1979 – Visitor Centre, Lower Fort Garry, Manitoba, Canada

Lower Fort Garry is one of the finest collections of early stone buildings in western Canada. It was a fur trading post, established by the Hudson’s Bay Company in 1832 as regional headquarters. Today, the fort is restored to the early 1850s. Built in 1979, the Visitor Centre was designed by the renowned local architect Étienne Gaboury, who is recognized for several of Manitoba’s most iconic structures, including the St. Boniface Cathedral, the Canadian Mint, and the Esplanade Riel pedestrian bridge in nearby Winnipeg. The centre exhibits leads the visitor through the many uses of the fort but particularly Hudson’s Bay Company’s role in opening up western Canada to European influence. It is a low building spread across the landscape, separated by a creek-bed from the main historic site, designed to complement rather than dominate the historic buildings. In effect it mimics the fort itself which is low and spread over the landscape above the Red River.

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