Vancouver Magazine March 2015

WHERE TO BUY

OLYMPIC VILLAGE II

CHAMPAGNE TOP & WHITE RED PROCEDURES SAKE & PORT (EXPLAINED: and icewine too) COSTS, RISKS, AS CHOSEN REWARDS BY OUR PANEL OF EXPERTS IN THEIR OWN WORDS: WHAT PATIENTS GOT DONE (and why)

WHERE TO ROMP

DOG PARKS

11

Now with th CENTRE

FOLD! ANNUAL

BEST CREAMS, LOTIONS & MEDICAL POTIONS

MARCH 2015

SECRETS of the Surgeons PM40064924

Cover.FINAL.indd 1

PLUS THE BITS WE WANT FIXED THE MOST 15-01-28 4:18 PM

Join us for the 1st

SPEAKER SERIES Monday, March 23, 2015 BrianJesselBMW.com/EventSeries

IT’S OFFICIAL

LUXURY HAS A SECOND NEW HOME BRIAN JESSEL BMW PRE-OWNED NOW OPEN VISIT US TODAY

BrianJesselMAR15FP_lt.indd 11 BrianJesselMAR15FP_sc.indd

2015-01-26 15-01-30 9:31 4:58 AM PM

TM

RIVER GREEN COMMUNITY PRESENTS THEIR LATEST COLLECTION OF LUXURY RESIDENCES

Canada’s most significant

WATERFRONT COMMUNITY Coming spring 2015. A rare and exclusive opportunity to be a part of Richmond’s most sought after private residences in the renowned River Green Community. Presenting 2 River Green, an unparalleled luxury living experience along Richmond’s signature waterfront.

PRIORITY REGISTRATION www.rivergreen.com | 604.233.2633 Illustration reflects the artist’s interpretation of the project and may be noticeably different than what is depicted.

This advertisement is not an offering for sale. Such an offering can only be made with a disclosure statement. E. & O. E.

ASPAC_RiverGreenMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-30 12:05 PM

ANAMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-23 1:56 PM

VOLUME 48

NUMBER 2

MARCH

F E AT U R E S

58

Forever Young

Plastic surgery and its siblings (Botox, cosmetic dentistry, et al.) aren’t one-sizefits-all. Four potential patients weigh the benefits By Stacey McLachlan, Michelle Patterson, Amanda Ross, and Steven Schelling

Everything You Always Wanted to Know But Were Afraid to Ask *

68

* About plastic surgery. Yes, some of these procedures hurt and some cost as much as a Gulf Islands cabin. Please breathe deeply

By Adrienne Matei

73

Face Time

Creams and lotions devised right here in B.C. By Ginger Jefferies and Danielle Tsang

Cover and this page: Pooya Nabei

76

Doctors in the House

The city’s masters of their craft share tips and tricks, and pose in their natural habitat

By Jess Burton

ORIGINAL MODEL Some people skip the Before phase. No one said it was fair

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

Contents.FINAL_N1.indd 5

5

15-01-30 9:08 AM

MARCH

***

“BACK THEN, WHEN PEOPLE ORDERED SCALLOPS, THEY THOUGHT IT WAS GOING TO BE SCALLOPED POTATOES”

—pg. 52

THE

THE

38 TASTEMAKER

84 PERSONAL SHOPPER From a

12 FROM THE EDITOR Everyone

timeless trench to seasonal sandals and a restorative recliner, we’ve picked out the most covetable new buys around

and everything seems prey to the pursuit of aesthetic perfection—including the pages of this magazine

86 MODEL CITIZEN Cactus

Readers give us hell for myriad reasons.

We sit back and take it

BRIEF DISH 18 VANCOUVER LIFE Exploring the

Georgia Strait’s submerged secret; a dog-eat-dog battle to preserve park territory; are psychedelic drugs the solution to certain addictions and disorders?

22 URBAN FIX

PG.30

One man’s crusade to make a greater priority of B.C. youths’ mentalhealth issues 26 BLOCK WATCH

Once an emblem of Olympic folly, Southeast False Creek is now the hood that epitomizes the city’s rapid growth 28 ON THE RECORD Rumana

PG.42

Monzur on life after the spousal assault that left her irreparably blind 30 THE ESSENTIAL 8

Spring into the season with some brilliant nights (and days) out—art, music, comedy, and more

Au Comptoir brings the feel (and taste) of an authentic Parisian bistro to Kits; plus, a new take on Lebanese and an old take on burgers

GOODS PLUS

14 LETTERS 42 CHEFS TABLE

Two chefs talk about infiltrating the boys’ club of professional kitchens 44 FRESH SHEET

A foolproof recipe from Rob Feenie showcases the delicious virtues of Lois Lake steelhead 46 DECANTER

There’s much more to Australian wines than low price tags and animal logos 48 MIX MASTER

When the U.S. started beating Canada at the rye game, these distillers fought to win back our title

Club’s Sebastien Le Goff on his unique je-ne-sais-quoi 88 MY SPACE

96 SNAP CHATTER Social

Wide-screen views and eclectic décor are balm for busy, globetrotting Carol Lee

scenes from a hospital fundraiser, a luxury-auto debut, and an artist tribute

90 SWEAT EQUIT Y A lawyer

takes leave from his practice to rekindle a passion for rowing 92 FIELD TRIP

In which our city slicker editor-inchief hits the dusty trails of an Arizona dude ranch

50 LAST SERVICE

Harry Kambolis’s restaurants once defined Vancouver dining. How his mini empire fell

PG.86

Va n m a g .co m See hundreds of winners from past Restaurant Awards, with chef videos and more PG.92

6

Tim Gardner; Evaan Kheraj (also Le Goff); Graddy Photography

THE

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Contents.FINAL.indd 6

15-01-28 4:09 PM

BAKER . MCGUIRE . MITCHELL GOLD . LEE . B OILER . DELLA ROBBIA . SANGIACOMO . SABA . GAMM A

i t’s b e a u t i f u l i n s i d e

1855 Fir Street at West 3rd Armoury District Vancouver 604.736.8822 Monday - Saturday 10-5:30 pm broughaminteriors.com

BroughamMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-22 2:04 PM

EDITOR-IN- CHIEF

John Burns ART DIRECTOR

Paul Roelofs SENIOR EDITOR

Michael White ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR

Naomi MacDougall TRAVEL & STYLE EDITOR

Amanda Ross ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR

Jenny Reed EVENTS EDITOR

Fiona Morrow CONTRIBUTING EDITORS

Frances Bula, Christina Burridge, Mario Canseco, Petti Fong, Kerry Gold, Michael Harris, DJ Kearney, Neal McLennan, Malcolm Parry, Guy Saddy, Jim Sutherland, Timothy Taylor, Daniel Wood CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS

Tracey Ayton, Clinton Hussey, Evaan Kheraj, Joe McKendry (contributor illustrations), Andrew Querner, Carlo Ricci, John Sinal, Milos Tosic, Luis Valdizon EDITORIAL INTERNS

Ginger Jefferies, Danielle Tsang PHOTO & ART INTERNS

Andrea Fernandez, Max Hirtz PROOFREADER

Ruth Grossman EDITORIAL EMAIL

mail@vancouvermagazine.com PRODUCTION MANAGER

Lee Tidsbury ADVERTISING DESIGNER

Swin Nung Chai

VANCOUVER OFFICE

Suite 560, 2608 Granville St. Vancouver, B.C. V6H 3V3 604-877-7732 ONLINE COORDINATOR

Jennifer Elliott ONLINE ASSISTANT

Rachel Morten VIDEOGRAPHER

Mark Philps

East India Carpets DISTINCTIVE DESIGNS SINCE 1948

8

1606 West Second Avenue at Fir Armoury District, Vancouver Mon-Sat 10-5:30 604 736 5681 eastindiacarpets.com

VANCOUVER MAGAZINE is published 10 times a year by Transcontinental Western Media Group Inc. Copyright 2015. All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be reproduced without publisher’s written permission. Not responsible for unsolicited editorial material. Privacy Policy: On occasion, we make our subscriber list available to carefully screened organizations whose product or service might interest you. If you prefer that we not share your name and address (postal and/or email), you can easily remove your name from our mailing lists by reaching us at any of the listed contact points. You can review our complete Privacy Policy at Vanmag.com.

Subscriptions in Canada: one year $39.99. Subscriptions in the United States: one year $59.99. Rates include GST. Back issues $10, including postage and handling. All figures in Canadian funds. For address change, send old and new address to our circulation department. Indexed in the Canadian Magazine Index by Micromedia Ltd. and also in the Canadian Periodical Index. International standard serial no. ISSN 0380-9552. Canadian publications mail product sales agreement #40064924. Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to: Circulation Dept., Suite 560, 2608 Granville St., Vancouver, B.C., V6H 3V3. Printed in Canada by Transcontinental Printing G.P. (LGM Graphics), 737 Moray St., Winnipeg, MB, R3J 3S9. All reproduction requests must be made to: COPIBEC (paper reproductions) 800-717-2022, or CEDROM-SNi (electronic reproductions) 800-563-5665. Distributed by Coast to Coast Ltd.

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Ad number: EIC WL NOV 2014 Masthead.FINAL.indd 8

Date: Sept 29 2014

Colour: 4 colour

Size: 4.625” x 10”

Insertion: Western Living

2015-01-27 11:13 AM

5HÄ HFWLQJ 9DQFRXYHU

sales@wallcentre.com . 604.331.1000.

SheratonWallMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-30 9:56 AM

YES, IT’S HOT OUT HERE.

That ’s the Point.

GENERAL MANAGER & PUBLISHER

Tom Gierasimczuk ADVERTISING SALES DIRECTOR

Janet Macdonald ACCOUNT MANAGERS

Eve Abrams, Deanna Bartolomeu, Judy Johnson, Lory Couroux (Victoria) SALES COORDINATOR

Jenny Murphy BUSINESS DEVEL OPMENT MANAGER

Dale McCarthy MARKETING & EVENTS SPECIALISTS

Christina Sobrepeña (mat leave), Jennifer Elliott ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT/ ONLINE COORDINATOR

Rachel Morten

GENERAL SALES MANAGER, CONSUMER ADVERTISING PRINT SALES

Kelly Whitelock

Like no place else.™

GENERAL SALES MANAGER, DIGITAL

VisitPalmSprings.com

GENERAL SALES MANAGER, MARKETING SERVICES

Peter Roland

Caroline K. Breton

Palm Springs

NATIONAL SALES DIRECTORS

Anna Vecera Marto, Andrea McBride NATIONAL ACCOUNT MANAGERS

FREE TROLLEY

Jillian Dann-Macerollo (team lead), Cathy Ellis, Colleen Fava, Gary Forshaw, Kathleen Irish, Cathrine Kinnear, Lennie Morton, Erin Suckling, Vanessa Watson, Lindsay Weir

BuzzPS.COM

DIRECTOR OF FINANCE

Julie Tardif PSBOT_VancouverMag_ThatsThePoint_4(625)4(937)_0115_b.indd 1

1/6/15 12:04 PM

GROUP CIRC ULATION DIRECTOR

Doris Chan SENIOR RESEARCH ANALYST

Eva Chau TORONTO OFFICE

Suite 100, 25 Sheppard Ave. W., Toronto, Ontario M2N 6S7 416-733-7600

CLASSIC IKON How a knife feels is just as important as how well it slices. The beautifully engineered WÜSTHOF Classic Ikon knives feature a unique “sweet spot” under the first rivet of the double bolstered handle for superb balance and heft. To top it off, each knife features WÜSTHOF’s PETech edge technology, which means you'll have an edge that lasts at least 20% longer and provides at least a 20% sharper cut. Made in Germany. Lifetime Warranty.

U.S. SALES REPRESENTATION, MEDIA- CORPS

1-866-744-9890 info@media-corps.com SUBSCRIP TIONS ENQUIRIES

800-363-3272

www.tc.tc

PRESIDENT & ACTING SENIOR VP, CONSUMER SOLUTIONS

Ted Markle VP & GROUP PUBLISHER

To learn more, check out our website or come visit us at one of our 16 western Canada locations. Our staff would love to talk to you about our wide selection of kitchen knives, how to keep them in good working order, and how we’ll stand behind them so they will serve you well for many years to come.

