MOVING HOMES
A CHAT WITH CHANGEMAKER GLYN LEWIS
Renewal Development CEO and founder Glyn Lewis says he hopes to challenge the “demolition-first paradigm.”
The idea for his Vancouver-based company was sparked when his sister, Mandalena, was living in a character heritage home in Esquimalt, built in the 1930s.
“It was charming, and she and her partner took really good care of it. They renovated it, and they poured their heart and soul into that home and really made it their own. A developer bought the whole city block and wanted to tear down her home,” he says.
“And my sister, being an environmentalist, thought it was tragic to see this beautiful character home torn down, especially since her partner had spent years fixing it up and renovating it.”
His sister decided to move the home to a property that she bought just north of Sooke on Gordon’s Beach. Lewis says it sparked something in him to say, “Why don’t we do more of this?”
Lewis’s firm has made waves since launching in 2020. ❱❱
WORDS: ELANA SHEPERT // IMAGES: SUBMITTED
Repurposing homes saves big bucks on demolition fees
Renewal is the only company of its kind in North America that identifies homes to save on a property, subcontracts companies to move them, while providing modernizations, such as new windows, an upgraded roof or a fresh coat of paint, to the new homeowners, Lewis says.
Real estate developers love working with Renewal because it provides a lessexpensive service. Since his staff doesn’t demolish every home on a site, the company doesn’t charge the same steep demolition fees as others.
“We have a structural financial advantage,” he says. “I can underbid versus the other demolition companies, because someone else is paying [for those homes] to leave.
“And the developers love this because they’re saving a bit of money, which is their biggest thing, and I can do it on time. And the community is really happy because ultimately, city councils and local communities want to see good homes saved and repurposed if possible,” Lewis adds.
The company gives homes a second life, making it a sustainable business model. But it also offers solutions amid the housing crisis.
Shipping homes
to
Coastal First Nations
Renewal has mostly worked with Coastal First Nations that need 20 to 40 new homes, and the company’s repurposed houses are somewhere between 20 and 40 per cent cheaper than modular or building new, Lewis explains.
Renewal says around 2,700 singlefamily homes are torn down annually in Metro Vancouver to make room for new development, and around 700 are in really good condition.
“My goal for renewal is to move and repurpose about 200 to 300 homes a year. We’re going to start mining homes in Metro Vancouver. Eventually, we’re going to start mining homes in Greater Victoria. We might start looking at Kelowna, and then we might start looking at other municipalities across Canada,” he says.
“I sometimes say that renewal is a campaign disguised as a company. And what I mean by that is that we’re ultimately changemakers,” Lewis says. “What’s motivating me, what’s driving me, what’s driving our team is to disrupt the demolition industry and to prove the possibilities of sustainable development.” ❚
“WHAT’S MOTIVATING ME, WHAT’S DRIVING ME, WHAT’S DRIVING OUR TEAM IS TO DISRUPT THE DEMOLITION INDUSTRY AND TO PROVE THE POSSIBILITIES OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT.”
GLYN LEWIS, RENEWAL DEVELOPMENT CEO
SPECIAL UPDATE
CELEBRATING OUR LOCAL HOUSING ICON:
THE VANCOUVER SPECIAL
Along with the boxy buildings themselves, attitudes towards Vancouver Specials, a massproduced structure meant to maximize zoning rules, have also been renovated.
The simple two-story homes pepper neighbourhoods across Metro Vancouver. Thousands were built between 1965 and 1985. The design was used in nearby cities like Victoria to a lesser extent, but never really left the region.
From maligned to sought after
A new Vancouver Special hasn’t been built in four decades. Over the course of those 40 years or so, the public perception of them has somehow
transitioned from bland, sometimes hated, to iconic and beloved.
And now contractors and design firms are advertising renovation ideas for Vancouver Specials — a niche but active market.
Architect Allison Holden-Pope of One Seed, who’s worked on multiple Vancouver Special renovations, says the trend to refurbish them became popular in the mid 2010s.
“They are sought after for their modern form, and ease of renovation as well as their potential for accessible living,” she says, adding they are easily set up for two families or multigenerational living. ❱❱
WORDS: BRENDAN KERGIN // IMAGES: SUBMITTED
A
‘blank palette’
The open, simple design and quality construction have made them ideal for customization. Holden-Pope calls it a “blank palette.” That said, they’ve become an icon of the city, so renovations should embrace that, too.
