1964 – Rice Centre, 491 Portage Avenue, Winnipeg

Short office tower sited on a long pavilion with retail and commercial spaces, and adjacent multistorey parking. Originally a bus station for long distance bus travellers operated under the parking structure. As part of the overall project, a hotel was also constructed at the Colony Stret end of the site. This hotel has since been redeveloped as a Holiday Inn, the original being demolished in 1984. It’s hard to overestimate the impact this development (originally called The Mall Centre) had on the downtown, before photographs show a row of varied single story commercial buildings including bookshops, record shops, and a barber. It was the start of downtown developments that removed the small urban grain from the core, later exemplified by the building of Portage Place mall.

Theodore Matoff, an assistant professor of architecture at the University of Manitoba said at the time in an article in the Winnipeg Tribune. “The Mall Centre is the first, commercial projects to attempt a regional solution for the prairie climate in downtown Winnipeg. It is interesting to note that economic interests – the desire to increase the sales potentials of merchandise, determined the architecture program. In this particular case, the businessman has been more creative than the architect. The Mall Center begins to have the excitement of a truly urban way of life.” Unfortunately the variety of business on the site prior to development was not replicated in any way.