Jacqueline Loch SENIOR VP, FINANCE

David Galarneau

Shop in store or online at WWW.HOUSEOFKNIVES.CA

10

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Masthead.FINAL.indd 10

2015-01-29 4:08 PM

19TH ANNUAL CANADIAN CANCER SOCIETY

M AY 0 2 2 0 1 5 F A I R M O N T H O T E L VA N C O U V E R PRESENTED BY

Your support enables a future where cancer is successfully prevented and treated. A future where a child with cancer can live to be an adult. Life-saving research, advocacy, prevention and support have changed cancer, but the fight’s not over.

Give the gift of hope and help change cancer forever.

For more information, please call 604-675-7339 or visit daffodilballbc.com

magazine

DaffodilBallMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-22 2:07 PM

HI-DIDDLY-HO, NEIGHBOURINO!

THIS

MONTH

WATCH FOR OUR APRIL ISSUE, WHEN WE’LL TURN AN EYE TO SOME OF THE DISTINCT DISTRICTS THAT

FROM THE EDITOR

The Big Picture

MAKE UP THIS CITY: DEMOGRAPHICS, RECENT HOME SALES, AREA ATTRACTIONS, AND MORE

We in this city, like everywhere, struggle to understand how to age gracefully and successfully; what sets us apart is that we are also in thrall to an idea of natural perfection

Mirror, Mirror

JOHN BURNS john.burns@vancouvermagazine.com

12

5

NUMBERS BEHIND THIS ISSUE

1 number of stories requiring input from Amnesty International (pg. 28) 4 number of years we’ve waited for the bar Prohibition to open (pg. 48) 9 sliders consumed by food editor Michael White in “researching” Recently Reviewed (pg. 41) 218 emails it took style editor Amanda Ross to corral the 13 surgeons for their beautiful portrait (pg. 76) 2,712 kilometres editorin-chief John Burns travelled to get out of the rain and onto a horse (pg. 92)

Diane Graham. Photographed on location in southern Arizona

about a year ago, we unveiled a redesign for this magazine. Banished, we hoped, were successive pages of dreary grey type. Trimmed and tightened were stories that had grown flabby through lack of discipline. Moved up and restored to glory was a food section that had drooped its way over time from the proud front section to the saggy back. (The rear got quite a lift as well.) This refreshed version was to be a whole new us, we hoped: bright, perky, and plump in all the right places.

Was Vanmag really so bad before? Perhaps not, but we thought that if we could only be ruthless in our self-assessment we would find the juice to make serious and lasting changes.

And I’m delighted with the results, not just because we’re looking sexier and sassier than ever but because the (endless) conversations about values and feel and functionality and design that preceded our makeover also led us to the cover story for this issue—a compendium of cosmetic procedures, surgeon tips, personal essays, recommended creams, and more that we’re calling “Vanity Fair” (beginning pg. 58).

We in this city, like everywhere, struggle to understand how to age gracefully and successfully; what sets us apart, as Stacey McLachlan writes in “The Young and the Restless,” is that we are also in thrall to an idea of natural perfection. “Is it irony or two sides of a coin?” she asks. “What could be more ideal than an organic apple? What could be more ideal than a face that never ages?” These and many other astute observations inform a package I’m very proud to publish: not just a how-to but a why-to, a when-to, and (at times) a why-not-to.

Refreshing the magazine meant digging deep into our understanding of why we labour so hard to share our views of this city with you. Looking in the mirror required, as Paddington Bear would say, a hard stare at who we really are. In the end, the same truth awaits everyone in that mirror, whether it’s this staff considering a magazine or all of us assessing what we present to the world. We should all be lucky enough to come to love what we find. VM

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

EditorsNote.FINAL_N.indd 12

15-01-29 9:58 AM

T I A A R C L I N E A L I G N E R O S E T F L O U MOO O I F LO S M D F I TA LI A L I V I N G D I V A N I E 1 5 A R P E R K A R T E L L H E R M A N M I L L E R PAO L A L E NT I A LE S S I A

AT E L E M A M E TA L A R T E F O S C A R I N I S A N TA & C O L E G A N D I A B L A S C O K N O L L E X T R E M I S R O D A B O C C I M I N O T T I M D F I TA L I A K R I S TA L I A DI

170 6 WES T 1ST AV E A R M O URY D I S T R IC T VA NCO UVER 6 04 6 8 3 1116 LI VI NG S PA CE. CO M

LivingSpaceMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-23 11:25 AM

DID SOMETHING IN THESE PAGES ENGAGE YOU?

THIS

MONTH

ENRAGE YOU? SEND A LETTER, ALONG WITH YOUR FULL NAME, PHONE NUMBER, AND CITY OF RESIDENCE,

LETTERS

TO MAIL@VANCOUVERMAGAZINE.COM. WE RESERVE

From Irate Readers

particular, your two-page spread on “The CD Side of Planning” (Block Watch) was, in my opinion, a hodgepodge of typefaces, colours, stilted graphics, etc.; in all, quite off-putting.

I am a subscriber to three outstanding periodicals, and there is nothing better than National Geographic for its graphic layout, charts, and photoillustrations. Another slick periodical is the Atlantic, and, of course, the New Yorker has been largely unchanged and classically elegant for decades.

Your material appears busy, confused, and the work of someone with too many fonts on their hands. Can’t you try to create something a little smoother and easier on the eyes?

Wheat Arrogance on Our Part  I was disappointed to read that

I would welcome a response, as long as you keep the text in one font style!

SUSAN HYAM North Vancouver

THE RIGHT TO EDIT FOR LENGTH AND CLARITY

@ VA N M A G _ C O M

soul of the compost bin?

If people don’t want their properties

WINE AWARDS

torn down, they won’t sell them—they’ll

Laurenz V. Singing Grüner Veltliner 2013 won “Light White.” Try it, it helps with your German! @helene_perndl

we bought ours, the family was only too

POWER 50

Enjoying “The Power 50” edition.

Great road trip reading! Well done. @JenU2 EATING & DRINKING GUIDE

Thank you for a really well written & gracious review of our humble restaurant. Pick up your copy of Eating & Drinking Guide 2015! You will never have to wonder where to go for a good meal again. @ShantisCurries

keep them in the family. However, when happy to accept $1.5 million for their mom’s retirement fund. We’ve heard no complaints from them thus far.

A. LUND By email

Returns of the Season  I was horrified to receive your November issue. Your “Gift Guide 2014” screamed “Gimme, gimme, gimme!”

In an issue devoted to shopping and gift-giving, it was amazing that you managed to avoid mentioning holiday gift-giving so often! The word you managed so well to ignore is “Christmas.” Christmas, that beautiful Holy Day celebrating the birth of the baby

as an “annoying trend” (“Freaks and

Get Over Yourselves

Geeks,” January/February). I under-

 Re: “The Vanishing Point” (Septem-

stand diners making unnecessary

ber). So Caroline Adderson is uncom-

mods/requests could be a nuisance,

fortable with change and she’s found

but for those who suffer from celiac,

4,000-plus other Vancouverites who

a disease under the same umbrella as

also dislike change. Well, there’s ther-

Crohn’s, lupus, and multiple sclerosis, it

apy for that, but by perpetuating the

is a horrible, horrible fate.

racially tinged offshore myth and by

October!

When someone with celiac does eat

personifying houses she’s never even

gluten, their immune system gets con-

lived in, I doubt therapy would help her.

DAWN S. SHORT West Vancouver

Vancouver defines gluten-free patrons

fused and starts to attack their body

biased viewpoint, please balance it out.

Trevor Bird and Matthew Stowe don’t

Maybe Adderson could write a piece

seem to appreciate how painful and

about all the cold and lonely souls who

tragic this disease is, hopefully in the

somehow “live” in new-build homes. I’d

future they’ll at least have the decency

hate to raise my family in a place where

just to say nothing at all.

no memories (or rainwater) could seep into the drywall.

Her viewpoint is pearl-clutching at its finest, and her Vancouver Vanishes

A Font of Wisdom

Facebook page is a great example

 I enjoy receiving your “free” maga-

your neighbour Likes this page, you’ll

zine in my $$$-valued neighbourhood

probably have trouble digging up the

of Edgemont Village, North Vancouver.

precious rhododendron on your own

A close look at the December issue annoyed me enough to write you. In

14

started the tradition of Christmas gifts, and it is a lovely tradition we still enjoy today.

But please, there are so many other aspects of Christmas: glorious music, for instance. Please don’t start the shopping frenzy as early as mid

If you’re going to give voice to such a

like it is a virus, like a cancer. Since

BASIL CHAN Vancouver

Jesus Christ. The three Oriental kings

of self-selection. Just a heads-up: if

property or replacing an original mail-

HER VIEWPOINT IS PEARL-CLUTCHING AT ITS FINEST. WHAT’S NEXT? MEMORIALIZING THE SOUL OF THE COMPOST BIN?

box. What’s next? Memorializing the

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Letters.FINAL.indd 14

2015-01-27 11:09 AM

CapilanoAudiMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-22 2:05 PM

Mayor of Port Coquitlam Greg Moore, Surrey City Mayoral Candidate, Barinder Rasode and Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson are all smiles following Vancouver Magazine’s Power 50 ceremony.

Katherine (left) and Janet McCartney, known for their efforts in bringing TED to Vancouver, pose with Publisher and General Manager of Vancouver and Western Living magazines, Tom Gierasimczuk.

The Vancouver Club Dining Grand Ballroom makes for the perfect venue for guests to mingle and enjoy a final Moscow Mule as the night came to an end.

Vancouver Magazine’s annual Power 50 Awards took place on Monday, November 17th, to celebrate 50 significant members of society who influence through consensus.

This year saw nominees acknowledged in 5 categories: culture, politics, real estate, business, and community, with Luigi Aquilini named number one for his joint venture projects with First Nations communities.

The 14th annual Power 50 Awards took place in the Vancouver Club Grand Ballroom where friends, colleagues, family, and business partners came together to celebrate the city’s accomplishments as well as Vancouver’s ongoing growth and success.

Western Living and Vancouver magazines Art Director, Paul Roelofs shares a drink with Western Living Editor-in-Chief Anicka Quin and Gary Ross before the awards ceremony hosted

by CBC host Rick Cluff takes off.

Ronan Barrett from the Fairmont Hotel Vancouver was the winner of the Big Blue Yacht Charters draw taking home a magnum of champagne.

A Power 50 ice sculpture greets guests as they enter the awards ceremony.

Known as the “King of Kingsway,” Daljit Thind accepts his Power 50 Award in the real estate category from Vancouver magazine’s Editor-In-Chief John Burns.

Jon Stovell is accompanied by wife Nancy Riesco and his Power 50 Award under the real estate category.

Mike Magee, Chief of Staff to the Mayor of Vancouver, and Calvin Rosode.

From intricate canapés to a full blown risotto bar, there was no shortage of delicious hors d’oeuvres at the Vancouver Club.

Power 50 nominee Julio Montaner, known for his research on AIDS, celebrates his recognition.

Mile’s End Motors helped light up the exterior of the Vancouver Club with its lavish Lamborghini Aventador and Land Rover Range Rover Autobiography LWB car display.

Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson, kicks off his third term with admiring party goers.

HOST SPONSOR

Power50ThankYouMAR15FP_sc.indd 1

MEDIA SPONSOR

GOLD SPONSOR

SILVER SPONSORS

15-01-20 12:44 PM

VA NC O U V E R L IF E

URBAN FIX

BL OCK WAT CH

ON THE RECORD

THE ESSENTIALS

“Here’s my stuff.

If you like it, it’s all my fault. If you hate it, it’s also all my fault”

T HE

ADAM DEVINE, PG. 32

The month in politics, real estate, business & culture

Sick Transit ah, there’s nothing like a vote on transportation to stir the blood and entrench class warfare. In one corner of the B.C. Transportation Referendum, the Yes side: a coalition of mayors, unions, commuters, and the B.C. Liberals. Opposing—and picking up momentum as D-Day arrives—an unwieldy collection of critics set against taxes, megaprojects, big corporations, and big government. The motion, to add a half-percent “Metro Vancouver Congestion Improvement Tax” to goods and services in the region, would fund a $7.5-billion, 10-year plan for new buses (including new B-Line routes), trains, walkways, the Pattullo Bridge, and high-speed service to UBC. It’s a laudable attempt to curb congestion—more laudable still if the Yes side can once and for all assure voters that TransLink is eliminating glut in its own upper echeclons. Mail-in ballots head out March 16 and are due by May 29.

