Calgary Community Design – East Village

Welcome to our first Calgary Community Design segment! We’re passionate about design and our city so what better way to connect both of those elements than to feature different communities in the city and point out the things we love about each place!

East Village is a unique and exciting community in downtown Calgary along the Bow River. It is filled with commercial, residential, and industrial buildings, restaurants, coffee shops, shopping, etc.

You’ll find Studio Bell National Music Centre, the new Calgary Central Library, restaurants, coffee shops, events in the summertime like movies in the park, seasonal markets, food trucks, music shows, shopping boutiques, and much more.

We have curated photos of some of our favourite places in East Village and were going to tell you why below.

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Photo: Simmons Building
Favourite design elements: The new black stained exterior beams against the original brick.

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Photo: Calgary Public Library
Favourite design elements: Steam bent western red cedar…  OMG!

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Photo: Studio Bell, National Music Centre
Modern rooms meets modern museum.

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Photo: Sidewalk Citizen in the Simmons Building
Favourite design element: The Simmons building is one of our favourite building in Calgary as they kept the original mattress building and just added a few new touches, but the original building is the same! We’re all about new and modern but there is something about keeping some original and traditional buildings and just updating them a little bit.

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Photo: Calgary Central Library
Favourite design element: Industrial metal railings against the warmth of the wood arch and red brick.

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Photo: Simmons Building Calgary
Favourite design element: The historic hand-painted ghost signage on all facades of the building[/su_column][/su_row][su_row][su_column size=”1/2″]

Photo: Calgary Central Library
Modern meets Historic.  Environmentally friendly triple pane windows and finishings made of low volatile organic compounds, meets historic Hotel St. Louis developed by Colonel James Walker in 1914.

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Photo: Calgary Central Library
Snøhetta / DIALOG Architecture showing off here, they shaped this space like an eye, or a canoe, to reference Canada’s First Nations people.

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Photo: Alleyway close to the Calgary Central Library
Favourite design element: Outdoor string lights blending the old to the new.

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Photo: Calgary Public Library
Favourite design element: The entrance framed by wood-clad arches inspired by the shape of the arched clouds made by our Chinook Winds here in Alberta.

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Photo: Phil and Sebastian in the Simmons Building Calgary
Favourite design element: Open–character floor space & exposed structural elements including the brick walls and heavy timber beams.

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Photo: Rosso Coffee, main floor of Studio Bell, National Music Centre.
Favourite design element: The custom glazed terracotta tiles made in Germany and fired in Netherlands are the showstopper on this building.

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Photo: Calgary Central Library
Favourite design element: The wrapped textured exterior with translucent fritted glass panels that are used to shield private study areas, while using clear glass to make public areas viewable from the outside.

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Photo: Phil and Sebastian in the Simmons Building Calgary
Favourite design element: Green painted window trim.

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We hope you explore and discover new places around you and see the beauty in those places!