One Wall Centre

The Sheraton Wall Centre is the tallest building in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada as of 2005. It is 48 stories high with a total height of 150 m. The lower floors of the building are a Sheraton Hotel and the upper floors are private residential condominiums. It is part of the Wall Centre complex owned by Wall Financial Corporation and was largely the vision of Peter Wall. The building was designed by Busby and Associates Architects and construction was complete in 2001. The Sheraton Wall Centre was deemed "Best New Skyscraper of the Year 2001 for Design and Functionality" by Skyscrapers.com.

The building is located at a high point on the downtown peninsula of Vancouver and is addressed as 1088 Burrard Street.

The Sheraton Wall Centre is the largest hotel in Western Canada.

Construction

To counteract possible harmonic swaying during high winds, it has a tuned water damping system at the top level of the building which consists of two specially designed 190,000 L water tanks. These tanks are designed so that the harmonic frequency of the sloshing of the water in the tanks counteracts the harmonic frequency of the swaying of the building.

The building exterior has a two-tone appearance. The glass on the lower levels is a dark glass, while the glass on the upper levels is light coloured glass. To satisfy the public and the City of Vancouver Planning Department, who were concerned that this building would dominate the skyline, when this building was in the planning stages it was agreed that it would have a very "light" appearance that would blend in with a blue sky. After the design was approved, a minor amendment was requested to change it to a significantly darker glass. This was approved by a low level staff member in the planning department who apparently did not realize the significance of this change. When the glass started to be put on the building the public and the city planners noted that this did not meet design that was reviewed by the public and the city planning department. After many accusations back and forth as to how significant this change was and whether it required public review, the City agreed to compromise and allowed the lower glazing that was already installed to be the dark glazing, but required that the glazing on the upper levels be the light glazing that was originally proposed.

Rumour has it that hotel owner Peter Wall threatened to call off the construction if the city forced him to replace all of the dark-paned glass, so a settlement was reached.

The Sheraton Wall Centre required a 23 m deep excavation — the deepest excavation to date for a building in Vancouver.