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The Leadership Studio at Muskoka Woods is located on Lake Rosseau and was designed in association with HOK Architects Corporation where I previously worked as a senior architect. Warren Mack (from HOK at the time and now working independently) and I worked on the design together which was great fun for us since we were together at the School of Architecture at Carleton University many moons ago.
Muskoka Woods came to us wanting a facility for their well established leadership program. We led a ‘problem seeking’ (brain storming) session with a large group of interested players from Muskoka Woods and came up with many ideas, problems, thoughts, goals and challenges written onto cards and posted on the wall. The key programmatic elements were identified as a large open space including a teaching wall, seating area for up to 40 people and an eat-in kitchen with bread oven; a fireplace gathering area; an art studio; a small library; and a screened porch. Conceptually the building should act as an educator in itself and inspire those who enter it. It should provide a feeling of warmth and intimacy but at the same time awaken the senses and create a moment of arrival, a sense of awe.
The design of the Leadership Centre started with an intimate understanding of the sloping wooded site with its relationship to the lake, an adjacent cliff, natural and constructed water courses, existing roads and both young and older trees. A conceptual path representing a journey of discovery became the central idea for the building. It was suggested that this path should start in the woods and cross a nearby creek so that the building is “discovered” and then entered. The journey continues within the building along a winding ramp which connects the lower and upper levels and becomes a spine for the structure splitting the form of the building along an east-west axis. The building opens up across this spine with a grand view of the lake to the south and windows to the north revealing the woods with hundreds of spindly tree trunks. The two levels of the structure are linked at this crossing by open tiered seating facing the lake. The experience culminates with the revelation of the intimate and inwardly focussed “nest” or hearth which is connected to the outdoors by way of a screened porch. The journey can then be continued outside the Leadership Sudio by following a rocky path through the trees up to the top of the cliff with its spectacular view of the lake and Muskoka Woods camp below.
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