Two downtown Edmonton buildings are about to get a new lease on life.

The Lodge Hotel and adjacent Brighton Block, both considered municipal historic resources, have been chosen as the new home to the Ukrainian Canadian Archives and Museum of Alberta (UCAMA).

The $10-million project will see the two adjoining structures, just east of the Shaw Conference Centre on Jasper Avenue, transformed into a state-of-the-art facility designed to benefit the Ukrainian community in addition to the city’s cultural, arts and tourism sectors.

A $3-million grant announced recently by the provincial government, through the Community Facility Enhancement Program of Alberta Gaming, marks the largest donation to date for the museum’s capital campaign.

Illustration courtesy of HIP Architects
The Brighton Block, left, and the Lodge Hotel, right, have been chosen as the new home for the archives and museum.

Organizers are now hopeful others will soon step up to the plate.

“We now have the $3 million from the province, which will kickstart our fund-raising campaign efforts,” says UCAMA president Khrystyna Kohut.

“With this initial gift, we will be applying to the federal and municipal governments for further funding.

“Coupled with funding from the corporate and the private sector, we would hope to be able to begin plans for construction in the fall of 2005,” she adds.

The new UCAMA home, at about 26,000 sq. ft., would then take another two years to complete before it would be ready to open to the public, adds Kohut.

Illustration courtesy of HIP Architects
Museum will feature a two-storey foyer, which will provide an overview of the facility.

But the joint venture between UCAMA, the Alberta Eparchial Museum of the Ukrainian Catholic Women’s League of Canada and the Ukrainian Folklore Centre at the University of Alberta, means the Ukrainian collection – including a library of more than 40,000 volumes and rare publications from Canada and Ukraine along with more than 1,600 artifacts – would have room to be properly displayed and stored.

Currently housed at 9543 110 Ave. in Edmonton, in a former bakery built in 1912, the property has been deemed functionally obsolete due to structural weaknesses and inappropriate conditions for the proper storage and display of the museum’s archival collections.

“All three institutions have concluded that it would be highly desirable to co-operatively share in the proposed facility, which would allow for a collaboration of resources, resulting in superior exhibits, programs and long-term preservation initiatives,” says Kohut.

While each organization will have input into museum exhibitions, ownership of the individual collections will be retained by the respective institution.

“We’re not merging the collections, but we are going to work together when it comes to programming and displays,” Kohut says.

Initially, the former ABS casino on the downtown core’s northern edge appeared to be an odds-on favourite to become the museum’s new base. However, it wasn’t in the cards.

“We had been looking at the old ABS casino building, but the plans for the purchase of that fell through,” says Kohut. “We saw the Lodge and Brighton Block as ideal properties, but at the time we began our search they were not available for purchase.

“It was sort of fortunate that the ABS deal fell through as then we had the opportunity to purchase the Lodge and Brighton Block.”

The prominence of the two buildings and their Jasper Avenue location were attractive drawing cards, Kohut says. It would also position the museum near the Shaw Conference Centre and close to major downtown hotels and Edmonton’s arts district.

The museum will be housed in the Lodge Hotel building, and when necessary Phase 2 will be implemented. At that point, the Brighton Block will come into play, allowing for further expansion when needed.

Architecturally, the museum means bringing the buildings up to standard, says Allan Partridge, a partner with HIP Architects, who is also working with David Murray Architects.

“It will be an adaptive reuse of the two designated structures,” says Partridge.

“They are Edwardian era, with commercial on the ground floor and mixed use on the upper floors, including residential. It’s very typical of Edmonton’s boom period – pre-First World War.”

“Structurally, they’re made with masonry walls and concrete. They’re in good shape. The floor structure is deteriorating a bit. It can accommodate residential, but it wouldn’t be able to accommodate museum uses,” he adds.

Plans call for vacant land to the east of the buildings to contain an access ramp to basement parking and more importantly, to form the principal entrance from Jasper Avenue.

The entrance will invite visitors into a two-storey foyer containing a curved wall, which will provide an overview of the facility on the main floor while a second-floor balcony accesses a donor recognition and founding members display wall.

This curved wall will lead visitors to the main circulation space, which is devised as a four-storey atrium containing the main stairs and elevator. Fronting on Jasper Avenue, meanwhile, will be a gift store and coffee shop.

For now, the buildings’ usage has not changed and tenants are still living onsite. Once construction is scheduled to begin, they will be given ample time to relocate, Kohut says.

(Laura Severs can be reached at laura@businessedge.ca)