"The Burns Block is named for its original owner and builder, Patrick Burns of P. Burns & Company, who had it built in 1909 as the headquarters for his meatpacking business. An Irish-Canadian, Burns was a rancher, meat packer and operator of a chain of butcher shops in western Canada. Burns Meats went on to become one of the largest meat packing businesses in the world. He founded the Calgary Stampede and later in life, was appointed to the Canadian Senate." - from the back of the postcard on the building's history available at Bitter. Several years ago, having just accepted the commission to design the CCTV Headquarters in Beijing, the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas announced in one of his publications that he was ’going East’.  It was one of the largest commissions ever undertaken by his office OMA, and the realization of an XL building from his popular tome S,M,L,XL. More than the building though, it was also an announcement that China was about to embark on a massive city building age, that architects of the West should heed the call or be left behind, and that we were all about to become globalized whether we were ready or not. But perhaps what Rem also meant was that we should 'go East' not just on an international scale, but on a local one as well. The ‘east side’ has always had negative connotations in urban environments throughout North America, not just Vancouver. To ‘go east’ then could mean to look at one's own inner city issues à la Jane Jacobs and attend to the urban decay that has been allowed to happen through ignorance and neglect. By extension, this also has intimate connections to the process of  gentrification and, in Vancouver, these issues find their physical manifestation in the Downtown Eastside (DTES).

The City of Aberdeen, WA & Grays Harbor Community Foundation - Simpson Triangle Eligibility: Open to professional artists living in Washington, Oregon and British Columbia Budget: $104,000 Deadline: 5:00 PM , February 27, 2012 The City of Aberdeen, WA, in cooperation with the Grays Harbor Community Foundation, is seeking an artist to create a significant three-dimensional artwork for the Simpson Triangle, a highly traveled site between the business districts of Aberdeen and Hoquiam, WA. The artwork will honor the legacy of a local family and inspire both generosity and commitment to community in local residents and those that pass through the City.

Request for Qualifications/Expression of Interest: Calling Artists, Designers, Historians and Graphic Designers Moose Jaw Trail Public Art & Heritage Interpretive Project located within Patricia Roe Park and Mark Thompson Park, Stonebridge Neighbourhood, City of Saskatoon Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada Budget: $180,000 Submission Deadline: February 27, 2012 3:00 pm CST The City of Saskatoon is seeking "Requests for Qualifications" from an artist/designer team for the creation, and implementation of an interpretive collection including commemorative artworks and interpretive panels. We are ideally seeking a team approach to this project but individuals may apply for any component but must indicate a willingness to work with others to form a team. There are three components to the project: 1. Commemorative Feature 2. Interpretive Panels 3. Themed art installation

A Pilgrimage to Levittown, NY (Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Burbs) from ResilientPLANET on Vimeo. [Editor's Note: Former Vancouver reporter Christine McLaren is traveling around the world as the resident blogger for the BMW Guggenheim Lab, a mobile think tank investigating solutions to urban problems. This week the project wraps up its three-month run in New York City -- which featured programming by Vancouver author Charles Montgomery -- and will travel next to Berlin, and on to Mumbai. This story originally appeared on the Lab's blog, the Lab|log.] Almost everyone has a secret pilgrimage destination tucked somewhere in their own personal book of dreams. For many these are, as Ryszard Kapuscinski once wrote, "certain magical names with seductive, colorful associations --Timbuktu, Lalibela, Casablanca." They are places to which we attach wonder, mystique, and fascination; places that we dream of one day exploring, with the subliminal hope of finding an exotic understanding of ourselves, the world, and our place within it. My secret place is Levittown. I have always wanted to go to Levittown.