Archinect - News

Dorte Mandrup team unveils Nunavut Inuit Heritage Center with rock and turf-covered roof

2023-07-18T11:16:00-04:00

Dorte Mandrup has announced their team’s success in an international competition to design the Nunavut Inuit Heritage Center. Located in Iqaluit, Canada's territorial capital, the facility is set to be a cultural bridge promoting Inuit heritage and facilitating “healing and reconciliation between Inuit and non-Inuit communities.”

The winning team included Dorte Mandrup, Guy Architects, LEES+Associates, Adjeleian Allen Rubeli, EXP, Pageau Morel, Altus Group, and indigenous consultants Kirt Ejesiak and Alexander Flaherty.

Image credit: MIR

The design concept is a creative interpretation of community perspectives, traditional Inuit knowledge, and the healing potential of the planned facility. The design takes its cues from the regional topography and environmental phenomena such as kalutoqaniq – patterns formed in snowdrifts by the prevailing wind. Emulating these natural shapes, the building will carve into the rocky hillside, echoing the features of the natural landscape.

“The Nunavu...

This glass pavilion atop Greenland UNESCO World Heritage site celebrates Inuit culture and heritage

2022-07-20T14:54:00-04:00

A recent project designed and built by Swedish architect Konstantin Ikonomidis located within a UNESCO World Heritage site in Greenland celebrates Inuit cultural heritage and traditional knowledge of the environment.

Called the Qaammat pavilion, the structure is situated in Sarafannguit, a cultural landscape in West Greenland and a World Heritage site since 2018. It was developed in cooperation with UNESCO, the Qeqqata Municipality, and the Sisimiut Museum.

Image: Julien Lanoo

The pavilion’s location is defined by the two fjords that meet on Sarfannguit’s eastern tip on the hills. This was carefully chosen by the local community, site manager Paninnguaq Fleischer-Lyberth and Ikonomidis. The installation will serve as a landmark and gathering space where the World Heritage site’s surroundings can be experienced by locals and visitors.

Image: Julien Lanoo

As per the architect's project description: “The Qaammat pavilion is designed as a poetic and aesthetic object, but most important...

Michael Maltzan Looks to Inuit Art as Inspiration for a Canadian Museum Project

2021-03-27T13:28:00-04:00

It was a trip to the Arctic that gave a Los Angeles-based architect the inspiration for the new 36,000 sqft expansion of the Winnipeg Art Gallery opening this weekend in the nation's seventh-largest city.

Qaumajuq, the Inuit art centre at the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Michael Maltzan Architecture with associate Cibinel Architecture. Photo Lindsay Reid.

Michael Maltzan's design for Qaumajuq, a center for Inuit art almost a decade in the making sprang out of an excursion he took in 2013 with the museum's director Stephen Borys.

Qaumajuq, the Inuit art Centre at the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Photo by Lindsay Reid.

After being tapped the year before for the design and completion of the IAC, Maltzan began studying both the artistic traditions and topographies endemic to the Inuit people in areas hundreds of miles to the north.

Qaumajuq, the Inuit art Centre at the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Photo by Lindsay Reid.

“It changed everything,” Borys told the New York Times. “When he got back to L.A., Micha...

Arctic Adaptations: Inuit Architecture Showcased in Venice Biennale

2014-10-30T13:55:00-04:00

For the first time in the 14-year history of the International Venice Biennale of Architecture, the Nunavut flag flew at the entrance to the Canadian Pavilion, an Inukshuk floating at the entrance of “Arctic Adaptations: Nunavut at 15.” The exhibit, curated by architects Lola Sheppard and Mason White, from Toronto-based design firm Lateral Office, coincides with the 15th anniversary of the territory’s creation.

Previously: “Arctic Adaptations: Nunavut at 15” to represent Canadian Pavilion at 2014 Venice Biennale