Jenny Reed

Dawn breaks on another day of full pens at the 99 B-Line’s Commercial Drive stop

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

BriefOpener.FINAL_N.indd 17

17

15-01-27 4:00 PM

MOTHER NATURE TOO SLOW? SINCE 1991,

THE

BRIEF

THE ARTIFICIAL REEF SOCIETY OF B.C. HAS SUNK SEVEN SHIPS AND PLANES TO FORM

VA N C O U V E R L I F E

Tr e n d i n g S t o r i e s

INSTA-HABITATS; AN EIGHTH, A DESTROYER OFF GAMBIER, AWAITS A LEGAL CHALLENGE

MARINE BIOLOGY

cannelloni—fill the video feeds.

This is the first day of Leys’s annual research cruise off the Vancouver coast studying the glasssponge reefs and how they make their living in the deep. Already she and doctoral student Amanda Kahn have discovered that sponge An ancient, unique forest stands silent reefs filter massive quantities of guard under the Georgia Strait water (9,000 times their body mass in a day), fertilize the oceans at 160 metres beneath the with nitrogen, and sequester huge ocean waves, it’s snowing hard. amounts of carbon. It turns out Streams of sediment, particulates, these sponge reefs, an ecosystem and bacteria drift past the wideno one even knew existed in the angle lenses of the robotic submers- Georgia Strait until 2001, are a ible as it descends. “We’re getting hidden but invaluable part of the close, guys,” University of Alberta marine ecosystem. biologist Sally Leys tells its pilots.

The next question is just how “I see the bottom. Slow…” From the much oxygen these sponges need to grey/brown sea floor loom shrubs make a decent living. of sea sponges in pale yellow and Deep-sea glass sponges span dish-glove orange. “Aren’t they the Pacific coast from Washingpretty?” Leys asks. Images of tubu- ton up to Alaska, but only in B.C. lar sponges—like a cross between do they form such massive reefs, a brass instrument and giant growing over their dead ancestors

Sponge Blob Rare Plants

A

18

like coral. The reef shown on the camera feeds aboard the Canadian Coast Guard research ship Vector rises off the benthic floor as high as 20 metres and is estimated to be between 6,000 and 9,000 years old.

There are a dozen such reefs between Vancouver and Vancouver Island. This one, the Fraser Ridge Reef, curves like a banana for almost a kilometre. Such sponge reefs, fossil walls of which can still be seen all over Europe, used to limn the ancient Earth’s shores.

When sponge reefs were found extant in Hecate Strait in the late ’80s, it was akin to finding a living fossil: people had believed they were long extinct.

On this research cruise, the robotic submersible will be manipulated from Vector to insert oxygen and flow sensors into the sponges’ inch-wide chimneys.

It’s delicate work. The sponges

Anne Casselman; inset: Sally Leys/CSSF

DEEP-SEA GLASS SPONGES SPAN THE COAST FROM WASHINGTON TO ALASKA, BUT ONLY IN B.C. DO THEY FORM SUCH MASSIVE REEFS

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

VancouverLife.FINAL.indd 18

2015-01-27 11:23 AM

Andrea Fernandez

have the consistency of meringue, while the submersible—ROPOS, or Remotely Operated Platform for Ocean Science—is the size of a small walk-in cooler and weighs over three tonnes. “I’m thinking about that one there,” says ROPOS supervisor and pilot Keith Tamburri as he steers it over to an outcrop. “I bet we could thread the needle on that one.” He gestures to the camera feed, pointing out a particularly fetching chimney.

Once deployed, the sensors will record water flow and oxygen draw, helping to paint a picture of the sponge’s metabolism and energetics.

“Studying sponges’ ability to exist with low oxygen and how much food they take up is sort of like a window into a very long past,” says Leys. To look at a sponge reef is like going back to a time before the seas were even that salty and long before they became the domicile of fish. “This is what the early ocean looked like,” Leys says, pointing to the murky greenish-blue sea floor, dotted with shrublike sponge growths, on the screen. “Only there was no organic snow, because plants hadn’t colonized land yet.”

There is something both profound and comforting about beholding one of Earth’s earliest animal life forms. To see such an ancient relative thriving a stone’s throw from Canada’s busiest port is remarkable, and to know that this life form was already on the planet some 545 million years ago is one of the most comforting thoughts I’ve had regarding the natural world. It humbles our existence to the point that all the worries of today drift away. On the ocean floor, life is dark, it is peaceful, and it just is.—Anne Casselman

RSEUCBRHEEAT A DI O4N

YOU CAN’T BITE CITY HALL Tempers ran high last year when the park board threatened off-leash areas. A new study seeks a more balanced solution

BARKS & REC Many jurisdictions recognize that if they create off-leash areas where dogs and people actually want to go, owners are less likely to break the rules—and now parks come decked out with everything from agility gear to poop composters.

North America’s off-leash mecca is certainly not Vancouver. Calgary boasts 150 off-leash areas making up 17 percent of the city’s park space. Including riverfront beaches, forest trails, and picnic areas, parks come with off-leash ambassadors— volunteers who help promote responsible dog ownership, set rule breakers straight, and even teach dogs, and their humans, new tricks.—JVE

 Layla runs below the branches of a

else. (Disclosure: I own a dog and also

cedar, sniffing determinedly. She’s a

attended these meetings.)

four-year-old of questionable lineage—

“I don’t use the community centre

husky, border collie, lab, plus anyone’s

or the soccer fields or the baseball

guess—and Trout Lake is her favourite

diamonds or the playgrounds. And

haunt. “There was a squirrel here two

I’m not saying they shouldn’t be here,

years ago,” jokes owner Erin Filtness,

but dogs are a huge thing in people’s

“and she still thinks it will come back.”

lives and there are countless benefi ts:

One more thing Layla doesn’t know:

companionship, exercise, safety,” says

she and the more than 100,000 other

Filtness, who bought her Commercial

dogs that live in Vancouver are about

Drive condo specifically because of its

to become the focus of an off-leash

proximity to Trout Lake. “Dog owners

review that will examine pooch-related

are here every day, 12 months of the

policies and park spaces city-wide.

year, rain or shine, but we get six per-

The move follows a tumultuous year that saw park board staff surprise dog

cent. How does that make sense?”

Malcolm Bromley, park board gen-

owners with a proposed 80 percent cut

eral manager, says that dogs are one

to the Trout Lake off-leash area—the

of the most polarizing issues in urban

only park of its kind on the East Side—

areas and one of the most emotional—

citing competition for park space and

during the Trout Lake kerfuffle he even

the need to accommodate those who

received poems, songs, and photos of

don’t want to interact with dogs.

people’s pets—and the overwhelming

Within weeks, over 1,000 owners and supporters launched Dog Lovers of Trout Lake on Facebook, and thousands

response inspired him to pull back and develop this city-wide plan.

The first step is to hire a consultant

more signed petitions, joined protests,

who has helped with dog policy in other

formed a city-wide group called Van-

jurisdictions, then to gather stakehold-

couver Dog, and wrote impassioned let-

ers on both sides of the debate. The key

ters to the board, pointing out that while

is keeping extreme opinions out of the

over 40 percent of Vancouver house-

room, which wasn’t done during his ten-

holds have dogs, they have access to

ure as head of parks in Toronto. (There,

just six percent of park space—less

the owner of a major pet food chain

in summer. They also argued the cut

went nose to nose with a psychiatrist

would only exacerbate one of the main

who treats dog bite trauma victims.)

problems the park board pinpointed:

Rather, it’s about using techniques that

off-leash dogs in on-leash areas.

help bring the more middle-ground

Along with a group of other dog owners, most of whom had never met

majority to a spot all can accept.

“We’ve got enough space,” says

offline, Filtness found herself at the

Bromley, who was given a German

centre of a fight she hadn’t seen com-

short-haired pointer by a young man

ing. In meetings with the board her

he met on the street, “and I think we’ve

main message was simple: dog owners

got enough will that we’re going to find

deserve park space just like everyone

the right solution.”—Jennifer Van Evra

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

VancouverLife.FINAL.indd 19

19

2015-01-27 11:23 AM

THE NAOMI STUDY (2005-08) SAW ADDICTS

THE

RECEIVE PURE HEROIN WHERE METHADONE WAS INEFFECTIVE; A FOLLOW-UP, SALOME,

BRIEF

VA N C O U V E R L I F E

JUST SURVIVED A FEDERAL CHALLENGE; THAT DATA WILL APPEAR LATER THIS YEAR

Tr e n d i n g S t o r i e s

THE NUMBERS GAME H E A LT H

Agony Vs. Ecstasy A psychedelic response to post-traumatic stress in an extraordinary project, local research scientists and therapists, specializing in newly resurgent psychedelic medicine, are seeking to confirm what others elsewhere have recently discovered. It appears that highly illegal ecstasy—MDMA— helps people overcome the living hell of treatment-resistant PTSD. In two studies done in Switzerland and the U.S., it has been shown that pure MDMA, plus intensive psychotherapy, can cure people whose lives have been shattered by horrific traumas, ones that—even after years—keep returning in flashbacks and nightmares.

Vancouver psychotherapist Ingrid Pacey, 70, has spent almost half her life dealing with women on the Downtown Eastside; many are casualties of childhood abuse, and later of chronic posttraumatic stress disorder. Today, Pacey is principal investigator in a $500,000 study run by the local chapter of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies

20

(Canada). With MAPS Canada, she and a dozen health scientists, psychotherapists, and volunteers aim to replicate findings that show MDMA can produce, with psychotherapy, an almost instantaneous cessation of PTSD. With just three MDMA/therapy sessions, nearly 83 percent no longer qualified for a treatment-resistant PTSD diagnosis. After relentless suffering, including ineffective exposure to legal antipsychotic drugs, addictions, and suicidal thoughts, it appears that ecstasy allows people to finally escape the horror.

“There are many people who believe in the myths of illegal drugs,” says Pacey, referring to the decades-long prohibition on psychedelics. “But pure MDMA—not street MDMA, which is cut with a lot of additives—is an ‘empathogen.’ It makes you feel like you love the world. You can’t feel danger: you can then talk about your fear without your fear shutting you down.” Pacey lists other psychedelic drugs—all similarly illegal—that

On March 23/24, the city conducts its sixth annual Homelessness Count, a one-night inventory meant to track progress on street homelessness, a scourge Vision Vancouver vowed to end by this year. Counts have fluctuated: in 2011, it was 154; last year, 533. We’re unusual in our annual count (Metro does one every three years), but that may change: last May, Ottawa enacted Bill M-455, which recommends all municipalities carry out so-called point-in-time counts using shared methodology and a common date rumoured to be scheduled for October 2016

have recently been shown to help resolve chronic addictions and fears: LSD has been successfully used in the treatment of alcoholism; psilocybin gives great relief to those suffering end-of-life anxieties; and ayahuasca and ibogaine appear to halt life-destroying addictions.

“Who knew?” she says, laughing.

Permission to use the drug required a Section 56 exemption from Health Canada (the same legal wormhole that allowed Vancouver Coastal Health to open Insite).

It was, says Mark Haden, chair of MAPS Canada and a UBC professor of population and public health, “a journey of 1,000 emails.” Approval for MAPS to receive a tablespoonsized vial of pure MDMA from Switzerland meant acquisition, he says, of a “bomb-proof vault” at UBC and four years of negotiations.

Six clients from the Lower Mainland—all victims of chronic PTSD—are subjects of the project, the first clinical psychedelic study in Canada since the mid 1970s. In the double-blind study, running to fall 2016, some get the drug, some a placebo. (The ones getting the placebo will be given MDMA after the initial study period.) Longterm assessment follows. Three identical studies exploring ecstasy’s efficacy in PTSD treatment are also running in Israel and the U.S. Interest in the results is huge.

And controversy is certain. Like the recent acceptance of medical marijuana, MDMA as a therapeutic medicine would challenge those who have long championed the War on Drugs. What if MDMA works? What if the use of therapeutic ecstasy or acid or hallucinogenic mushrooms could significantly reduce the costs, pegged at $46 billion a year, of North America’s anxiety disorders/depression epidemic?—Daniel Wood

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

VancouverLife.FINAL.indd 20

2015-01-27 11:23 AM

SubaruMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-23 11:27 AM

WELL EQUIPPED FROM $24,995*

MODELS EQUIPPED WITH

EYESIGHT ®†

‡‡

It’s also rated PZEV, which stands for Partial Zero Emission Vehicle, so your footprint is minimal, no matter where your right foot takes you. Learn more at subaru.ca.

Do what you want when you want. The XV Crosstrek is ready with legendary Subaru Symmetrical Full-Time All-Wheel Drive and exceptional fuel economy.

