Deer Lake & Constance Lake FNs honoured for wood innovation and advocacy
Award winners announced at 5th Annual Wood WORKS! Awards Gala
Chief Arthur Moore, of Constance Lake First Nation (200 km west of Timmins), and the Deer Lake K-12 School at Deer Lake First Nation (1,000 km northwest of Thunder Bay) won prestigious Wood WORKS! Awards, announced November 24 at the 5th Annual Wood WORKS! Awards Gala, held in Collingwood, Ontario. There were over 300 industry and community leaders, politicians, architects and engineers who came to celebrate Ontario’s finest wood-based construction and advocacy.
Smith Carter Architects & Engineers Inc. and Lavergne Draward & Associates Inc. of Winnipeg, Manitoba, accepted the Jury’s Choice Award (sponsored by The Working Forest) for Deer Lake's new K-12 School. This award recognizes projects that represent excellence in design, use wood in a unique manner and invoke a sense of community spirit and pride.
The designers carefully fit the school into the community and its natural environment of tall, thin, spruce trees. The use of wood referenced historical dwellings and echoed the “deep roots–new beginnings” concept. Even the lighting—a series of skylights in a corridor ascending diagonally in sections and terminating at high level windows—reflects the surroundings, where sunlight feathers in from above the trees. Laminated wood decking was used for the ceilings and roof deck throughout the building, and fir glulam beams and columns were used for the structure. The whole building, in its creative and thoughtful use of wood, represents a solid, warm foundation for learning.
“The Jury selected this building because it harmonizes so well with its surroundings. It’s a place where the past and the future are part of the present, and students will be inspired,” remarked Bérubé.
Chief Arthur Moore received the Building the Future Award -Community Leader (sponsored by the Ontario Forestry Industries Association), which recognizes a leading individual who facilitates the construction of commercial, industrial and institutional projects with wood, and stands out as a persuasive wood advocate. Chief Moore has shown a strong commitment to his community in Constance Lake by investing in local projects, such as the Holistic Education Centre and the Eagle’s Earth Historical Centre. He believes strongly in supporting the local forest industry, which he sees as vital to the livelihood of his community.
“People like Chief Moore are showing us how to maintain a sustainable forestry industry, which will last forever,” commented Marianne Bérubé, Executive Director of Wood WORKS!