by Katherine McIntyre
Photo by Gary Fiegehen
With a backdrop of spectacular mountain peaks and anchored by massive beams, the new Squamish Lil’wat Cultural Centre in Whistler, British Columbia, evokes the spirit of a Squamish longhouse and a Lil’wat istken (pit house). Designed by Native architect Alfred Waugh and in keeping with time-honored First Nations’ traditions, their building “treads lightly on the land, leaving behind a small footprint.”
Combining aboriginal respect for the present and future of the land and forest, the Cultural Centre was awarded a LEED certificate for environmentally sustainable design. But it was a long, slow journey to its recent opening in July 2008.
For thousands of years the Squamish and Lil’wat Nations co-existed peacefully as hunter-gatherers, fishing in the rivers and living their nomadic lifestyle in isolated wilderness around Whistler Valley. The Lil’wat roamed the area north of Whistler and the Squamish claimed as their traditional territory the land stretching from Greater Vancouver to the Squamish Valley. It was around Whistler that they lived peacefully in an overlapping land claim.
In the late 1890s, prospectors, miners, loggers, and trappers discovered this isolated valley rimmed by snow-capped mountains, its lakes filled with hungry fish. They named it Whistler after the shrill whistle of the western hoary marmot. It was the fishing that attracted Alex and Myrtle Philip to open a lodge in the early 1920s. Soon their valley became known as the best summer destination west of the Rockies. By the late 1960s, skiers had discovered the mountains. From modest beginnings with one gondola, a chair lift, and two T-bars, Whistler grew into an international favorite ski resort with world-famous ski runs, high-end hotels, trendy restaurants, and luxurious spas.
It was the Lil’wat Nation that first approached Resort Municipality of Whistler in 1997 to discuss how their Nation could become a tourism presence in growing and affluent Whistler. From these discussions, they hatched the idea of a world-class cultural center to showcase their time-honored and contemporary way of life.
“When we heard that the Vancouver bid for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games would include our traditional territory,” Chief Janice George of the Squamish Nation reminisced, “we realized that our two Nations should come together. So as an alternative to describing our mutual land as an overlapping land claim, we renamed it shared territory. And we agreed that working in tandem would create more cultural and economic clout than working independently.” Partnering with Councilor Lois Joseph of the Lil’wat Nation, the two women joined as co-curators for the proposed new cultural center.
Welcome poles greet visitors outside the entrance. Photo by Katherine McIntyre.
Between them, they produced a vigorous story line. “Instead of outlining historical facts, museum style,” said Councilor George, “we decided to describe our way of life through displays of our traditional arts: cedar bark weaving, wool weaving, wood and canoe carving, paddle making, drumming. And we would develop training programs to teach our people these skills.” When Vancouver 2010 Bid Corporation presented its final bid for the Olympic Games, it included a film documenting the Lil’wat and Squamish way of life, including a segment on their weaving skills.
The scramble for funds ended when additional money became available from the federal, provincial, and municipal governments and private sponsors for the long-delayed cultural center. Finally their dream had roots.
Alfred Waugh, originally from Canada’s Northwest Territories’ Chipewyan Tribe, came to their project with plenty of experience in design, green planning, and interpreting the needs of aboriginal clients. “I draw from their history, not mimic their past.” said Waugh. “I explore their roots and make use of design concepts that respect these roots.” Searching through historical documents he discovered pictures of Squamish tribes living in longhouses. Waugh described them as “long, rectangular, cedar plank family compounds, sometimes up to 100 feet long with a new section being added for each new family.”
When it was time to move, the house was dismantled, put on a skid, and towed by dogs to a new site. The Lil’wat were secretive earth people hiding themselves in nearly invisible, dark, circular istken pit houses, dug about eight feet into a warm hillside and covered by an earthen roof. It was Waugh’s challenge to represent each Nation fairly, to capture the heart of what a longhouse and a pit house represented. Plus, he had to work within modern-day environmental standards and comply with the LEED program.
The Municipality of Whistler donated 4.35 acres of Crown land in the heart of Upper Whistler Village, across from the Fairmont Chateau Whistler and the Four Seasons Resort Whistler. “It was a difficult piece to work with,” stated Waugh. “The best site for the building was on a heavily treed triangular outcrop of land, curving around a rocky incline. Bordered by Fitzsimmons Creek on one side and a road on the other, the site extended down into a three-acre forest. And,” he added, “we had to comply with a 90-foot setback from the creek.”
Fitting in with his philosophy of capturing the past but running with present-day environmental concerns, Waugh worked with the site to minimize its ecological impact. Whereas a longhouse in the old days was long and straight, his modified longhouse and roofline followed the natural curve of the land. By tucking the three-story building down the incline from its upper-level entrance, it avoided destructive site excavation, but it did displace a decadent second-growth hemlock forest. However, a tree survey of the site taken prior to building and site conservation strategies made sure that any areas disrupted by construction would be replanted with foliage indigenous to the area.
“Following our Native tradition to leave a small footprint, our building occupies only seven percent of the land and is a doorway to the forest,” commented Waugh. “That our building entrance faces east to let in the morning sun is another tradition.”
Drawing from each Nation’s culture and using their past for inspiration, Waugh’s longhouse and pit house are of glass, cedar, and stone anchored by massive Douglas fir beams and columns. Recently planted tough mountain foliage of tobacco, wild rose hips, red huckleberries, honeysuckle, and ferns, and rugged boulders bearing designs of mysterious pictographs, border the walkway. Two tall welcome poles, with mythic figures carved into each, guard its entrance. A masked man peers from one pole; from the other, the image of a bear appears on one side and a raven on the other. Continuing with the bear theme, master carver Johnny Abraham has created a lumbering bear with a salmon in its mouth on the heavy cedar entrance door.
