Jeff Craft of SWA Group, Dallas, Alan Schwartz of Terraplan, Toronto, and Les Klein of Quadrangle Architects, Toronto, were in Ottawa last week to present their proposal for Canada’s National Holocaust Monument. The monument, commissioned by the federal government, is planned for a site across the street from the Canadian War Museum. Team Klein is one of six international teams shortlisted for the project from the first phase of the competition in May 2013.

The teams presented their proposals to a seven-member jury in this final phase of the competition. The jury will now deliberate and make its recommendation to the Government of Canada, and the project is targeted for completion by September 2015. The monument’s organic forms emerge from the earth, symbolizing death (black granite and dark forms) and renewal (white limestone, birch trees and light-filled spaces). The monument uses evocative art with imagery and sound, as well as landforms and landscape in a highly sculptural manner, contributing a poignant monument and a major urban park and plaza to the urban infrastructure of Ottawa.

For more details on the competition, please visit the summary of all of the proposals by Alex Bozikovic, the Globe and Mail’s architecture critic, here.