IT’S UP FOR IT. THE 2015 XV CROSSTREK.

2015

THE

BRIEF

URBAN FIX

 FR ANCES BUL A

Civic Af fairs

Steve Mathias runs the Inner City Youth Mental Health program out of St. Paul’s Hospital, shown here

The Kids Aren’t Alright But the champion for B.C.’s youth mental health has a plan photos by carlo ricci

S 22

steve mathias used to throw up every morning before school.

His anxiety levels were so off the charts, he couldn’t even manage phys. ed. When he went on to medical school he fell into a mild depression, and the doctor he visited just prescribed pills—not really what he needed. So these

days, when yet another kid in her teens or 20s shows up at his door, another kid on the verge of being pulled under by the riptides of young adulthood, on the verge of shutting down, of giving up, he gets what she’s going through.

Intimately. “There’s a great deal of anxiety in my family, a lot of

anxiety around performance and not making mistakes,” says Mathias, the child of a military family whose father went on to work for the United Nations in Haiti.

“It’s the same thing so many kids express to me.”

Life is very different these days for the psychiatrist and UBC assistant professor. Father to three kids under eight, with deep-set eyes and a shock of grey hair over his boyish face, he’s built an unexpectedly tranquil space for himself above the emergency entrance to St. Paul’s Hospital. One wall is covered with the ubiquitous IKEA poster of an orange bike in Amsterdam. A plastic bag of carrots and a Thermos await afternoon snack time. The bookshelf displays a copy of the positivethinking compendium If Only I’ d Said That by BC Business publisher Peter Legge.

Things seem less certain, though, for tens of thousands in B.C. doing battle with all the demons of anxiety (and worse) that erupt so often in youth— everything from drug use to schizophrenia to unshakable thoughts of suicide. Despite the impression many have that we are raising a generation of extraordinarily coddled and hovered-over children, the evidence suggests the opposite.

An interim report on youth mental health, delivered to the provincial government in November, disclosed discouraging numbers. Based on surveys from other countries, “As many as 12.6% of children and youth aged 4-17 years—or nearly 84,000 in British Columbia—are likely experiencing clinically significant mental disorders at any given time,” began the submission from Charlotte Waddell, who holds the

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

UrbanFix.FINAL.indd 22

15-01-28 4:06 PM

Canada Research Chair for children’s health policy at SFU. “These surveys also reveal stark service shortfalls in that under one third of young people with disorders— just 31% or 26,000 in BC—are estimated to be receiving specialized mental health services.”

Those numbers don’t even include those aged 18 to 24, considered by many in the mental-health world to be basically still kids in need of support. Mathias says that in 2012 172,000 people under the age of 24 visited doctors, showed up in ERs, or fi lled prescriptions for mental-health problems in B.C. He estimates at least as many have problems but don’t get help. Just at St. Paul’s, 1,500 young people come into emergency with mentalhealth or addictions concerns each year. Those concerns are the biggest health issue young people have, the heart disease and cancer of their demographic. Hence one of Mathias’s mantras: “If you’re going to have a mental illness, 75 percent of the time symptoms occur before 25.”

Many kids make it through with the help of family and friends who stick by them, fight for them, and push them into treatment.

There are many, though, who don’t have that, whose families are as troubled as they are, who come from foster care or get kicked out or have to leave because it’s all too unbearable. For them there’s no one to push to get an appointment with a doctor or make sure they have a place to eat and sleep or help them track down and apply for a specialized treatment program. For them it’s free fall. steve mathias has a vision.

It’s a big, bold one: dozens of clinics around the province; onestop shops dedicated to teens and

GROWING PAINS One in eight youth in B.C. will experience mental disorders, likely determined by age of onset 0-6 “We see the emergence of autism, anxiety, troublesome behaviours, and attention deficit” 7-12 “We see most of the anxiety disorders emerging by that point and then conduct disorders, which are the serious antisocial behaviours” 13+ “We see, in most cases, substance use, depression, bipolar, eating disorders, and schizophrenia really take hold” —from the statement

by Dr. Charlotte Waddell, Interim Report: Youth Mental Health in B.C.

20-somethings enhanced with all-out social media and internet entry points; apps that provide online coaching in mindfulness and controlling anxiety; video conferencing; easy-to-do cognitivebehaviour therapies. All in a kind of franchise operation of community mental health that will make it easy, even fun, to access.

“We’ve designed a system now that waits for young people to have a severe problem before they can get help,” says Mathias, in the steady, even tone he uses even when he’s making his strongest sales pitch for change. “It’s as if we told people with cancer that we would only treat them when they’re at Stage 4. And the fact that we’re not treating them now means that 20 years from now, we’ll still be having the same conversation about all these people, now living in the Downtown Eastside.”

His ambition seems mildly delusional, considering that mentalhealth services for young people now float unanchored between three massive, drifting bureaucracies: the health-care empire, the ministry of children and families, and the school system. Inside each are multiple actors: teachers and administrators, public-health nurses, emergency room and family doctors, private psychiatrists, addiction counsellors, mentalhealth counsellors, foster-care workers. Then there’s the reality that Vancouver Coastal Health just closed its one clinic dedicated to youth, the Pine Free Clinic in Kitsilano. And, of course, healthcare budgets, already the largest share of public expenditure, are perpetually overstretched.

What hope does Mathias have?

People around him say that if anyone can alter the direction of this particular Titanic, it’s him. “He

has been a very ambitious man on behalf of young people,” says Krista Thompson, Vancouver director of Covenant House, the agency that has been central in working with homeless kids. “He is a natural marketer. He has a way of producing natural sound bites.”

Mining company Silver Wheaton Corp. was sufficiently impressed that it donated $1.6 million in 2012 to fund services for his mental-health program for innercity youth, which will run until April 2016.

“What we liked was the approach,” says Silver Wheaton CEO Randy Smallwood. “Steve had some pretty good numbers to back him up.”

Smallwood says that he has a personal interest in helping improve mental-health services for young people, and his company has publicly set out that area as one it wants to support. He worried about the overlap of similar services in the DTES, but Mathias demonstrated that what he was doing was unique and that it dovetailed with others’ work there. “He’s a bit more of a collaborator,” says Smallwood. (The company is “definitely considering continuing our support,” he says.)

The health ministry came onboard later with additional funding of $750,000 a year.

But there are also hints—from Thompson, from others, from Mathias himself—that pushing for change, no matter how noble the cause, has set off a tussle inside the complex medical-social-service system that surrounds young people. “Sometimes he rubs people the wrong way,” says Thompson.

Others murmur that he’s been lucky, crusading at a time when the political will is there to support his campaign for a different model of services. Thompson’s colleague

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

UrbanFix.FINAL.indd 23

23

15-01-28 4:06 PM

THE

BRIEF

URBAN FIX

Civic Af fairs

FROM THE SHADOWS The counselled becomes counsellor  At 20, Matt Piercy knew his life had gone very wrong. He’d grown up in placid Maple Ridge the son of two medical workers. As a teen, he developed psychiatric problems and entered into a life of hospitalizations and drugs. A few years later, he was living in a crummy hotel on a bad stretch of Granville Street, addicted and with no plan for the future beyond surviving the day.

Then he met Dr. Steve, as he calls him.

Five years later, he has strong ideas about his future. Sitting on the brick landing of the Yaletown Starbucks, Piercy—a young man with a deep-red flat-top who looks like he could make the football team—is planning to get a social-work degree at UBC. In the meantime, he works as a peer counsellor with the Inner City Youth Mental Health Program out of St. Paul’s and lives in a West End apartment. Today, he’s on his way to an addictionsupport meeting after his work shift.

“I still take medications, but I am doing well.

I have a nice home and awesome friends,” says Piercy, who speaks in quick bursts. Mathias did what a lot of people are afraid to do with kids like him: skipped the “Everything’s going to be okay” to acknowledge that yes, he had real problems.

The doctor got him diagnosed, got him on medication, got him going to Covenant House, got him the resources he needed to secure housing and return to school. “He, the team,” says Piercy, “they saved my life.”—FB

“I still take medications, but I am doing well.”

Matt Piercy credits Steve Mathias with turning his life around

at Covenant House, program-services director John Harvey, puts it more bluntly. “There is no new money, so how are we going to pay for this? As Steve started to be successful, more resources were being applied to his program. Someone in the system lost out.” changing the system seemed just as hopeless in 2006. Back then, kids who were

24

on the street, or about to be, would cross paths with the medical system in some way. They’d show up in an emergency room or at a clinic talking about a different problem—inability to sleep, weight loss, a drug habit, drinking—and someone would recommend they see a psychiatrist or some other mental-health service.

That person would make an appointment, and four times out

of five the kid wouldn’t show. “It was a revolving door in the emergency room,” says Thompson.

At St. Paul’s a cluster of psychiatrists decided to try something different. Chief among them were Bill MacEwan, Megan Sherwood, and Mathias, the young doctor who had just come back from a fellowship in Melbourne where the national government had created a comprehensive system for

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

UrbanFix.FINAL.indd 24

15-01-28 4:07 PM

treating young people with psychiatric problems.

All three noticed the obvious problems with the homeless they were seeing at Covenant House down on Drake: the kids didn’t even bother trying to get help; they’d get appointments to see specialists, then not show up; they’d keep the appointments but refuse to take the pills prescribed. Mathias had been one of several medical students who started a clinic in 1999 in the Downtown Eastside, where they saw that forming a real bond with the people they were trying to help (not just treating them like patients) made a difference. Could the same approach succeed with youth in peril?

“They had this idea that they would move closer to the kids,” says Thompson. The trio started hanging out at Covenant House, meeting kids there, covering the costs of their work through sessional billings that hacked the unbreachable limitations of the Medical Services Plan. The kids responded. The rate of kept appointments climbed from 20 percent to 80. Covenant and the doctors started wondering how to go beyond just their own drop-in efforts. Sherwood and MacEwan moved on (Sherwood to adult psychiatry at VGH; MacEwan to run psychiatry at St. Paul’s), but Mathias stayed put. “Bill was the mentor, but Steve really picked up the ball and ran with it. He was the driving force,” says Harvey.

From those on-site meetings at Covenant House, Mathias created the Inner City Youth Mental Health Program, now with a team that includes seven psychiatrists, two social workers, an occupational therapist, and a psychiatric nurse. That team serves about 160

WILL THIS BE ON THE TEST? Mental competency is measured using the Global Assessment of Functioning. Answering a number of questions, patients receive a score from 1 to 100.

Broadly, a score above 80 is normal; serious problems correlate with scores below 50.

Mathias says many of his patients are in the low 40s. Because of discrepancies in subjective scoring, the GAF test has been replaced in the most recent Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders

He also gets resistance from those who think this new system is going to mean giving every teenager in the province a mentalhealth diagnosis, pathologizing every one of them into becoming a client. He counters that the problem isn’t getting too many kids into treatment; it’s helping too few. “Men in North America are especially reluctant to get help, and it impacts productivity for our young men.”

For the next decade, Mathias is going to be out making the time has come for these arguments over and over. the next step, Mathias They’re going to be hard for some believes—the first in his plan for to accept—especially the idea a provincial network, a brand for that there’s enough money to do youth mental health. This month, everything he believes should be a storefront on Granville Street done. (Mathias also thinks the becomes that one-stop shop he’s province should pay young people been talking about, a place (not minimum-wage salaries to finish yet named) where teens and school.) There will be those who young adults can come for basic fight against his ambitious plans physical health, for help with and those who encourage them. addictions, for mental-health John Harvey, who has spent hours treatment, for whatever they hashing out Mathias’s ideas with need. Just above the clinic, which him, says, in the end: “I trust his is a couple blocks north of the ambition. I trust what he’s trying bridge, the Career Zone already to do.” runs services aimed to help For his part, Mathias insists young adults access education the money is there. All he’s askand training. ing for is $100 million for child Mathias figures that the and youth mental health, almost new storefront will end up serva rounding error in the province’s ing about 1,600 young people a health-care budget of $17 billion year, a number that he admits (and rising). It makes more sense, scares people in other parts of he argues, to spend the money the mental-health network who early than to wait until the probfear he is opening the floodgates lems become far more entrenched. to a demand for services there’s As people get older and they’ve no way to meet. So part of his been addicted or struggling work now involves just trying to unsuccessfully with building a calm everyone down. “We can’t life for themselves for more than a be scared as a system that if we decade, “their belief in what’s posbrand health services for young sible is really diminished,” he says. people we’ll be overrun. That fear He points instead to the resilience is standing in the way of a couple of youth. “There’s a lot more hope. hundred thousand people in this They themselves still have hope province getting help.” for their future.” VM kids at six sites—the new Kettle Friendship Society social-housing building on Burrard and the new Renfrew House project in East Vancouver among them—as well as at services run by Atira, Raincity, Coast Mental Health, and Covenant House. The doctors run group sessions, meet one-on-one, and carve out time just to play with their clients.