“Our approach is if you’re going to be renovating a Vancouver Special, it’s important to celebrate the iconic Vancouver Special look,” she explains.
Before
One example of her firm’s work involved an 1980 East Vancouver house. “We wanted to update it for envelope and performance, but also give it a bit of a facelift,” Holden-Pope says.
One Seed updated the exterior while retaining the most-recognizable aspects of the form. The goal was to make sure people could still tell it was a Vancouver Special.
“One of the iconic elements is the lower level is often brick and the upper level a separate material,” she says. The deck across the front usually is part of that split.
The update keeps that divide, but removes an essentially unusable part of the deck. However, there’s a canopy above the entrance, keeping the visual split.
“OUR APPROACH IS IF YOU’RE GOING TO BE RENOVATING A VANCOUVER SPECIAL, IT’S IMPORTANT TO CELEBRATE THE ICONIC VANCOUVER SPECIAL LOOK”
ALLISON HOLDEN-POPE, ARCHITECT
The Vancouver Special is special to Vancouver
There’s been a push in Vancouver for “faux-craftsman architecture” (a style that was popular out east from the late 1800s to 1930s) to be treated as heritage architecture, because that’s what looks like heritage architecture in other cities. And Vancouver does have homes from that era.
But that’s not Vancouver’s true strength. “Our historical architecture is more connected to the 1950s and the Vancouver Special era,” Holden-Pope says.
That’s when local styles were developed, instead of copying designs from Eastern Canada and the U.S. “Where Vancouver and the Pacific Northwest really stand out on a global scale is with West Coast Modernism and Mid-Century Modernism,” she explains.
Those styles informed the design of the Vancouver Special. West Coast Modernism embraced the local climate and different materials from Mid-Century Modernism.
And as these special homes have embraced the climate around them, for better or for worse, they’ve found a special place in the hearts of Vancouverites. A symbol only we can (or would) own. ❚
A Shared Approach to Local Design
In Vancouver, great homes are not created in isolation. They are shaped through collaboration — between vision, craft, and community.
JMS Projects & Design and Portside Interiors share a belief that thoughtful spaces begin with intention and are realized through partnership.
At JMS, each project is guided by custom millwork, layered materials, and interiors designed for real life. Their work balances architectural precision with warmth — spaces that feel refined yet deeply personal.
At Portside Interiors, we curate furniture and lighting with a similar philosophy: craftsmanship first, longevity always. Rooted in West Coast ease and Scandinavian clarity, our collections are chosen to complement considered architecture and elevate everyday living.
When design vision and sourcing align within the same community, the result is cohesive, intentional, and built to last. By working locally — designer and showroom in dialogue — we create homes that feel connected not only in aesthetic, but in story.
Together, we are proud to support Vancouver’s design community and contribute to homes that reflect the character of this city: layered, enduring, and quietly confident. ◆
For design and renovation inquiries, connect with JMS Projects & Design www.jmsprojects.ca
For curated furniture, lighting, and décor, visit Portside Interiors in Vancouver or explore our collections online. www.portsideinteriors.com
Gene Guindon, Portside Interiors Ashley Yost, JMS Projects and Design
“IT WAS NOT SOME CONSCIOUS PLAN TO EMBED MYSELF SO DEEPLY IN THE CITY, IT JUST KIND OF HAPPENED ALONG THE WAY”
These days, his artwork takes centre stage, which comes in a variety of forms. But many will recognize one piece in particular. The now-iconic voxelated killer whale leaping next to the city’s convention centre is probably his bestknown work.
“As a favour to me, whoever you are reading this, look at all the public artwork I’ve done around the city,” he says. “If you see it all together and you realize, ‘Oh, there’s this other sort of thing that Doug does,’ and after that you’re on your own.”
Suite X is Coupland maximalism
Suite X is made up of a large main room with floor-to-ceiling windows letting natural light fill the space, which is packed with Coupland’s art and other works, including ads he picked out and furniture he built.
It’s Coupland maximalism — busy, bright and meticulously designed.
Walking into the room, there’s a Lego recreation of the orca statue sitting in a glass cabinet next to fishing floats painted gold, while an IBM ad and poster from Japan colour a room divider to the right.
