Highrise To Replace Moffatt’s Pharmacy Building In Dartmouth
DARTMOUTH — A Dartmouth landmark will get a major makeover this year as part of a substantial development planned for the city’s downtown core.
The project will see the building housing Moffatt’s Pharmacy torn down and replaced by a pair of mixed-use buildings, including a highrise stretching about 15 storeys high.
Moffatt’s itself will remain open but relocate to the ground-floor commercial space of the new development.
Connor Wallace is a principle at ZZap Architecture and Planning, the firm that designed the proposed new buildings. ZZap designed the project on behalf of Alec Chedrawe, a young developer whose father, Danny Chedrawe, heads up Halifax’s Westwood Developments Ltd.
Moffat’s Mural Will Be Saved
Wallace says the project will unfold in two phases. The first phase will be a seven-story building fronting Portland Street, featuring retail space on the ground floor and 37 apartments above.
The building will go up beside the current Moffatt’s building, allowing the pharmacy to stay open throughout construction until it moves into the commercial space of the newly finished building.
Wallace says the team behind the project is also committed to saving the iconic mural painted on the side of Moffatt’s.
“Although it’s starting to deteriorate a bit over time, we recognize that that’s a very prominent landmark within downtown Dartmouth,” he says.
“Although many perceive it as just a pharmacy, it’s definitely a local business with a kind of well-known reputation within Dartmouth… So we wanted to maintain that and keep that as part of the site and the development.”
Wallace says the team hopes to hire a local artist to recreate the mural as part of the new building.
Highrise Will Arrive In Phase 2
Wallace says the team at ZZap is “still working through the final design” of the Phase 2 building but that it will be a highrise “reaching somewhere around 15 storeys” with commercial units on the ground floor and “ground-level townhouse units along Canal Street, closer to the water.
The tower will sit across the street from St. James United Church, which Wallace says inspired his team’s design.
“We looked at the design as paying homage to that church,” he says. “It’s another very historic landmark that we wanted to pay homage to, and that starts to translate into the feel of the design.”
The Halifax Regional Municipality passed its landmark Centre Plan development bylaws late last year, paving the way for more highrise-type developments in Dartmouth in coming years. Wallace says the team at ZZap designed the new project with both the past and future of the area in mind.
“We look at the regulations we’re required to meet in order to get an approval and eventually a permit to build a project. But then we also look at the specific site, the context around it, what buildings are around it, what type of architectural styles are around it, how the design and materials of the building integrate into the property and its surrounding context,” he says.
“That’s really what we brought to this particular project. We didn’t want to just come forward … with a standard building that just meets the bylaw requirements. We wanted to work with our client to come up with a design that speaks to the area and is unique to the area.”
Project Still Needs Approval
The Portland Street project is still in its very early stages of municipal approval.
According to the HRM’s Maggie-Jane Spray, the project is right now in a “pre-application review,” where city staff work with the developer to help ensure the project is consistent with the city’s bylaws.
Once the team decides to move ahead with a full application, Spray says they will have to go through the city’s public consultation process.
Wallace says there are “no concrete timelines at this point” attached to the project but that the team hopes to start construction this year.
Trevor Nichols is a reporter for Huddle in Halifax. Send him an e-mail with your story suggestions: [email protected].