One doctor has pickup basketball sessions. Mathias goes out snowboarding with them when he can.

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

UrbanFix.FINAL.indd 25

25

15-01-28 4:07 PM

THE

BRIEF

B L O C K WAT C H

Real Estate

SPOTLIGHT

The Little Village That Could It’s taken its own sweet time, but Southeast False Creek draws ever closer to fulfilling its Olympian promise

it’s hard to believe that only four years ago the Olympic Village was associated with colossal financial failure. “Today nobody in media wants to cover the Olympic Village because there is no story if there is no tragedy,” says Bob Rennie, who stepped in to help sell off the site in 2011. (Developer Francesco Aquilini bought the remaining condos last year.) We’re sitting in Kafka’s Coffee on Main Street, across the street from The Independent, a residential tower that Rennie is marketing for developer Rize Alliance.

Rennie knows the coffee shop is filled with 20somethings who would likely oppose a tower development. Yet they are his target market: youth whose parents might help them get into the market with a condo. And condos to answer that demand are popping up in the Olympic Village area, bordered to the east by Main Street and to the west by Cambie.

The plan for the Village was always for a socioeconomically diverse population, and the mix of rental, one-bedroom, and high-end units for downsizers has fulfilled that mission. Step into the Village’s Tap & Barrel or Urban Fare any Saturday afternoon, and you’ll find a bustle of young families, groups of young people, couples, and seniors. And so, it’s becoming abundantly clear that the former Olympic housing site is blooming into an ideally situated, full-on neighbourhood.

Most marketers still prefer to call the area Southeast False Creek, but it’s always going to be the Olympic Village, says Rennie. Rennie himself attempted to

26

rename it The Village on False Creek due to the black cloud that once hung over it. (Briefly, he also tried to christen the entire area north of Broadway NoBro.) There’s a lot more density to be added to the estimated 1,600 Village residents already living at the site.

There are another 23 units that Aquilini has for sale.

And several towers around the fringes are in various stages of development, totalling another 3,813 condo units, according to Rennie Marketing Systems’ data.

And there’s undeveloped city-owned acreage to the west of the Village, which Rennie estimates will add another 700 to 1,000 units one day.

Whether the Village will ever have soul is another question. For now, it’s a pretty face with great beer and (soon to be expanding) patios. And hallelujah, it’s no longer a ghost town. We’ll settle for that. VM

“Olympic Village is seen around the world as a model of forward-thinking, green, livable urban design. Its failure is invisible: the people of low income not able to live there because of a decision by city council over a decade ago to do away with more mixed-income housing.” —Charles Montgomery, author, Happy City

John Sinal

by kerry gold

T O W E R WAT C H

EVERYONE’S A STAR As Southeast False Creek condos continue to sprout, developers use whatever it takes to stand apart

BOSA FALSE CREEK Where 180 Switchmen St. (the new street south of Terminal, off Main) Specialty Rent-to-own: 15 percent of rent is set aside as down payment Completion Taking applicants Units 90 Developer Bosa Properties

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

BlockWatch.FINAL.N.indd 26

2015-01-27 11:15 AM

HOT BUY 1801–1708 COLUMBIA ST.

$799,900 // A 984 sq. ft. penthouse (2 beds/ 2 baths) in Wall Centre False Creek is $200 a sq. ft. cheaper than the original Village

FIGURE ONE SCIENCE WORLD

Construction completed

Olympic Village

Under Construction/In development

Not in OCP for rezoning

The Creek 737 units

Central 304 units

QUE

S A LT S T

Block 100 231 units

Mario’s Gelato

James 155 units O CO

COLUMBIA

1 S T AV E

First Place 129 units 2 N D AV E

Meccanica 170 units

Proximity

YL W

4 T H AV E

Unnamed Aurmon

Maynards Block 253 units

(Application)

Montreux 91 units

Pinnacle Living I 105 units

Pinnacle Living II 133 units

Opsal Steel 175 units

Earnest Ice Cream

Unnamd Beedie 260 units

MAIN

Marguerite Ford Apartments 147 units

The One 215 units

O N TA R I O

3 R D AV E

Tower Green West 488 units

MANITOBA

W O

Foundry 106 units

E

(Application)

IE

Exchange 68 units

Lido 183 units

Flying Pig

Arts Club

K

FOR SALE: 15 acres for mostly residential development

Unnamed Concord 179 units

CR

CAMBIE BRIDGE

Wall Centre False Creek 558 units

BEC

City of Vancouver/Social housing

5 T H AV E

MOUNT PLEASANT

John Sinal

 JUST ADD WATER (VIEWS) Every day in every way, the former industrial wasteland that is Greater Olympic Village— properly, Southeast False Creek—grows busier and busier. Construction workers lounging outside JJ Bean are a standard sight as one commercial building after another falls to the marketer’s axe. For now, Second Avenue stems the sprawl.

MECCANICA Where 108 E. First Ave. Specialty Marketed with auto details for the Porsche workshop that once stood there Completion 2014 Units 165 Developer Cressey

OPSAL STEEL Where 1775 Quebec St. Specialty Heritage conversion from the 1918 Opsal Steel Building Completion 2014 Units 178 Developer Bastion Development

MAYNARDS BLOCK Where 445 W. Second Ave. Specialty Inspired by the historic auction house Maynards Completion 2013 Units 254 Developer Aquilini Development & Construction

EXCHANGE Where 388 W. First Ave. Specialty A small project, named after BC Tel heritage site Completion 2009 Units 68 Developer PCI Developments Corp.

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

BlockWatch.FINAL.N1.indd 27

27

15-01-27 4:00 PM

THE

BRIEF

ON THE RECORD

 PET TI FONG

Newsmakers

A Brave Face

reason was behind this demonic attack. [Her husband, Hasan Sayeed Sumon, was subsequently found dead in prison.] He took Rumana Monzur was a graduate student at UBC when her husband my sight and it made my life a went into a “demonic” state, savaging her and gouging out her eyes. Four hundred times harder, but we are years later, irreparably blind, she has never seen herself post-surgery capable of overcoming.

PF What surgeries did you have?

RM The tip of my nose was missPETTI FONG The last time I saw you ing, and my amazing surgeons took was in 2011. You’d returned from cartilage from my right ear and Bangladesh, where the attack took reconstructed it using that part; place, and you were being wheeled they used other parts to replace out of YVR. You had a scarf on what was missing.

PF Were you vain before? your head, but your face and RM I loved to dress up, and I wanted the damage inflicted on it were everyone to have the same idea of exposed. This is the image many dressing up to look their best. Looks people have kept of you. What do don’t matter to me anymore. I hope you think you looked like then?

RUMANA MONZUR What I remempeople can see in me my energy, not ber was feeling my face for the first how my nose is or how my eyes are time afterward. A part of my cheek or what my face looks like.

PF What do you miss about seeing? was gone, and my jaw was totally RM I miss seeing the people I love— open. I didn’t have a nose, and I like my daughter—when they’re didn’t dare touch that part. It felt happy, they’re smiling. Many like it was not my face.

HE TOOK MY SIGHT AND IT MADE MY LIFE A HUNDRED TIMES HARDER, BUT WE ARE CAPABLE OF OVERCOMING

OnTheRecord.FINAL_N.indd 28

friends I saw before I became blind, when I talk to them and they’re laughing or changing positions, I can totally understand how they look. I remember that, but I miss seeing their smiles and expressions and emotions. Your face is the mirror to your heart.

I miss seeing that. VM For much more on the process and results of plastic surgery, see “Vanity Fair,” beginning pg. 58

John Sinal

IN BRIEF Monzur, 37, is studying law at UBC, where she received a master’s degree in political science last year. University students and faculty helped raise $95,000 for her medical care and living costs

PF Your husband attacked you in front of your daughter, Anusheh, then five years old. He bit off part of your nose, your cheek, your lips and throat. He gouged out your eyes. What is the last thing you remember seeing?

RM He told me he wanted to kill me. He wanted to buy acid and destroy my face and kill me. When he strangled me and I struggled, he destroyed my face and my eyes.

I would love to know what the

15-01-29 10:05 AM

+

WITH GREAT POWER, COMES GREAT CONVERSATION The Vancouver magazine + Brian Jessel M Power Event Series, starting March 23, 2015

SPEAKER

EVENT

SERIES For the first time ever, Vancouver magazine and Brian Jessel BMW team up to bring select 2014 Power 50 honorees to the stage in a networking and thought leadership speaker series hosted at the luxurious Brian Jessel BMW dealership.

Join the most powerful and influential Vancouverites for 5 nights of up-close and personal interviews. Each evening will feature two 2014 Power 50 speakers in conversations moderated by Vancouver editor-in-chief John Burns and publisher Tom Gierasimczuk on topics ranging from new affluence to the city’s global brand.

THE EVENT SCHEDULE Monday, March 23, 2015 | 6 p.m. – 8 p.m. | Brian Jessel BMW, 2311 Boundary Road, Vancouver

May 11, 2015

July 6, 2015

September 14, 2015

November 2, 2015

The names of the speakers will be revealed at BrianJesselBMW.com/EventSeries Reserve you tickets now! Limited seats available for these complimentary evenings.

BrianJesselM-PoweredMAR15FP_sc.indd 8

15-01-30 12:11 PM

TIM GARDNER

THE

SKIER WITH LUNAR HALO, 2014.

WATERCOLOUR ON PAPER. 15.5 X 25 INCHES

BRIEF

THE ESSENTIALS

MAN WASHING FACE AND BIG DIPPER, 2014.

WATERCOLOUR ON PAPER. 16.125 X 12.125 INCHES

S t u f f You Should Do

VISUAL ART

The Art of Necessity Meticulous watercolours document, from a remove, the comings and goings of ordinary folk

DANCE

TIM GARDNER MONTE CLARK GALLERY. MAR. 7 TO APR. 4

30

THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX STEP A night of commissions investigates life through movement TRACE, QUEEN ELIZABETH THEATRE. MAR. 26 TO 28

 With her latest mixed program, Emily Molnar continues to bring the leading edge of modern dance to the city. As artistic director of Ballet BC, she sees her role as expressly curatorial, selecting the best from around the world. Trace began with confirmation that Vancouver would host the Canadian premiere of William Forsythe’s Workwithinwork. “His work is inspiring and challenging for a dancer,” explains Molnar, who collaborated with the choreographer in Frankfurt. “This piece is episodic, very virtuosic and intimate. It’s a

established in Europe but just now breaking

beautiful example of his neoclassical style.”

into North America. “We generate a lot of

As soon as she pinned down Forsythe,

new work,” Molnar notes of World Premiere.

Molnar decided to bring back Medhi Waler-

“This is for nine dancers and uses many dif-

ski’s Petite Cérémonie, a piece created for

ferent pieces of music. Stylistically, it’s quite

the company in 2011. “It’s the perfect con-

different.”

trast to the Forsythe,” she says. “It brings dance and theatre together and asks what it

Taking risks, Molnar says, is what makes Ballet BC exciting and engaging for audi-

is to live life—and whether you live inside or

ences. “These works are beautifully crafted,”

outside the box.”

she says. “With them, we hope to create

Rounding out the program is another

meaning and community, as well as offering

debut, commissioned by Molnar, from Walter

the sheer pleasure of their visual artistry to

Matteini, an Italian choreographer who’s well

be enjoyed.” Ticketmaster.ca

Gardner courtesy the artist, Monte Clark Gallery, 303 Gallery New York; dancer Peter Smida: Michael Slobodian

u.s.-born, canadian-raised artist Tim Gardner makes work that appears to go resolutely against the modern grain: realist, figurative, and largely in watercolours.

“I took one look at his work and said to myself, ‘This guy gets it,’ ” Gardner’s former Columbia University professor Archie Rand said of him over a decade ago. “He’s not making art that is answering academic or verbal questions. He’s making works of necessity.”