The Great Hall explodes with light from its spectacular plank window, which echoes the horizontal wood planks of a longhouse. Encasing the whole north side, it ushers in spectacular forest and mountain views. Reproductions of historic wool and cedar weavings, banners, and canoes float suspended from a 22-foot ceiling.
A Squamish Lil’wat ambassador from a team of young Native guides trained to tour visitors around the center wears an intricately woven cedar strip headband. “Everyone asks me about my headband. It keeps out negativity and keeps the positive spirit in,” he explains. “They’re woven by Lil’wat women and are very popular in our gift shop. So are our cedar wristbands.”
He describes the polished, painted concrete floor inset with embedded pictures. “Their colors are symbolic of our life forces—land, river, and stone, and our connections to the earth. We remember them for the richness they bring to our lives. Rivers provide water for fish, stone for tools, and plants for food, shelter, and warmth.”
But what about the famous weavings hovering overhead? Vera Edmonds, a Lil’wat from the Mount Currie area and a master weaver, learned from her grandmother where and when to find the best grasses and roots and how to cut, peel, and dye them. She passed on this knowledge to her apprentices. Their handiwork, a 12-foot by 8-foot cedar mat in the fish-bone pattern, hangs close to the entrance, the largest cedar mat ever woven.
Suspended near the cedar mat is a giant spinning whorl carved from a piece of yellow cedar as well as an intricate blanket designed and woven by Chief Janice George and a team of Squamish women weavers. It is a modern reproduction of an ancient Squamish pattern. In the old days, Squamish women spun wool from mountain goats on a handmade wood whorl and wove its blankets on a primitive loom. When the Hudson Bay Trading Company entered the scene with their distinctive Hudson Bay blankets, they discovered that trading furs for a blanket was easier than spinning and weaving their own traditional blankets during the long winter nights. Their ancient art was nearly dead until Chief George and her husband Buddy Joseph revived their community’s interest in historical weaving.
The Squamish Lil’wat Cultural Centre in Whistler, British Columbia, features a Squamish saltwater canoe (foreground) and a Lil’wat river canoe. Photo by Katherine McIntyre.
For thousands of years the Squamish and Lil’wat Nations traveled the rivers in freight canoes for moving cargo and in smaller canoes for hunting, fishing, and berry picking. They honored the canoe builders for their ability to turn a hollowed cedar log into a sleek craft using only a hand adze, a stone maul, and bone, antler, or stone chisels. Suspended as if floating in air, at the far end of the Great Hall, master carvers with modern day tools have recreated a Lil’wat lake canoe. Beneath it, a narrow river craft often used by the women to go berry picking, and a 40-foot-long Squamish hunting canoe are reminiscent of those seen in historical pictures. All the canoes are carved, just as they were in the old days, from a single piece of red cedar by master carvers.
Life-size models wear blankets woven by Chief Janice George’s team of women using the same primitive looms as those used by their ancestors. They are exact copies of blankets worn by Squamish chiefs when they went to Britain in 1910 to discuss their treaty rights with King Edward VII. To date, their climate-controlled museum holds only a few historic items, some antique baskets weathered with age, arrowheads, photographs, and ceremonial clothing. They hope for cultural donations and tribal treasures lurking in other museums or in private collections.
In contrast to the Great Hall, adjoining Istken Hall, a cozy nine-sided circular, wood and glass building with a panoramic view, is anchored to a rocky outcrop. Douglas fir, cedar, frosted glass, and copper furnishings echo its mountain setting. It features a pit house-styled green roof, sprout dandelions, wild strawberries, and wild alpine flowers.
Planned as a restaurant and meeting room, Chef Scott Thomas Dolbee of the Four Seasons Resort Whistler consulted with award-winning Chef Andrew George, a specialist in first-nation cuisine, developed menus to meld gourmet flavor with traditional Native cooking. Their spectacular results appear as Squamish salmon chowder, Lil’wat venison chili with fry bread, smoked duck, grilled sturgeon, alder grilled steak, and wild blueberry cobbler. More unusual palate pleasers include pemmican, caribou jerky, quail eggs, salmon roe, and wild boar bacon. They plan to keep their meals light and simple, and to use local produce.
“Keeping the center within the LEED Green Building Rating System has resulted in plenty of energy savers.” said Terry Ward of Newhaven Construction, a Squamish Nation-owned company familiar with remote British Columbian projects. These energy savers include double-glazed, thermally broken, and low-emmissivity coated windows, a mix of non-incandescent lights and display lighting, and occupancy monitors in most of the rooms. The concrete floor has radiant heat from a boiler with the option of changing to ground-source heating at a future date. Special design pre-manufactured roof panels are used to reduce on-site costs. Finishes are kept to a minimum, emphasizing architectural features. Stone and wood were sourced from the surrounding territory. Natural ventilation for spring and fall is provided through operable windows. Water conservation is maximized through dual-flush toilets and moisture monitors in the planted areas. Land disturbed by construction was replanted with native plants. Steel for reinforcing rods, fly ash in concrete, and other recycled materials have been used. Recycling and waste management exceed LEED requirements. Existing trails in the forest were maintained and new paths will be kept to a minimum. The green roof on Istken Hall also replaces land damaged in construction.
Future plans include on-site demonstrations and workshops of traditional skills, actual reproductions of a Squamish longhouse, and an Istken pit house and herbal walks with experienced Native guides. For visitors to Whistler, they catch a glimpse of a nearly lost society. For the two Nations, there are jobs, leadership training, and guidance in the old skills. Best of all the Cultural Centre has created a resurgence of personal pride in members of both Nations.
Katherine McIntyre has been writing about world travel for many years and is now concentrating on the wonders of her own country of Canada.
