The ‘W’ is for the Winds of change

Sign of the Times

Since 1903, the old Woodward’s building at 108  West Cordova has been a landmark of downtown Vancouver–first, as the city’s premier department store, and then, when the downtown Eastside crumbled into a seedy strip of bombed-out shells populated by the bedraggled and desperate around it–ground-zero for the city’s many cracked-out junkies.  

Now as the neighbourhood around Woodward’s rapidly becomes the chicest place in town to shop (at cool indie boutiques), dine (at artisanal charcuterie places in still-scary alleyways), and live (in “loft-style condos), the ‘W” is back in business.Smack in the midst of this gentrification, the old Woodward’s is now being re-imagined as, you guessed it, a loft-style condo development for young cool design types who would rather dodge addicts on their way home than live in suburbia.  The condos (which are still neighbours to crack addicts, but promise to radically revitalise the neighbourhood) sell for 250,000 to $1.4 million a pop. 

And like the styling boutiques and bars sprouting up around it (more on that later), the design approach to this gentrification effort reveals significant street style. 

Outside the building, in a new public plaza, the old ”W” of the store’s sign sits prettily rusting like a work of sculpture. 

On the ground floor, a new Nestors market, intended to replicate the former food floor of the old Woodwards department store, looks out onto a basketball court. 

Playing Ball with Stan

  The backboard of the basketball net features a large scale  iconic work by local  hero Stan Douglas–a photo recreation of the famous Gastown riots, which took place back in the 70s only steps away from the current site. 

Lingerie for Lakers fans

And the floor of the chic new, art/court is an enviro-friendly terrazzo made from the crushed marble of the old Woodwards ladies lingerie department . 

A nearby sign, posted in the upper window of a still-rough artists’ loft–presumably by a real artist–says what must be on the minds of the people who gave up the ghost on the old Woodwards, let alone Vancouver’s entire downtown Eastside: 

Savvy sign