Even the ceiling has a collage of patterns and commercial art he put together.
Coupland is at ease in the hotel room, which isn’t a surprise given the amount of time he’s spent in them over the years, and the inspiration for this one.
It started with a discussion with the Fairmont Pacific Rim’s co-owner Ian Gillespie. ❱❱
DOUGLAS COUPLAND
“I was having a thing at my place one night, and he was in my living room, and said ‘This is kind of great. You know, we’ve got to take apart the old Olympic suite. Why not just make it look like your living room?’”
Coupland was intrigued by the idea, especially having spent decades in hotels of all sorts. “If I could walk into a hotel room, what would I want to walk into?” he muses while sitting in the middle of the room he manifested.
Only a carpet, TV and a couple of couches were picked without Coupland. The rest comes from his brain. “I think everything else here was by me or things I recommended. I will say that the chairs and tables there are exactly like the ones in my dining room,” he says, gesturing to the glass dining room table with a paintflecked hand.
Along with the two-dimensional art, there are things Coupland created with his own hands. “These tables I did back, like, 15 years ago with Roots,” he says of a couple small three-legged side tables. “I don’t have any space left at my house, and they’re happy here.”
The TV set was made by someone else, but its simplicity impresses Coupland, as the simple easel-like stand looks innocuous, hiding wires inside the frame.
Tangentially, Coupland notes the evolution of the TV meant one less hidden space in a hotel room. “In the ’90s, TVs were still big, bulky, cubic things, and hotels would put them inside an armoire,” he explains.
“People would throw things [in the armoire] they didn’t want the housekeeping staff to find, like pornography, leftover local currency, swag, T-shirts from whatever convention they were going to,” he says. “And that sort of ended around 2000 when TVs got flat, and I kind of missed that.”
He didn’t just come up with a list of items, Coupland was thoughtful about how each piece would interact with the potentially overwhelming visual environment — with remarkable precision.
“Like, this should be….” He pauses, getting up to move a small table a few inches from the wall. “There. Like this.” It needs breathing room around it, so it can “work as an object instead of melting into a generic pillar,” he explains, referring to a column in the wall behind the table. “I’m less of a control freak than I used to be, but that’s where it goes,” he says. “And see, it doesn’t make any difference from anyone else’s point of view.”
Decorating the accommodation space was intriguing for Coupland, and he’s interested in doing it again. “A dream gig would be, like [if someone asked me to do] a whole hotel,” says Coupland. “Like yes, I would love to do the whole thing, because now I’ve learned so much.”
‘I hate views’
The grand panorama enveloping Suite X captures much of what draws people here, from mountain peaks to the salt chuck, framed by Stanley Park and the Port of Vancouver — two pillars of the city’s character.
But if Coupland really had it his way, his room wouldn’t have a view at all. “I hate views,” he says. “I don’t like views at all. My place, I’m deep inside the trees. It gets dark there two hours before everyone else.
“I think that means my ancestors lived in caves,” he adds with a smile, “and people who like views have ancestors that live in trees.”
Confoundingly, he can’t help but throw his gaze out the windows. “In the view, you can talk about anything,” Coupland says, comparing it to a Richard Scarry illustration. “In the summer, you get the cruise liners,” he says. “You’ve got helicopters. You’ve got birdlife galore on the roof there.”
The bright-yellow conical pile on the North Shore also catches his eye. “Look at the sulphur. People from here love it. I love it. But if you moved here from some other city it’s like, ‘Oh, it’s that ugly yellow thing.’ But no, no, you don’t get it. It’s the sulphur pit.”
In the background, the North Shore Mountains pop up. For any aspiring artists out there, Coupland offers a tip. “The way they draw the mountains in the North Shore … is like that,” he explains, scribbling a simple wavy line across a small piece of paper.
“It just goes, bloop, bloop, bloop,” he says, adding curving lines down from the bottom of the waves, creating mountain peaks and valleys. To colour it in, he adds, requires blue instead of green. ❱❱
The cursed sport of real estate
In his 2000 book on all things Vancouver, City of Glass, Coupland starts his essay on real estate by calling it the city’s top sport, central to discussions at water coolers and speculation like a Canucks playoff run. “It’s a sport, and it’s a curse, and it’s like...,” he says thoughtfully, “trying to see the future.”
