Location: Orillia, Ontario
Architect: MacLennan Jaunkalns Miller Architects Ltd. (MJMA Architecture & Design)
This re-inhabitation and reclamation of an industrial brownfield site creates a new recreational and social heart for the City of Orillia. The project reimagines Orillia’s storied industrial past and references both the site’s previous use as a foundry and the City’s legacy of brick civic buildings. This 100,000-square foot facility includes aquatics, fitness, multipurpose spaces, a double gym/performance space, a community art gallery, and indoor track, with a connective tissue of civic spaces. The built form of the facility is integrated into a 26-acre naturalized park that includes a wetland and is connected to the City’s trail system.
Photo Credit: Scott Norsworthy
A highly contaminated water table and a requirement for a clay cap and overburden for the landscape allowed for the creation of a new topography on the site. The building’s resultant three-level scheme capitalizes on open views between the levels and has two levels of program with access to exterior space. Primary program spaces are clerestory and skylit, generating “perfect light” for athletic and performance activities and light that diffuses throughout the building interior. A running track is integrated with the primary clerestory for the gym and fitness areas, offering exceptional north views back to the city centre.
Photo Credit: Scott Norsworthy
The area between Lakes Simcoe and Couchiching has seen human occupation for at least 4500 years. The City of Orillia was incorporated in 1875, and by the turn of the century, the area around the site was extensively developed with heavy industries, which by the 1990s were mostly closed or demolished, leaving brownfield sites in the heart of the city. This project reclaims and rejuvenates this land for community use, connects and expands the city’s trail system, and creates a new civic and park space around which further development will catalyse.
Photo Credit: Scott Norsworthy
Due to extensive contamination from foundry waste and gas residue from solvents in the groundwater the site was previously deemed uninhabitable. Careful work in organizing the site uses, and significant capping and venting methodologies were deployed to transform a brownfield site into a safe civic facility. This ‘return’ of land to the city for public use constitutes the most significant sustainable achievement of the project. The project also was designed to LEED Gold standards, and through careful daylight modelling, generates copious controlled daylighting throughout the facility with 20 percent glazing.
Photo Credit: Scott Norsworthy
The legacy of impressive, brick civic buildings in Orillia and the site’s industrial past are maintained and reinterpreted with the bold masonry massing of the facility. At a civic level, this new social heart will act as a catalyst for remediation-based development of adjacent sites and encourage the urbanization of unused downtown land. Operationally the facility allows a rich program mix that is layered and flexible, accommodating both recreational use and competitive tournament-based play. The civic spaces are designed to support an array of current and future social uses, including art and cultural displays. Interior and exterior programs are linked physically and visually, and expand to connect users to lit walking trails, as well as the larger pedestrian and cycling network.
This blOAAg post is part of a series exploring the OAA’s 17 Design Excellence Finalists for 2022, as selected by our jury.
Click here to see other projects from this current award cycle.