Project Description
The Exchange District,
in Winnipeg, Manitoba, is home to a host of structures dating back to
the city’s early 20th-century heyday as a critical waypoint for the
country’s grain trade. The town had a booming population and economy,
and much of the activity was focused on what is now known as Old Market
Square. What remains from those salad days is a collection of historic
industrial buildings populated by an arts community, and the square has
become a public green space that plays host to summer festivals, outdoor
concerts, impromptu yoga classes, and even weddings. And now, at the
center of all this is an aluminum mesh cube, 28 feet long, wide, and
tall.
The work of local firm 5468796 Architecture,
Old Market Square (OMS) Stage is the result of a city-funded design
competition to replace an old bandshell, which was used as few as 15
times per year, with something that would better engage the urban
environment. “One of our inspirations was the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey
that travels through time and fascinates everyone,” says firm principal
Sasa Radulovic. “We thought: ‘Can we create something that could
emanate that kind of energy from within?’ and ‘How can we do that with
music, sound, and light from within so that it becomes a player in the
city?’ ”
The new stage is lined with curtains formed from 20,000 identical
extruded aluminum pieces, rotated to form a complex pattern. These
modules are the final in a series of extrusions developed after months
of research with metalworkers in a local Hutterite colony. They are held
together with aircraft cable and rivets, and form a versatile backdrop
for projections and illumination; the flexible mesh curtains can also be
winched back on two sides of the cube to reveal the stage within.“The
project started off as a bandshell, but ended up being something else,”
Radulovic says. “Whether your event is 30 people or 30,000 people, you
can hold it there.” —Katie Gerfen