Canadian design studio Public City Architecture designed a four-season pavilion in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

Constructed in the floodway zone of the Red River, Forest Pavilion, it is the first civic structure of its kind to apply protective FEMA flood design standards.

Covering 25.3 hectares of woods and parkland, Crescent Drive Park offers a range of amenities to visitors at the Forest Pavilion including washrooms, and covered and open sky gathering spaces. Designed to withstand flooding, the pavilion is built on a solid concrete base featuring upstands to raise framing sole plates, and pressure relief strategies in the wall, which are concealed to keep water moving. All materials below the flood-line can be completely submerged without decay, according to the architects.

“The plan is also designed to shed flowing water by reducing right angles, introducing large swinging wall panels in the middle of the plan, using no floor mounted fixtures, and specifying stainless doors, frames, and fasteners below flood-line,” the architects explained.

Forest Pavilion is a multifunctional civic asset built on a very tight budget over six years. In addition to three new public washrooms, Forest Pavilion offers three new types of outdoor rooms designed to address the impacts of a changing climate on urban parks.

The Shade Room is a roofed hallway through the pavilion providing respite from hot summer temperatures. An insulated room adjacent to it has passive ventilation and provides a tempered space to warm oneself up in winter, or in summer, a place away from the driving rain or hot prairie wind. The third room is an open-sky room with a central fire feature and 5-metre-tall screen walls, providing an indoor-outdoor space for casual gatherings.

Forest Pavilion is situated on the site’s highpoint with the architects taking advantage of the topography to reduce the necessary constructed flood protection measures. Native planting, durable hot-dipped galvanised steel, mechanically fastened rough-sawn fir sourced and milled using sustainable harvest practices, and super low-flow plumbing fixtures, LED lighting, and occupancy sensors to reduce consumption are some of the sustainable building material choices made during the pavilion’s construction.

No trees were felled in the construction of Forest Pavilion.