How does he view it now?
“Real estate, like, what the fuck happened?” he adds. “I think that’s what everyone’s still trying to figure out.”
In Coupland’s eyes, problems with commercial and residential property involve the forms of buildings and who can access them. He sees the financial barriers younger people face now, and empathizes, but doesn’t see any plausible solutions.
“For $2 million, you can get a 610-square-foot, badly arranged dump with no view, or there’s nothing else,” he says. And Vancouver will be stuck with the cost-of-housing issue, Coupland adds.
“The big question is: ‘How does this get fixed?’ And the answer is that it’s not fixable. It’s a bizarre and unique phenomenon that only exists here and in Toronto,” he says. “In 10 years it will still
“JUST A TINY BIT OF INTELLIGENCE ADDED AT THE DESIGN PROCESS COULD MAKE THE CITY SO MUCH BETTER LOOKING.”
DOUGLAS COUPLAND
be the same. There is no solution.”
Coupland muses that the city could become more involved, but that would “be a disaster, too.”
It’s not just the cost, though. Vancouver’s architecture also leaves him uninspired. “You know, there’s actually not that much good architecture in the city,” he says. A lack of thought and money invested in the design stage has
left Vancouver with mediocre buildings.
“Go to New Zealand. It’s like here, except everything there looks amazing — then I return home and get sad because buildings here are only about archaic zoning, corner cutting, lowest bidding,” he explains.
“But JUST A TINY BIT OF INTELLIGENCE added at the design process could make the city SO much
better looking.”
To fix the problem, Coupland favours rules that govern design. “Because once you build something, it’s there for the next hundred years,” he says. He notes that Arthur Erickson’s elements of concrete, cedar, glass and river rock are hard to screw up. “For a place where I would live, I’d probably use the exact same material,” he says. ❱❱
Coupland plans to update his book on Vancouver
While he may take issue with some aspects of Vancouver, he’s still a booster for the city.
In 2000, Coupland wrote City of Glass, a collection of more than 50 short essays on a variety of topics he’d be asked about by visiting friends, indulging in that social prognostication while talking about the city he loves.
It’s an unusual guide for an urban centre.
Instead of offering tips like best breakfast spots or hikes, it captures Vancouver’s personality, discussing characteristics locals know and appreciate, including Chinatown, Grouse Mountain, and “see-throughs” (a nickname for the glass-and-steel towers that don’t deflect your gaze).
“I did this because there was nothing else out there [like it]” he explains. “It
describes the city to you in a way that’s sort of generalist.” A quarter century later, he still feels the same about the city in many ways. “But I will say, the book is so out of date,” he adds.
There was a revised version in 2009, but while some of the essays were ahead of their time, it needs updating again, he says. And so it will be. Coupland has spoken to his publisher and is planning a new edition.
Among new topics he’s interested in adding are the city’s current relationship with China, Squamish, Bowen Island, and plants like blackberries and English ivy. “Whenever you see these things, it means that the land’s probably going to be turned into condos soon,” he says. “With alders on the North Shore, especially.”
He’d also like to update his essays on Whistler, the film and TV industry, as well as Main and Hastings. “Fentanyl should be its own category,” he adds. Meanwhile,
the city’s relationship with cannabis has changed a lot in the last 25 years, too, with grow-ops essentially gone and retail stores for vaping and weed popping up everywhere.
Even his section on Stanley Park would get a redo, addressing the storm of 2006 (which he notes in the 2009 version) and the letdown some visitors to the park feel when the rainforest might not materialize as expected. “They could see it as land remediating itself instead of just feeling betrayed by our civic advertising,” he says.
Dining options will also be elaborated on, highlighting how good the city has it now.
“The availability of any conceivable cuisine you like, made largely by the best ingredients, many found locally,” he notes. “It’s no surprise that the 100-Mile Diet originated here. Have you ever tried going out for a good dinner in, say, Cleveland?” ❚
China Before Communism
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“This business is all about people, and realtors are a part of each of their clients lives for a time, so although it is business it is also personal, it is full circle.”
PRESIDENT’S CLUB DESIGNATION: TOP 1% OF REALTORS ® ACROSS GREATER VANCOUVER
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