Extractions : a winery in the Cowichan Valley
Creators: name: Ockwell, Susan J.
Publisher: name: University of British Columbia
Year: 2009

description: Ideas of how architecture may attempt to mediate between the natural and cultural landscapes and thus encode a paradigm of specific cultural values as well as surrounding topography, the region and the climate were explored in this project. Architecture that acts as catalyst for the process of one's interpretation of these two orders (natural and cultural landscape) embodies a diverse series of actual experiences thus requiring a certain range of sensibilities from its inhabitants; and as such it was intended that this project would be understood over time and after a number of uses. While such a task was not meant to be carried out in an overt way within the architecture and was not meant to evoke a precise response on the part of the inhabitant, the intentions were to begin to reveal an understanding of the local - the uniqueness of all conditions converging in one place. Conclusions drawn in part one of the graduation project regarding the nature of the natural and artificial (cultural landscape) and the subjective lens through which they are registered were considered throughout the project. The winery (and the Cawichan Valley Site) was used (in part one) to exemplify our present day tendencies of commodification and reduction of natural and cultural/social landscapes as well as our Western culture's taxonomic urge to systematically segregate and classify. In many ways the winery's immediate connection to land has been lost to a rather iconographic interpretation of what was previously an unadulterated landscape - born out of direct contact with an environment that stems from working the land. The winery, as an operation which inherently confronts the dialectics of the artificial and the natural, became the vehicle through which to explore the cyclical process of extraction and insemination. The seed of the non-indigenous vine is inserted into the earth resulting in the grape; the conception of a building is symbiotically merged with its context to construct an architecture. In this way, the design of the winery was intended to embody the idea of immediacy ( a n d haptic perception) resulting in a true connection to and understanding of a locale. The first order became that of the band of cellars, thrust into the landscape for protection resulting in the re-channeling and filtering of the movement of water, grapes, and people. The structural rhythm and compartmentalization of the cellars act as a (farjiiliar) datum or field of reference through which the rest of the building and the landscape beyond is registered. The second order is the constructed or interior landscape which established the various sites of activity and the promenade for their experience and the third order is the overlay of circulations of the grapes, visitors, workers, and water. The programme was established in consideration of a number of factors. There are certain regional (topographical and climactic) aspects of the Cowichan Valley which make it conducive to a small scale operation. This facility operates on a 'you-ferment' level as well as supplies enough cases for sale to visitors and a few of the restaurants in the area. It is intended that it be a 'hobby-type' winery where amateur wine makers can learn the process and be involved in some or all of the stages of the wine-making. Its location makes the holding of lectures; workshops of varying duration; involvement for members in all seasonal aspects; and tours of the winery a practical proposition.