Gardner has articulated that drive as a need to connect, to be drawn more closely to those around him, while maintaining his sense of being a natural outsider. His first works featured images of his brother partying with friends—peeing onto flower gardens and the like—depicting a version of masculinity that he wasn’t part of but needed to understand.

He paints from photographs, capturing on canvas a snapshot of time, turning the seemingly everyday into something worth considering. “In his view,” local critic Robin Laurence wrote in Canadian Art magazine, “the comings and goings of ordinary folk are of consequence, and, more importantly, so is their relationship with the natural world.” Monteclarkgallery.com

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Essentials.FINAL.indd 30

2015-01-27 11:03 AM

CALL OF DUTY TV funnyman Adam Devine on bearing the burden of standup genius ADAM DEVINE, COMMODORE BALLROOM. MAR. 5

 Living up to the title—if not the

the road, touring a standup show

spirit—of his hit Comedy Central

that lets it all hang out. An alum-

show Workaholics, Adam Devine

nus of the improv scene, he says

is certainly keeping himself busy.

his passion for standup grew

Staying true to a life of debauch-

after he became disenchanted

ery takes commitment, it seems.

with the ensemble setting, want-

Alongside Season 5 of the druggy-college-dropout sitcom, he stars in Adam Devine’s House

ing to take more risks—and more responsibility.

“If I fail miserably, I want it

Party (which he created as a

all on me,” he explains. “There’s

launchpad for up-and-coming

something really freeing about

standup comics); will reprise his

getting onstage with a micro-

egomaniacal role, Bumper, in

phone and just saying, like,

this year’s Pitch Perfect 2; and

‘Here’s my stuff. If you like it,

returns as Andy, the male nanny,

it’s all my fault. If you hate it, it’s

in Modern Family.

also all my fault.’ You know? Like,

Still, according to Devine,

‘Those are my jokes. If you don’t

some things remain “too tight-

like them, then fuck you, those

butthole for TV,” and so he’s hit

are my jokes.’ ” Ticketmaster.ca

T H E AT R E

Heart of Darkness A Ghana-born playwright digs deep in his exploration of self-loathing OBAABERIMA, THE CULTCH. MAR. 24 TO APR. 4

tawiah m’carthy’s acclaimed one-man show focuses on agyeman, a Ghanaian locked up in a Canadian jail for a violent crime. His past is marked by secrets, shame, and suppression: having fled his native country to study law, Agyeman achieved distance between himself and the taunts of “obaaberima” (“girl-boy”) but remained trapped by his own inability to accept himself.

On the eve of his release, Agyeman decides to tell his story, believing that honesty is his only hope for a better future. Created by M’carthy, who was himself born in Ghana, with Toronto’s Buddies in Bad Times Theatre company, Obaaberima received rave reviews on opening and seven 2013 Dora Award nominations (winning two). The Toronto Star called his performance a tour de force and the play persuasive and touching. Its Vancouver run continues the Cultch’s impressive commitment to staging vibrant, modern African drama. Thecultch.com

M’carthy: Tanja Tiziana

Gardner courtesy the artist, Monte Clark Gallery, 303 Gallery New York; dancer Peter Smida: Michael Slobodian

COMEDY

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

Essentials.FINAL_N.indd 31

31

15-01-27 3:43 PM

SPIRIT MEMBER GEOFFREY KELLY IS SOMETIMES PART OF THE IRISH ROVERS AND WILL PLAY THE LOCAL STOP

THE

OF THEIR FINAL WORLD TOUR, A CELEBRATION OF 50

BRIEF

YEARS OF FIDDLES AND UNICORNS, AT NEW WEST’S

THE ESSENTIALS

MASSEY THEATRE, MAR. 13. IRISHROVERSMUSIC.COM

S t u f f You Should Do

JAZZ

Reunited, and It Feels So Good A jazz-fusion legend and a post-bop iconoclast walk into a bar…

CHICK COREA AND HERBIE HANCOCK CHAN CENTRE FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS. MAR. 15

born a year apart (herbie hancock in Chicago in 1940, Chick Corea in Massachusetts in ’41) both were piano prodigies who recorded their first jazz albums in the early 1960s before lengthy (separate) spells playing with Miles Davis. Both emerged from the master’s shadow with best-selling electric jazz-rock records in the early ’70s—embracing funk, fusion, and Latin flavours—before combining for the first time (to the surprise of their wider public) for a back-to-basics acoustic-piano concert tour in 1978. Two exceptional albums came out of that series: Corea Hancock and An Evening With Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock.

A quarter-century and dozens of Grammy awards later, the two remain at the top of their game. Corea recently released the acclaimed Trilogy, while Hancock published the autobiography Possibilities last year. It would seem this reunion is fuelled by anything but nostalgia; rather, it’s a means to recharge creative batteries and reimagine old favourites like Hancock’s “Maiden Voyage,” Corea’s “La Fiesta,” and Davis’s “Someday My Prince Will Come.” Chancentre.com

Essentials.FINAL.indd 32

THE SPIRIT IS WILLING The St. Patrick’s Day show of the year SPIRIT OF THE WEST, COMMODORE BALLROOM. MAR. 14

 We may never escape the ’80s.

and friendship, playing our hearts

Some of their excesses seem to

out. I will continue to write and

disappear, only to resurface (inex-

tour, because this is what I do and

plicably), like jumpsuits and shoul-

what I love.” But he’s had to hand

der pads. Others never leave. One

off guitar duties and adapt to

constant we will never apologize

memory lapses. (There’s an iPad

for is our fondness for Spirit of

with lyrics on the mic stand.)

the West, the prototypical West

A captivating performer (he

Coast Celtic-rock outfi t that turns

also tells stories and performs a

32 this year. Thirty-two! Return-

spastically hypnotizing dance at

ing, too, is the group’s annual St.

shows), Mann is a successful actor

Patrick’s show at the Commodore.

on local stages. A bout of colorec-

This is the year to go, with lead

tal cancer last year gave the mate-

singer John Mann having increas-

rial for his latest solo album, The

ing troubles from the early-onset

Waiting Room; that story is now in

Alzheimer’s he announced last

development with the Arts Club

fall. He has said he’ll perform as

Theatre. That show is scheduled to

long as he’s able: “We will forge

open the Arts Club’s new perfor-

ahead as we’ve been doing the

mance space on West First Ave.

last 30-odd years with humour

this fall. Ticketmaster.ca

Corea: Dick Zimmerman; SOTW: Alec Watson

Herbert Jeffrey Hancock and Armando Anthony Corea

POP MUSIC

2015-01-27 11:04 AM

THE 8TH ANNUAL

W I N E A U C T I O N & TA S T I N G

March 5, 2015

at

benefiting

Audi Downtown Vancouver

F O R T I C K E T S V I S I T G R A P E J U I C E VA N C O U V E R . C O M

FOUNDING SPONSORS

EXCLUSIVE VENUE SPONSOR

P L ATI N U M S P O N S O R

GOLD SPONSORS

BigSistersMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-22 11:35 AM

HUMANS’ DEVASTATION OF THE EARTH TAKES A MORE SCHOLARLY TURN

THE

BRIEF

WHEN ILLINOIS-BASED COMMON GROUND’S SEVENTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON CLIMATE CHANGE: IMPACTS AND RESPONSES TOUCHES

THE ESSENTIALS

DOWN AT UBC ROBSON SQUARE IN APRIL. (LAST YEAR WAS IN REYKJAVIK; THE YEAR BEFORE, PORT-LOUIS, MAURITIUS.) FOR DETAILS, ON-CLIMATE.COM

S t u f f You Should Do

PHOTOGRAPHY

Lancetooth Crosscut Saw (2014) from the series Last Stand. Ink on cotton rag

Trunk Show An exhibition mourns a time when you won’t see the forest or the trees DAVID ELLINGSEN, INITIAL GALLERY. MAR. 26 TO APR. 25

“fi ve generations of my family have been a part of the forest industry in British Columbia,” says Cortes Island photographer David Ellingsen. “From falling oldgrowth trees and clear-cutting to contributing to local sustainable harvest initiatives and environmental responsibility.”

It’s no wonder, then, that his current show—he’s been exhibiting for a dozen years—concerns remnants of the

ancient forests that surround him. Mighty stumps, like the rotting carcasses of dinosaurs, suggest how modern industrial practices bring Mother Earth to her knees, even as the painterly beauty of these Last Stand compositions celebrates the beauty bound up in the aging of the Earth. Is there a paradox between visions of devotion and despair? Of course—as only a British Columbian can articulate. Initialgallery.com

Pérez Art Museum, Miami

GALLERIES

THE NOUVELLE VAG The art gallery pumps up the volume with an eight-month look at its proposed collaboration with a Swiss starchitect MATERIAL FUTURE, VANCOUVER ART GALLERY. MAR. 27 TO OCT. 4

 Choosing renowned Swiss

wealthy donors stepped in to

will also be a section devoted to

firm Herzog & de Meuron for the

prevent the museum’s flight to the

the history of the VAG and its pre-

proposed new Vancouver Art

financial district in order to save

vious moves.

Gallery was a bravura move. Will a

money. Ahem.

In a move that must be seen

Mostly, though, the exhibition will seek to highlight Herzog

a few blocks east of the gallery’s

not simply as introducing the

& de Meuron’s commitment to

current site? It’s hard to imagine,

architects and their methodology

contemporary art and the expres-

but there’s no denying the sheer

to Vancouverites but as a call for

sion of place through materials

chutzpah of facing down the

a collective embracing of a vision,

and design. VAG curator Bruce

plan’s critics with the possibil-

the VAG has given over half of

Grenville insists this prioritizing

ity of a building that would ignite

its ground fl oor to an exhibition

of artists and geography, and a

excitement worldwide.

of the architects’ previous work,

subtle non-institutional capacity

Material World: The Architecture of

for drawing people into spaces,

wondrous Tate Modern, a wel-

Herzog & de Meuron and the New

makes for a truly energizing

coming beacon on London’s

Vancouver Art Gallery. Over this

prospect for the city. “They design

South Bank, also created in San

time, the display will evolve to

buildings with the ability to change

Francisco’s Golden Gate Park the

unveil first the design concept and

the way people feel, both about

spectacular De Young museum—

then the schematics of what could

their community and themselves

a project only realized after

be the gallery’s new home. There

as citizens.” Vanartgallery.bc.ca

The architects of the

Roland Halbe/Herzog & de Meuron

grand design actually materialize

“Bird’s Nest” Stadium, Beijing

34

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Essentials.FINAL_N.indd 34

15-01-27 4:10 PM

EXPERIENCE YOUR NEW AUTO SHOW

MARCH 24 - 29 Tickets and information at VancouverInternationalAutoShow.com

@vanauto15

Facebook.com/VIAS

VANCOUVER CONVENTION CENTRE

@VancouverAutoShow

LBMG VIAS VanMag 8.125x11.indd 1

2015-01-27 3:20 PM

VancouverIntlAutpMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-28 5:09 PM

PortlandMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-26 5:00 PM

TA S T E M A K ER

CHEF S TA BLE

FRESH SHEET

THE DECANTER

MIX MASTER

“I love to cook because it makes people happy.

I would never go home and cook for myself because there’s nobody there who’s gonna applaud you: ‘That was great!’ ” PG. 43

T HE Hot restaurants, food trends, wines & chefs

Scale Down, Veg Out felix zhou has worked in some finely appointed kitchens, West, Nita Lake Lodge, and London’s Michelin-starred La Chapelle among them. He also happens to be an enthusiastic meat eater. So why did he jump at the chance to assume his first executive-chef role at the Parker, a 19-seat, 500-square-foot vegetarian restaurant on bustling Union Street whose “kitchen” is little more than some induction burners off the bar?

“The challenge,” explains Zhou, an astonishingly young-looking 27. “In London I worked for a very vegetable-driven chef ”—Simon Rogan, at his acclaimed pop-up Roganic. “Anyone can cook meat, but to create a menu just based on very humble vegetables, and showcase them and make them taste good and look good, I think it’s a unique skill.”

Come the thaw, Zhou looks forward to incorporating spring garlic, rhubarb, and sorrel into his seasonally changing menu.

