Friends of Art History Visual Cultural Series: “Re-using/Re-locating, Architecture’s Discards”

Friday, January 18th, 2019 at 2:30 pm to 7:00 am

In-person event
412 St. Patrick’s Building (Carleton University Art Gallery), Carleton University, 1125 Colonel By Drive, Ottawa, ON, K1S 5B6

TEF III UBC, Vancouver, completed in 2003, incorporates terracotta “sisters of mercy” salvaged from the Medical Dental Building (built 1929, demolished 1989)

Friday, January 18^th, 2:30 p.m., 412 St. Patrick’s Building
Susan Ross, Architect (OAQ, MRAIC, LEED AP, FAPT) and Assistant Professor,
Heritage Conservation, SICS, Carleton University
“Re-using / Re-locating, Architecture’s Discards”

The vast and growing problems of waste and landfill from demolition is leading to new strategies for urban mining, deconstruction and designing for disassembly. Spolia – the reuse of salvaged historic building fragments in new structures – is a well-studied area of art/architectural history, but how will we assess future spolia, resulting from current paradigms of sustainable materials reuse in architectural design and heritage conservation?

This talk builds on a wider examination of the relationship between heritage values and waste. In it, professor Ross will compare recent examples of projects that incorporate highly valued salvaged elements, with strategies for reclaiming and reusing all discarded building materials, either on or off site. This includes considering how material and other values associated with original place or use are sustained, transformed or even deliberately unsettled.