Famous Landmarks in Vancouver
An Art Deco tower and a sail-roofed harbour terminal frame Canada's densest downtown.
Vancouver's built landmarks cluster in a small, intensely dense downtown on the Burrard Inlet waterfront, reflecting the city's status as the most densely populated in Canada. The oldest survivor, a 1906 provincial courthouse near Robson Square, was repurposed as an art museum after the provincial government moved out, and now houses one of the largest art museum buildings in western Canada. A few blocks away, the 1930 Marine Building rises in Art Deco style, its facade covered in carved marine ornament, and stood as the city's tallest structure when finished. Down on the harbour itself, the sail-roofed Canada Place complex, completed in the mid-1980s, combines a convention centre, hotel, and cruise terminal at the water's edge.
Canada Place
1986 · Eberhard Zeidler
Rows of white, sail-shaped fabric roofs run the length of this harbourside building, a silhouette often echoed by the masts of cruise ships moored beside it; a hotel, a convention centre, and a trade centre sit under the same roofline.
Canada Place combines a cruise-ship terminal with the Vancouver Convention Centre East Building, the Pan Pacific Vancouver Hotel, the Vancouver World Trade Centre, and the virtual-flight attraction Flyover Vancouver. Designed by Zeidler Roberts Partnership working with Musson Cattell Mackey Partnership and DA Architects + Planners, it sits beside Waterfront Station, the transit hub for SkyTrain, SeaBus, and the West Coast Express. A 2001 extension added a second berth for cruise ships, most of which depart from here for Alaska. In 2010 the building served as the Main Press Centre for the Winter Olympics.
- A 2001 extension added a second cruise-ship berth.
- It served as the Main Press Centre during the 2010 Winter Olympics.
Photo: Nicolas Untz (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Vancouver Art Gallery
1906 · Francis Rattenbury
Recognisable more by setting than ornament, the museum fills a former courthouse building beside a large public square and is, by floor area, the largest art-museum building in western Canada.
The gallery occupies a building designed by Francis Rattenbury and opened in 1906 as a provincial courthouse, adjoining what is now Robson Square. The courthouse was designated the Former Vancouver Law Courts National Historic Site of Canada in 1980 and handed over for museum use, with the Vancouver Art Gallery completing its move in 1983. The gallery itself had been founded in 1931 in a separate building by Sharp and Johnston, expanded in 1950, before this later relocation. Its permanent collection holds around 12,000 works by artists from Canada and elsewhere, shown alongside travelling exhibitions.
- It is the largest art museum building in western Canada by floor area.
- The building served as a provincial courthouse until the early 1980s, decades after the gallery itself was founded elsewhere in 1931.
Photo: GoToVan from Vancouver, Canada (CC BY 2.0)
Marine Building
1930
Sea creatures, ships, and other marine motifs are carved across the exterior and lobby of this Art Deco tower, ornament that gave the building its name.
Completed in 1930 at 355 Burrard Street near the financial district, the Marine Building opened as the tallest skyscraper in the city, a title it briefly held before taller towers followed. It is ranked among the best Art Deco buildings in the world, owing its name to the extensive marine-themed ornament covering its exterior and interior. The building carries a heritage designation. Its architecture and decoration have made it a repeated setting for film and television productions.
- It briefly held the title of the city's tallest building after opening.
- Its Art Deco interiors have made it a recurring film and television filming location.
Photo: Zhatt (Public domain)
History
Indigenous settlement here predates the city by more than 10,000 years, with the Squamish, Musqueam, and Tsleil-Waututh among the peoples established along these shores before colonial development began. The buildings that now define downtown Vancouver arrived in distinct waves. In 1906, the provincial government raised a courthouse designed by Francis Rattenbury; it stood for decades before being designated a National Historic Site in 1980 and handed to the Vancouver Art Gallery, which completed its move in 1983, having been founded elsewhere in 1931. In 1930, the Marine Building added an Art Deco skyscraper to the financial district, briefly the tallest in the city. Decades later, in the mid-1980s, Canada Place extended downtown onto the harbour itself with a sail-roofed convention and cruise terminal, later expanded in 2001 and pressed into service as a press centre for the 2010 Winter Olympics.