Kamil Bialous

THE PARKER 237 Union St., 604-779-3804

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

DishOpener.FINAL.indd 37

37

2015-01-27 10:56 AM

AU COMPTOIR’S CHEF DE CUISINE,

THE

DISH

DANIEL M C GEE, CULTIVATED HIS FRENCH CHOPS AS SOUS CHEF AT

TA S T E M A K E R

Recently Reviewed

PIED-À-TERRE, THEN DABBLED WITH ASIAN FUSION AT GASTOWN’S PIDGIN

Paris Match Perhaps nothing can fully compare to the experience of dining in the City of Lights, but Kitsilano’s Au Comptoir comes as close as any room in Vancouver by timothy taylor photos by a ndrew querner

B 38

By the time you read this, famed Montreal-born author Mavis Gallant will have been gone for a year.

She died in Paris, at age 92, on February 18, 2014. She had lived there virtually all of her adult life, but she’ll always be Canada’s greatest writer to me.

She was also a great dinner companion. I ate with her once at the legendary Le Dôme, in her neighbourhood of Montparnasse; I was served turbot on quinoa,

plated with an ivory swirl of wine reduction and bright sprigs of greenery. Very fancy. But she also liked a humbler place around the corner in Rue de la GrandeChaumière called Wadja: a classic Parisian bistro with tightly packed tables and chairs, a tiled floor, and roiling conversation and laughter. When we arrived there, the owner came out to greet Mavis and seated us like we were minor royalty.

“What’s pavé de biche?”

I remember asking her while puzzling over the menu. “Oh,” she replied, “that’s Bambi.” Later she told me I reminded her of a jazz pianist from Winnipeg named Johnny, who also happened to be her long-gone husband. I’m not sure what she meant by that, but I’ll always treasure it.

Mavis never made it to Vancouver, as far as I’m aware, but I know the restaurant where I’d take her

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Tastemaker.FINAL.indd 38

2015-01-27 11:22 AM

to dine here if I could. Opened last October, Au Comptoir isn’t like a Parisian bistro; it is one, channelling the spirit I encountered at Wadja quite unlike any other restaurant I know of in this city.

What I like best about the vibe here is its café-style friendliness: “Welcome.” “Can I get you a drink?” “We have some specials.”

I love service that gets right to it without pausing to admire itself.

No fancy stemware, just paper napkins on the bar, remnants of a tile mosaic on the bare concrete near the front door, a chanson soundtrack—check, check, check.

And topping it off, the pleasant chaos of chatter, just like I remember from Wadja.

The food perfectly matches the ambiance. These are refined plates, but very approachable.

I ate at Au Comptoir twice in busy December. The first time, on a rainy evening, the pavement outside slick black and neon-stained, I felt pretty cozy at the bar tucking into a gorgeous beef shank special—rich and cooked to forktender, underlaid with a creamy pomme purée and caramelized Brussels sprouts. It was preceded by oeufs meurette, a bistro classic of poached eggs with slow-cooked onions and wine reduction, made smoky with the addition of bacon.

It arrived in a little skillet that was tantalizingly strewn with paperthin discs of black truffle, although this ended up being the only negative of my visit. Truffles are menu

THE

TICKET AU COMPTOIR 2278 W. Fourth Ave., 604-569-2278 HOURS 8am-10pm daily (closed Tuesdays); weekend brunch 10am-5pm PRICES All dinner mains under $30 NOTES Prior to Au Comptoir’s instant success, this address hosted a series of failures, including a seafood restaurant, a soup spot, and a coffee shop. Like the Parisian bistros that inspired it, it gets plenty loud when busy

Opposite page: chef de cuisine Daniel McGee; confi t leek tart with potato crisps. This page, top: oeufs meurette with bacon and black truffle

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

Tastemaker.FINAL.indd 39

39

2015-01-27 11:22 AM

THE

DISH

TA S T E M A K E R

Recently Reviewed

click bait, I suppose, but you might as well skip them if they’re without aroma or flavour, as these ones were. (Perhaps too long in transit from Périgord?)

A second meal, this time with a group, allowed me to sample more widely. The highlights were a leek tart with superbly crispy pastry, garnished with frisée and lightly sour buttermilk ricotta. A smoked-salmon appetizer came with shavings of endive and fennel, chervil, and dill fronds.

40

Main-course standouts included herb-crusted ling cod served with a smear of eggplant purée and a fresh, lively sauce vierge, while grilled lamb sirloin with a white-bean ragout played different notes—earthy and comforting.

These are dishes that present their flavours robustly but always artfully. Meanwhile, all around us, the room rang with conviviality, and second bottles of wine could be seen making their way from the cellar to the tables.

With Au Comptoir (whose owners, Maxime Bettili and Julien Aubin, met in France at the start of their culinary training), we now have in Vancouver a taste of Paris at its best—which can be hard to find in Paris itself if you don’t have a local guide. A year on from when we lost her, I’d like to think it would be Mavis’s hangout, were she here. I can practically see her holding forth at a table along the wall, cracking jokes and remembering Johnny. VM

Clockwise from top left: Au Comptoir’s bustling lunch service; grilled lamb sirloin with white-bean ragout; selections from the dessert carousel

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Tastemaker.FINAL.N.indd 40

15-01-28 4:04 PM

Andrea Fernandez

SECOND BOTTLES OF WINE COULD BE SEEN MAKING THEIR WAY FROM THE CELLAR TO THE TABLES

B R I E F LY N O T E D

Sliders 546 W. Broadway, 604-559-0040  The branding is dull and the menu

wood—and it has more people working

produce to make jams and spreads

the door than its competition has work-

that are dispensed into jars and shared

ing the taps. A cavernous space, Steel Toad has an insatiable desire to please: live music, big TV screens, and a food menu that aspires to haute levels.

The food is better than it need be.

concept seemingly fi ve years late, but

(The chef, Robbie Robinson, worked

Sliders plates a convincing argument

at Claridge’s and Le Crocodile.) Piz-

as to why its namesake comestible

zas have a solid Napoli-inspired crust

hasn’t yet worn out its welcome. This

but are hampered by a more-is-more

unremarkable-looking space was

approach to toppings; neverthe-

clearly created with the aim to replicate

less, they’re priced aggressively low

itself into a fast-food empire. Luckily,

(starting at $12 for a Margherita that

whatever it lacks in aesthetic charac-

can feed two). A Montreal smoked-

ter it makes up for with a diverse menu

meat sandwich isn’t revelatory except

of addictive hand-held flavour bombs.

when—again—you’re only charged

An Original Beef slider is more

$12. One suspects the “bistro” menu

than the sum of its parts: properly

is rarely explored by most patrons,

charred Alberta beef, aged cheddar,

but those who do get offerings like a

BEER BUZZ Steel Toad is named for those who worked in the Opsal Steel plant that formerly occupied the brewpub’s premises. (The term “steel toad” is typically used in reference to whomever operates or works in close proximity to the blast furnace.)

Head brewmaster Chris Charron, 27, is a Vancouver native who developed his skills at Muskoka Brewery before returning here. He created fi ve inaugural beers for Steel Toad and hopes to add more in time

with friends and family. That practice is expressed here with a selection of “cold mezze”—most vegetarian or vegan—that are uniformly fresh and vibrant: try the hummus trio, including a rich, tahini-forward house iteration and a pair of ever-changing seasonal flavours. Lunch offers wraps (fried-toorder falafel delivers epic crunch) and salads (chickpea lentil is a fortifying protein powerhouse), while dinner adds heaping plates of beef-okra stew, lamb shank, a daily fish, and more. (We found the lamb’s bath of yogurt-mint sauce a bizarre match, but our neighbours devoured it.)

Clever cocktails and a brief but thoughtful wine list, combined with the dining room’s gentle buzz, will make

good pickle, and the clever addition of

cauliflower-and-whiskey soup with

Hickory Sticks—an excellent burger,

sablefish that could easily pass muster

diminutive or not. Better still are the

at a fine-dining establishment (for

seating didn’t seem so eager to send

Oyster Po’ Boy (with pickled onion and

double the $8 price).

you on your way. VM

horseradish aioli) and Mushroom &

Young brewmaster Chris Charron

Goat Cheese, one of three vegetarian

has settled into a nice groove, with

options that rival many of their meat-

options that range from the very topi-

centric counterparts.

Each palm-sized slider costs $4, which might seem steep given that

you want to linger. If only the metal

cal (a sauvignon saison that uses New Zealand hops) to the near-sublime (a wallop of a heavily peated session

you’ll need two to make a meal, but

ale). Better still, a flight here is $6.96,

their uniform deliciousness forgives

versus $8 at 33 Acres and Brassneck.

this, as does the option of adding a

Welcome to the neighbourhood.

fountain soda and an almost-too-generous hillock of fries for a mere toonie.

Steel Toad Brewpub & Dining Hall 97 E. Second Ave., 604-709-8623

Jamjar 2280 Commercial Dr., 604-252-3957  In 2003, Nuba introduced to Vancouver its elevated notion of Lebanese food: falafel, hummus, shish tawook,

Andrea Fernandez

and other usual suspects, but prepared  Does Olympic Village really need

with local, organic ingredients and an

another beer-focused spot? There’s

uncommon attention to detail. Jamjar,

already 33 Acres, Brassneck, Craft,

the brainchild of two immigrants who

and Tap & Barrel. The consistently full

recently arrived here from Lebanon,

house at Steel Toad suggests it does.

offers a still more sophisticated take

The historic Opsal Steel building has

that’s attracting packed houses.

been expensively refurbished inside with a sleek mix of glass, iron, and

Jamjar takes its name from the Lebanese tradition of using surplus

Roasted butternut squash pizza and beer flight at Steel Toad

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

Tastemaker.FINAL.indd 41

41

2015-01-27 11:22 AM

SHELOME BOUVETTE WORKED IN SEVERAL

THE

DISH

VANCOUVER KITCHENS BEFORE BECOMING EXECUTIVE CHEF AT LOLITA’S SOUTH OF THE BORDER CANTINA IN 2005. SHE’S NOW

C H E F S TA B L E

Kitchen Confidences

AN OWNER OF PERUVIAN-THEMED CHICHA

This Woman’s Work Professional kitchens used to be almost exclusively the domain of men. These two chef/restaurateurs have witnessed—and played a part in—the retreat of that norm as told to mark philps

Q Where did you get your start in the industry?

onions, and you’d make chicken pot pie or just basic things, and that’s how I taught myself. I just realized that I loved it. We didn’t buy a lot of packaged food.

SHELOME BOUVETTE I always wanted to be a chef, ever since I was a little kid. I’d watch The GalQ Do you have a memory of the first loping Gourmet and Julia Child, thing you made as a little kid? and so I was always in the kitchen with my grandma. We’d be making SB My mom would come home— perogies and borscht. And then she worked full-time and she was I went to cooking school and just a single mom—and I’d have things started working from the bottom. ready, and she’d be like, “Where LISA HENDERSON I was always did you learn that?” I felt like it was moonlighting in the restaurant what I wanted to do. I just picked it business, and I took off to Tofino up. I would read everything, and it for one summer and was offered up was just something I was good at. a restaurant, the Alley Way Café.

I eventually went on to build my own restaurant, RainCoast Café in Tofino, for 16 years.

Q What were your food experiences at home? Were your parents into food?

it was a lot of Stove Top stuffing wrapped in hamburger roulade.

But my aunt, whom I was very close to, had a cellar stuffed with preserves, she had a wood-burning stove, she cooked pies, she made tea the proper way. She was my inspiration, for sure.

SB Both my parents cook. My

whole family cooks. We didn’t have a lot of money, so you would go and get your carrots, celery, and

42

LH I took cooking classes in school, and I’d go home and try them out on the family. One of my formative memories is picking wild asparagus in Kamloops.

Q Do you see more young women applying for apprenticeships nowadays?

SB My kitchen right now, there’s one man, but the rest of us are women. We’re different. We’re more sensitive. People always say women can multitask, but I don’t

Evaan Kheraj

LH My mom certainly tried, but

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 0 15

ChefsTable.FINAL.indd 42

2015-01-27 10:54 AM

FOLLOWING 16 YEARS AT TOFINO’S RAINCOAST CAFE, LISA HENDERSON CO-OPENED LATITUDE, ON MAIN STREET, IN 2009. SHE’S NOW EXECUTIVE CHEF AT CHINATOWN’S THE UNION

everything into one place. I really respect that about her.

MALE CHEFS COOK FOR THEMSELVES. FEMALE CHEFS COOK FOR EVERYONE ELSE know if that’s necessarily true.

Definitely more emotions, more drama, in the kitchen.

Q Did you have female chefs who

were mentors to you?

SB Tina Fineza. She’s one of my

LH I had a friend who said, “Male chefs cook for themselves. Female chefs cook for everyone else.” That’s always stuck with me.

