In July, what was previously conceptual became reality for Calgary Flames fans as the city hosted a joint press conference revealing the design of the newly-named Scotia Place – the future home of the Flames in 2027 – and a groundbreaking ceremony to kick off construction. Since that press conference, site preparation for the start of construction in September has been ongoing.
Located on 10 acres of land located on two converted parking lot north of the Saddledome, the design of Scotia Place includes the main event centre building, integrated public plazas, a parkade and a community rink. Following the reveal, the design drew a lot of praise from the fanbase for how different it was from the design shown in the previous incarnation from 2021.
The firm behind Scotia Place’s design is HOK, who provided designs for Detroit’s Little Caesars Arena and Edmonton’s Rogers Place, and the redevelopment of arenas in San Antonio (AT&T Center), Phoenix (Footprint Center) and Atlanta (State Farm Arena). FlamesNation spike with Bill Johnson, Design Principal for HOK and lead designer on Scotia Place, to learn more about the whole process.
(Questions and answers lightly edited for clarity.)

How did you get involved with the Scotia Place project?

Well, it’s sort of like every project. Generally they’ll send out a request for proposals, and then we will go and express interest. And then there’ll be some sort of a conference and they’ll narrow it down to a couple of groups. And then we’ll basically go in and interview for the project.
But this happened a long time ago. The first phase was right before the pandemic. I remember the last trip, the last airline flight I took was to Calgary. We did the interview and we went home, and the borders shut down and everything shut down. We didn’t know if it was going to go forward or not. But we spent two years, almost two years designing version one, so people will say V1, which was the version that was prior to this one. And then it was put on hold, and then more funding became available, I think the province got involved, the site scope increased a little bit, which gave us a lot more room to do a better design, so we just kind of picked up where we left off and did the version that you saw at the groundbreaking.

What are you able to do with the second version of the design that you might not have been able to do with the smaller space on the first version?

Well two things, because I kind of remember living through some of the city comments and some of the planning comments on the first one. What they were really uncomfortable with on the smaller site was the building was very tall and it kind of came crashing down to the sidewalk and they just felt that was not a very comfortable kind of architectural solution for this area that they were hoping to be kind of the heart of the whole new entertainment district, so we weren’t able to create kind of a base or an offset to give the building a street scale. And when we had more space, we were able to actually spread things out. We turned the building; you know, the hockey sheet was going north-south in version one, we turned it [90] degrees, so now it’s going east-west, and that allowed us to really open up 12th Avenue on the north and 4th [Street/Stampede Trail] on the south for big open spaces and entertainment plazas. And then also, the program did change because they added the community hockey rink, and there was no way we could fit that on the site before, so now the community hockey rink is taking the part of the square footage we got back.

We always tease our city hall friends because the use the term “event centre” to describe the building, while many of us in the sports side of things default to “arena.” As the scale of these facilities has changed over the past 15 or 20 years (from being simpler “arenas” into more complex uses), does it impact how you approach the design when you conceptualize it for broader uses rather than as a more basic arena?

I wouldn’t say it’s changed what we do at HOK. We’ve been talking about this for decades. But I think that our advice is starting to get taken a little bit more. And what really changed was when the price of these buildings continued to just climb and get more and more expense, the buildings had to take on a much more multipurpose program and plan because you really honestly can’t justify the cost of the venues for just a single tenant. The Saddledome is sort of what you describe: seats and ice rink and it’s a pretty basic building. But a lot has changed since the Saddledome was built.
The problem with doing anything multipurpose is there’s probably an initial first cost to that, it’s not as simple, it’s not as maybe straightforward. And I think for a long time, owners were reluctant to spend the money to plan in flexibility and resiliency into the projects, but now they’re listening to us and they’re really doing it. So I’d say that’s what changed.

Along the same lines, we’re seeing more of these buildings conceived as part of integrated districts with engaged streetscapes rather than as standalone arenas. How do you integrate touchpoints at street level in a way that feels organic?

One of the things that the team and the city was very set on and determined to do was, the reason the Saddledome is the way it is is because the ice rink is at grade, so you have to go through those enormous flights of steps to get to the main concourse, and then you have to go back down, if you have a good seat, or keep going up. And so what that did was put all the service and back of house stuff on the sidewalk level, and there’s no way to really make that open and inviting because that’s all back-of-house stuff that’s really necessary.
So the new Scotia Place was going to be 30 feet in the ground… and when you walk into the walk into the main concourse from the sidewalk. And that allows us to laminate restrooms and team store and sports bar at the sidewalk level, and so instead of looking at a big flight of steps or a big solid wall like at the Saddledome, you’re going to be able to see people inside, the lights, you’re going to see people coming out, it’s going to be a whole streetscape. Everybody said ‘You know what? We don’t care. It’s hard to put it into the ground but we want to push this building into the ground,’ so that’s what we did.

Populous and HOK are the two big players in the arena and stadium space. Populous just opened the BMO Centre expansion kitty-corner from Scotia Place. With all the stuff going into the area around Scotia Place – there’s the new library, the National Music Centre, the BMO expansion, the SAM Centre – is it exciting to go into an area where there’s so much stuff going on and there’s so much competition for everyone’s visual attention?

To answer the first part of that question, so I went to Stampede this last time and had a blast. I’d only been to Stampede once when I was probably seven years old, and it was just so much fun, I really enjoyed it. And so I really got to look at the BMO first-hand. And you know what? It’s a really nice building. I loved how they have that big amphitheatre and the bands can stand on it and play to the crowd, it’s providing some shade. But our building’s going to be so much prettier, and better, and cooler.
And yes, we love being part of that momentum. There’s going to be all sorts of comparisons, but we really felt like from the very beginning, it felt like Scotia Place and the BMO need to be really complimentary players. Even in the colours, the materials selections and the things we’ve done, it was very intentional to make the two buildings have a dialogue with each other, but not necessarily borrow or add on to a new idea. They’re going to be very different, but they’re both going to be very big and they have to play nice together.

As fans are waiting for their first chance to see an event or a game at Scotia Place, are there any other buildings or experiences you’re taking inspiration from in this building?

I will tell you that the one that really the Flames liked the best, because they toured a lot of buildings prior to starting this, the one they really liked the best was one of our buildings: it’s Detroit, Little Caesars. And the Scotia Place really kind of takes that seating bowl to the next level. The thing that is neat about Detroit is that the seats are really close to the dasher boards. It’s very vertical. You’re creating a wall of intimidation, to give the team sort of a strategic advantage.
By contrast, another one of our buildings that they really did not want to follow was in Edmonton, because, and I know there’s a funny thing there, but Daryl Katz really wanted bigger volume inside, the building really steps back, there’s not so many overhangs, so you can really get out to the front and you can really see the whole thing. And it was done for some very good reasons. But the Flames wanted a really tight, intimate building, and so they tended to really gravitate closer to Little Caesar’s. That’s probably the one we drew the most inspiration from.