Cortes Island, BC

JWT has a long history with the Hollyhock retreat, first acting as their architect to expand their greenhouses located within their beautiful gardens, and then to do a property wide inventory of all their facilities and ultimately facilitate a group discussion and vision for how Hollyhock can move into the future as a sustainable and economically viable entity which still retaining its nonprofit goals and objectives. Several design elements were identified through this process including updating the lodge, redeveloping their beach front accommodations, creating a series of small sitting and reflective areas along their trails, rebuilding their aging hot tubs, creating an outdoor room and gatherings pace near the beach and building a dedicated on property events centre.  This multi-year process helped secure$350,000 in federal grants matched with a like donation from private sources which led to the first stage of the vision plan being realized.  One of the surprises to the client group was to find out that their aging yet eclectic accommodations stock was both is decent shape but also had a unique historic value to preserving frozen in time a small yet unique collection of “back to the land 1970s utopian and communal architecture”. Documenting this was important to validate top the board that some of their most significant assets were hiding in plain sight.