Special 2010 Olympic Feature
Let the Olympics Begin
On this the first day of the 2010 Olympic Games downtown Vancouver is dressed up and ready for them to begin. The Hudson Bay, The Private Residences at Hotel Georgia (See blog post Friday, January 1, 2010.) and even the eagle sculpture in the bottom left of the photo are wearing their best gowns. These "gowns" will be worn through out the 2010 Olympic Games, February 12 to the 28th and the 2010 Paralympic Games, March 12 to the 21.
Where as The Private Residences at Hotel Georgia is wrapped in a Canadian Flag, The Hudson Bay features four storey banners of tones of blue and white. Doing their stuff on the banners are: a ski jumper, a speed skater, a bob sledder, a free style skier, a figure skater, and even spectators in Oylmpic hoodies and Olympic toques. Specific athletes pictured include: Canadian medal winning speed skater Clara Hughes, bobsledder Pierre Lueders, the American Lindsay Jacobellis, and a 2006 Olympic silver medallist in snowboarding. Almost 40 banners are mounted on the building’s upper exterior panels facing Seymour and West Georgia Streets. Each banner is 16 meters high and approximately five meters wide. with almost 40 banners celebrating the Games and Canadian Olympic and Paralympic athletes.
"Hudson Bay's Vancouver flagship store is a six-storey building in Downtown Vancouver. Located at 674 Granville Street, on the corner of Georgia, the cream terra cotta building with Corinthian columns was built in 1927. The current store was built on the site of another HBC store from 1913. The last additions were made in 1949. The original HBC store in Vancouver was a small storefront on Cordova between Carrall and Abbott. Another HBC building, the stone-trimmed brick Fur and Liquor Warehouse, was built on the railway side of Water Street during the warehouse construction boom in Gastown of the 1920s." Wikipedia.
As to the eagle it is part of this years B.C. Lion's Society Charity for Children with Disabilities public art project. The 135 sculptures of "Eagles in the City" were place through out B.C. in April 2009. Each eagle is individually decorated and will be auctioned off in April 2010. A tour map of the sculptures is available through the link http://www.eaglesinthecity.com/default.aspx?PageID=1001. Previous years the Orca-killer whale- and Spirit Bear have been the sculptures that have decorated the city, celebrated the spirit of B.C., and raised money for Children with Disabilities.
Photo: Taken January 2010 by SW.
"Hudson Bay's Vancouver flagship store is a six-storey building in Downtown Vancouver. Located at 674 Granville Street, on the corner of Georgia, the cream terra cotta building with Corinthian columns was built in 1927. The current store was built on the site of another HBC store from 1913. The last additions were made in 1949. The original HBC store in Vancouver was a small storefront on Cordova between Carrall and Abbott. Another HBC building, the stone-trimmed brick Fur and Liquor Warehouse, was built on the railway side of Water Street during the warehouse construction boom in Gastown of the 1920s." Wikipedia.
As to the eagle it is part of this years B.C. Lion's Society Charity for Children with Disabilities public art project. The 135 sculptures of "Eagles in the City" were place through out B.C. in April 2009. Each eagle is individually decorated and will be auctioned off in April 2010. A tour map of the sculptures is available through the link http://www.eaglesinthecity.com/default.aspx?PageID=1001. Previous years the Orca-killer whale- and Spirit Bear have been the sculptures that have decorated the city, celebrated the spirit of B.C., and raised money for Children with Disabilities.
Photo: Taken January 2010 by SW.
