Discovering our future thus at hand, we must continue to take stock of our accomplishments and achievements in the city of Calgary and beyond and move forward with the full portfolio of our works to date. Even as we intensify understanding of our past and present accomplishments in this city we have come to love, we must look towards the future and begin actualizing steps towards grasping tomorrow in the measured but immediate way as we did here in this city. It has never been easy to forge forward a new path, but our strength and endurance through the strife forward together will reinforce the steps ahead.
As before, I address the five items as discussed in the previous memo, with positive news and ideas hopefully making their appearance:
1) The beauty of geometry and tradition when enacted in built form at a large scale never ceases to surprise and awe. For this reason, the concept for the tower for Saskatoon has been revised to improve on the geometrical elegance in plan. It continues to house the plan-wide rooftop garden in advertisement of the importance of building with appealing green environments in mind. The major project for California has now been suggested in cursory form to someone from Silicon Valley, a founding partner at a major venture capital firm. There is real interest in establishing a skyscraper complex to cater to their extraordinary work pushing forward the digital frontier from that community. The difficulty in this project has to do with the complexity of building on the water, something accomplished for the Cornell engineering campus in NYC on the Hudson, and the Burj Al Arab in Dubai. The water nevertheless is technically the mobile Pacific Ocean, therefore it is a new level of high advancement.
2) The premise of protective zoning is in a legal document, while the framework is being pondered upon. FYI, this would be a Master's thesis for yours truly. The idea dawned that instead of only a boring bureaucracy to buffer move-in's, a virtual simulatory cosmopolis could be generated via networking to support a wider interested populace in their activities related to working and to effectively engender natural priority and timeliness of move-in's to the actual skyscrapers, which ought to be protected like a resource as the forests as per the sentiment of Albertans. There has not been time yet to work out the conditions for prototypal floors for our future engagement in this city, but interest amongst builders should set forth formulations and suggestions in favor of garnering future small scale projects in business.
3) Helix has now a landing page at http://helix.trade but the showcase of skyscrapers in light of the firm's need to foreground works outside of architecture that garners support as appropriate for world architecture is still amiss. For the guild, I have not caught news of success in finding proper office/meeting space which has been disappointing, but it is noteworthy to mention that I am designing a logo for the guild. It consists of a golden bird with five feathered fingers on each side that houses a coat of arms. The coat of arms has an "X" made up of on one hand a hammer, a traditional tool, and on the other hand, not sure what yet. Suggestions welcomed.
4) The report to the RCMP and the public did reach completion to the point before the discussion on the benefits we have brought to Calgary. In the probable response to foreign pressure section, due to the detraction from building materials on reserve by the city to enable erecting many condo buildings, it includes the suggestions of inventorying and labelling of materials specific for future oriented visions by the architecture office, conspicuously yet named, and also the bringing in of vegetation, saplings, and related supplies to boost our advancement into the green skyscraper.
5) It does not escape my attention that in order to build in Saskatchewan, we need to have a projection of how many skyscrapers are to be built, perhaps along with a small number of vertical residential buildings, in order to project what type of settlement, temporary or long term, we as a team need to plan for. This is a difficult question as we need to ponder whether we are building skyscrapers or a world. World architecture is well within our tradition and such has been established with our builds in Calgary. However, it is important to note that there needs to be a balance between economic and urban growth of a city and its longstanding principles of stable and grounded life style. It was suggested that Edmonton is nearer to us and that city might be interested in some advancement via skyscrapers. It is unclear how far investigation could lead into two different Canadian cities for future development within the next few months, but suffice to say both cities should be on my agenda in exploration. It continues to be my belief and within my vision that Saskatoon is ripe for at least some development, therefore I continue to urge immediate news and exploration.
There is definite excitement and too a measure of anticipation for us to reach beyond this world of Calgary to other cities. This world shall continue to receive my attention and I hope yours as well. That positive interest and excitement constitutes the response I find when I explore the possibilities of other cities including those in America means that our future will be bright and full of new yet known rewards which could present themselves given adequate planning. The question of whether we build skyscrapers or worlds will continue to hover on the horizon, but thanks to the strength of our tradition, it will be a path of discovery that houses all the promises one could hope for. In reiteration, we must take into account, meaning in understanding as well as actual documentation, all the works we have accomplished, whether big and small. This is the way towards showcasing our expertise and establishing efficiently into any future cities where we are to build. Our business card is the city of Calgary which shines forth as a beacon in the ocean of worldly affairs.
A new memo will be forwarded on December 1.
Thank you.
Ann Lee (now a.k.a. Ati Iken on the Internet)
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