Kelowna, BC | Design

Niche

This project is in the City of Kelowna, British Columbia. It is surrounded by farmland, a network of connector roads and magnificent lake views. The site slopes in multiple directions with the highest point of the site located near the intersections of Lakeshore and Barnaby Road and the lowest point of the site facing the farmland to the north.

From the onset of the project, it was important for the developer to be able to provide a unique, timeless and sensitive development on this site. The individual units are sized to accommodate families and to provide a safe, unique, and quality lifestyle on this site that acts somewhat like an island of homes surrounded by farming activities.

The most important features to deliver a successful project are:

1. Capture, celebrate and enhance the views for each unit
2. Provide a safe and private experience for the future residents
3. Provide a variety of suite options to provide for a diversity of family types and living styles
4. Minimize the visual impact to the farmlands by using materials and forms that sensitively enhance the landscape and surrounding properties.

Using the project objectives stated above, it was our design philosophy to create pockets of buildings scattered on the hillside. Each unit is to have lake views on all the main living spaces as well as ample privacy between each of the buildings.

The Building Siting and Layout uses the natural downward slope of the site to gradually step buildings (almost a full floor from the front to the back of the site) downwards toward the lake views as well as stagger the units in an arc downwards along Lakeshore Road.

It was very important to the team to embrace the sensitives of the existing context. The site is uniquely located amongst a variety of farmlands and acts as a suburban residential island. To embrace the hillside and the unique location, we used an internal perimeter road to further set the units away from the neighbours and road so that the units were consolidated toward the center of the site. This also provided more separation space between the proposed buildings, the farmlands and Lakeshore Road.

The choice of materials uses a strategy where the buildings will all have the same base material – either a soft white EIFS or soft grey EIFS, complemented with a wood tone and a secondary wood accent (grey) colour. This soft approach to materiality allows the landscape to become the star of the show, while letting the buildings quietly sit in the hillside with biophilic inspired colour tones and simple block forms.