Client: Brivia Group + Henson Group

Location: Vancouver, Canada

Type: High End Residential Passivhaus

GFA: 44,700 m²

WKA, Design Architect with Arcadis, Vancouver, Executive Architect

Standing 60 storeys high at the pinnacle of downtown Vancouver, CURV is the tallest Passivhaus tower in the world. Acting as a tribute to the city and advancing its aspiration to be the greenest in the world, CURV will mark a new era of design and engineering, raising the standard by which all future high-rise residences can be judged.

Passivhaus is a building standard, considered to be the most rigorous voluntary energy-based standard in the design and construction industry, resulting in buildings that consume up to 90 percent less heating and cooling energy than conventional buildings. The Passivhaus high performance building standard is internationally recognised, science based and proven.

Legacy highrise buildings that form the majority of our cities around the world were mostly designed with straight lines with little thought given to saving energy. These angular towers dominate the skyline of our cities and have become synonymous with over consumption and global warming. It seemed appropriate therefore to use curves as the generating geometry of a building that will be one of the most energy efficient towers in the world.