with Nick Milkovich, it was clear that these design choices were made for people and plants alike, opting for tranquillity in what is likely a very high-tension space. I found this very refreshing.

In reaching the upper law courts for a chat with Nick, this idea became even more clear as he spoke of the shift in design ethos taking flight during the early 70's. In place of traditional judicial architecture, Erickson and his team sought a design that favoured occupant health and fulfilment; accomplished with the introduction of natural light, the attention to acoustics, accentuation of time, and the specific use of colour, detail, and material to accentuate the beauty and respite of the space. A quote from the same article mentioned above speaks well to this idea. It reads,

“When Arthur Erickson Architects embarked on the Robson Square project, many people, despite the Vietnam War, despite nuclear threat, were still able, somehow, to take an optimistic view of human nature and of the institutions that symbolize North American and British democratic processes. Erickson, himself, at that time and still, has a desire to create monuments that will elevate the human spirit and put the citizen in touch with a carefully orchestrated urban site and, through landscaping, with nature.”

I mention the use of colour because, in addition to the blues and greens in the Great Hall, I quite enjoyed the designer's use of red volcanic mineral (poslin? sp.?) to change the hue of the concrete from grey to pink in the upper courtroom. This detail, alongside the crimson rug, when juxtaposed against an immense use of glazing and natural light that nearly turns the grey sky to white, causes the room to become a coloured space entirely.

This idea speaks to a key landscape architectural concept known as coloured air, a minimal intervention theory first introduced by Bernard Lassus in Susan Herrington’s Landscape Theory in Design. In an experiment, Lassus placed a red tulip in front of a white card, causing the air and the card itself to be perceived as red. It was Lassus’ position that intervening in a space without physically altering it can nevertheless change it entirely through sensory perception. Whether they intended to or not, I believe that the designers also employed this idea of coloured air to transport the courtroom occupant to a far more tolerable environment without physically altering the functionality of the space.

I’d also like to briefly speak to the power of acoustics, and more importantly perhaps, the power of a narrative. I have arguably very little knowledge regarding architectural stylings, theorists, typologies, eras, etc. Likewise, I am not typically able to identify precedent, discern between the uses of form or intention, or recognize the use of symbolism in architecture, etc. As such, I relied heavily on the knowledge imparted by our instructor and guest speakers in my assessment and understanding of the spaces we visited throughout the course. Perhaps this explains why today's response is centred on the first hour of our day.

In the design of the aforementioned courtroom, where we made our first group stop, we were able to connect with Nick on a far more intimate level, where we could hear his design stories, understand the construction of the Law Courts, and ultimately gauge what it was like to work under Erickson. The process was fascinating, and we hung onto every word. Unfortunately, we spent the rest of our tour outside and I was one of many classmates to experience the mild hilarity and extreme difficulty in failing to hear him speak 95% of the time. Much of what I came to know about the architecture was repeated by LVD or understood after the tour, and the day was spent in a sort of perpetual wander/wonder at the architecture in question. All this is to say, I became hyper-aware of the acoustic performance of the interior space vs the exterior spaces we visited, and even the difference between exterior space typologies, making me highly cognisant of how I might factor such details into my work in the future.