SB That’s why I do it. I love to cook because it makes people happy. I would never go home and cook for myself because there’s nobody there who’s gonna applaud you: “That was great!”

favourite people. She’s done so well with her career—she decided not to be just stuck in one place. Her and Annette Rawlinson, they started this company, Service Excellence Hospitality Consultants, where they’ve gone in and they’ve just opened up all these restaurants, and they’re so successful. Then they can up and do something else rather than just stay and put

Raised in the Philippines, Tina Fineza earned a degree in film studies before pursuing a culinary career. Her talents brought her through the kitchens of Lumière, Star Anise, and others; subsequently she became consulting chef for the likes of Habit, La Taqueria, and Les Faux Bourgeois

LH The restaurant I took over in Tofino was run by a fiery Chilean woman. I learned about working hard from her, but it was her approach toward people and how she treated us that made me decide I was never going to run a kitchen like that. To be called “idiot” over and over—you just know that’s how you’re not gonna do things.

SB It’s almost like being a parent: you don’t want to make your parents’ mistakes, so you try not to do that with your own staff. I’ve worked under a lot of people who would yell and scream and throw pans. I just choose not to treat my staff like that. You have to respect people. They’ll work hard for you if you respect them.

LH Though I’ve had people that can’t hack that style. They have to be yelled at. You can’t just say, “Do the soup of the day. Off you go.”

They freeze. VM

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

ChefsTable.FINAL.indd 43

43

2015-01-27 10:55 AM

THE

DISH

FRESH SHEET

Star Ingredient

Get Hooked Steelhead from nearby Lois Lake is a delicious and sustainable choice by murr ay ba ncroft if you love salmon as well as trout, here you have the best of both worlds. From the cold waters of landlocked Lois Lake, close to Powell River, these steelhead are sustainably raised (the Ocean Wise program approves) and available yearround. Steelhead is closer to rainbow trout genetically but closer in size and appearance to salmon.

Don’t let its delicate, trout-like texture fool you—steelhead is versatile and very forgiving in the kitchen. For seafood aficionados and the strictly fish-and-chips set alike, it has broad appeal: it’s silky but firm, and mild in flavour. Rob Feenie, executive chef of Cactus Club Cafe, is a long-time proponent, preparing it on a recent episode of Food Network’s Beat Bobby Flay. VM

AROUND

TOWN As with ceviche, the citrus cure in this recipe effectively “cooks” the fish just enough

THE RECIPE

This easy preparation comes courtesy of chef Rob Feenie.

He recommends serving it with toasted brioche

it’s between an eighth- and a quarter-inch thick. Cover with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for one hour (no longer).

Remove from fridge, rinse off the cure, and pat the steelhead dry. Using a sharp knife, cut it into quarter-inch cubes.

GRAINY MUSTARD/HORSERADISH CREAM

CURED STEELHEAD 3 each lemons, limes, oranges, zested 300 ml coarse salt 225 ml sugar 1 fillet of steelhead

15 g grainy mustard 30 g horseradish 8 ml freshly squeezed lemon juice 125 g crème fraîche

Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl and set aside.

Thoroughly combine the citrus zest, salt, and sugar in a mixing bowl. Lay the steelhead, skin side down, on a baking

To serve, spoon the cured steelhead onto slices of toasted

sheet. Coat the top side with the citrus cure, packing it so that

brioche and drizzle with the mustard/horseradish cream.

44

Clinton Hussey

Citrus-Cured Steelhead Tartare with Grainy Mustard/ Horseradish Cream

Find Lois Lake steelhead on local menus such as at Cactus Club Cafe (various locations, Cactusclubcafe.com) under the name Soy Dijon Salmon, and at L’Abattoir (217 Carrall St., 604-568-1701, Labattoir.ca), where it’s served poached with crunchy potato salad. If you want to prepare it at home, look for it at Costco (various locations, Costco.ca), or head to Seafood City at the Granville Island Public Market (Granvilleisland.com/ public-market)

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

FreshSheet.FINAL.N1.indd 44

15-01-29 9:35 AM

Now through

MARCH DUNGENESS ENGLISH BAY • KITSILANO • HORSESHOE BAY • WHITE ROCK • NEW WESTMINSTER • PORT MOODY • RICHMOND BOATHOUSERESTAURANTS.CA

FROM WHITE ROCK TO WHISTLER

Dine out for life on 26 March and 25% of food proceeds from participating restaurants goes towards supporting people living with HIV/AIDS.

BENEFITING

BoatHouse_DiningOut.indd 1

FOR MORE INFORMATION & PARTICIPATING RESTAURANTS

2015-01-28 5:32 PM

DISH

THE DECANTER

 DJ KE ARNE Y

Wines Discovered

Wizards of Oz

MORE AUSSIE E XCELLENCE

Well known for affordable yet predictable wines, Australia also produces terroir-driven sleepers worth saving and savouring in the 1980s and ’90s, Australian wineries transformed the global market. With their signature democracy, they knocked wine off its lah-di-dah pedestal by making ripe, fullflavoured varietal wines that were widely available at astonishingly decent prices.

But then, big corporations got involved, overenthusiastically producing and marketing bottles that were modest in the extreme.

Decades later, Australia’s punishment is to be dismissed by many critics and consumers as yesterday’s news: just one big vat of same old, same old.

This really is unjust, because the stampede of “critter wines” (in reference to the zoo’s worth of animal-decorated labels that emerged in pursuit of Yellow Tail) obscures a greater truth: the country has always been a vast paradise of vinous diversity. Today, the buzz term is “cool climate,” thanks to a spectacular array produced in regions like Tasmania, the Mornington Peninsula, the Adelaide Hills, the Yarra Valley, and Margaret River—places where temperatures are moderated by altitude or proximity to the ocean.

Wolf Blass Gold Label Chardonnay 2013, the winner in the Rich White category of our 2015 Wine Awards, is emblematic of the kind of trim, elegant wines that have always been quietly produced in Australia. VM

TAHBILK MARSANNE 2010

($31.99 at privates)

This iconic winery dates back to the 1860s and boasts the world’s largest single planting of the Rhône grape marsanne. Old vines give this lemon-verbenascented gem a solid core of waxy botanical layers and citrus cream.

A surge of highvoltage acidity will keep this one humming for years

This stunning example of Shaw + Smith’s bracing, minerally, “too fresh to be Aussie” expression of sauvignon validates the coolclimate pedigree of the Adelaide Hills.

With aromas of apple and lemon, this bone-dry, stony wine is perfect for shellfish

46

SHAW + SMITH SAUVIGNON BLANC ADELAIDE HILLS 2014

($19.99)

YERING STATION LITTLE YERING PINOT NOIR 2012

($15.99) The cloudy, drafty Yarra Valley resembles northern Sonoma, with fog, high hills, and a predilection for pinot noir. Bursting with raspberry flavours, juicy acidity, and lithe tannins, Little Yering is earthy and crisp—begging for a lamb chop

2015 WINE AWARDS WINNER

 Wolf Blass Gold Label Chardonnay 2013 ($25.99) High-altitude, cool-grown Adelaide Hills fruit gives this sleek oaked chardonnay impressive concentration and tensile power.

Flinty like good white Burgundy, with a thick spread of lemon curd and crème brûlée flavours, it finishes long and strong.

BEST

CELLAR

 MARK DAVIDSON is an iconic Aussie in this town. A sommelier in the heyday of the William Tell and then the Beach Side Café, he nurtured and shaped wine culture on the West Coast in a profound way. His influence is now felt globally, as he’s a wine educator for Wine Australia; you can fi nd him sharing its gospel from Sacramento to Shanghai.

Bottle: John Sinal

THE

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Decanter.FINAL.N.indd 46

15-01-27 3:44 PM

Our bespoke cocktail creations incorporate house-made bi ers that will challenge convention while vintage cocktails honor the history of the cra of bartending.

Enjoy our impressive champagne selection with a diverse offering of wines, spirits and cra beers. Open 4pm Monday to Saturday.

It’s about time.

801 West Georgia Street, Vancouver, BC V6C 1P7 (entrance off Howe Street) t 604.673.7088 prohibitionrhg.com

ProhibitionBarMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-23 11:26 AM

THE

DISH

MIX MASTER

 NE AL MCLENNAN

Spirit Guide

Cross-Border Relations Rye has long been Canada’s spirit, but when U.S. distillers began showing us up, we had to raise our game of all the indignities our American neighbours have inflicted upon us, stealing our national tipple and turning it into the official drink of Williamsburg ranks right up there with all 12 seasons of Three and a Half Men. Look at the back of any well-stocked bar and it’ll be littered with bottles—Rittenhouse, Thomas H. Handy, Colonel E.H. Taylor—that would lead you to believe that rye, like the Snuggie and the class-action lawsuit, is an American invention. How did it come to this?

Partly, it’s the common misconception that all Canadian

whiskies (think Crown Royal, Canadian Club, Gibson’s) are rye—but they’re not, really.

They’re blended whiskies that use varying degrees of rye, depending on the brand. While our Canadian distillers continued to make these very profitable blends, a few American producers correctly predicted that consumers would be willing to pay a premium for straight rye, with all its distinctive spiciness. Some, like the very cultish WhistlePig (just arrived in B.C.), went so far as to source actual barrels of rye sitting in a Canadian warehouse—which is why, notwithstanding that the

brand is from Vermont, it’s a Canadian rye.

WHISTLEPIG Luckily, some folks here at 10-YEAR ($139) home are hell-bent on reclaimBready and grainy ing our birthright. Dark Horse is and gingery, there’s the newest offering from superlaa welcome bite tive Alberta Premium, a brand of rye at the mid that’s done more than any to keep palate straight rye alive in the Great White CANADIAN North (and whose regular rye, at CLUB CHAIR$23.75, is the greatest whisky deal MAN’S SELECT in the world). Even more earth100% ($26.49) shattering is Canadian Club: the There’s rye spice 500-pound gorilla of Canadian but softened considerably by warm distilling is releasing Chairman’s vanilla and English Select 100% Rye—an actual rye toffee notes. Its whisky. The only problem with lightness lets the these two is that, at under $30 rye taste shine each, they’re priced so low, the cool kids won’t take them seriously. VM ALBERTA THE BOT TLES

PREMIUM DARK HORSE ($29)

Some nice driedfruit and sherry notes tame (sort of) the rye base.

A rich dram

Brad Stanton designed the drinks for long-awaited Prohibition— the bar was first announced in 2011

THE DRINK

Vieux Carré From Brad Stanton, Prohibition, Rosewood Hotel Georgia, 604-682-5566

1 oz WhistlePig rye whisky 1 oz Hennessy VS cognac 1 oz sweet vermouth (preferably Punt e Mes or Cinzano Rosso) 1 bar spoon Bénédictine 2 dashes Angostura bitters

 Combine ingredients in a mixing vessel and add ice. Stir until optimal chill and dilution are achieved. Strain mixture over ice into an old-fashioned glass. Garnish with a lemon twist, being sure to spritz its oils onto the drink first.

48

Luis Valdizon

2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

MixMaster.FINAL.N1.indd 48

15-01-27 3:46 PM

a Cl

ssic

C o c kta

ils

featuring

whiskey SOUR

jack daniel’s honey, angostura bitters, fresh lemon and lime, shaken with egg whites

CactusClubMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-22 11:34 AM

50

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Feature.Kambolis.FINAL.N1.indd 50

15-01-29 2:53 PM

With his restaurants Raincity Grill, C, and Nu, Harry Kambolis played an incalculable role in the evolution of Vancouver dining.

Now they’re all gone, and no one has even stepped up to offer a eulogy. Where did it all go wrong?

last

by alex a ndr a gill // portr ait by carlo ricci

SERVICE

I

t was the media launch for seafood (“sea” for Sustainable Environmental Awareness), a pioneering partnership with the David Suzuki Foundation, and, as usual, host venue C Restaurant was puttin’ on the ritz. After checking in with the valet, guests were escorted under umbrellas to the tented False Creek patio. Servers offered wine and hors d’oeuvres: oysters, smoked octopus, and conversation-piece salmon “fingers” (fried, edible rib bones with crispy flesh still attached).

This was 2001, and the event’s fin-to-tail tasting menu—proceeds of which benefited the foundation’s marine-awareness program—was visionary. (It would be another four years until the Vancouver Aquarium set Ocean Wise afloat.) Executive chef Robert Clark and owner Harry Kambolis were the first to champion a carte du jour composed solely of local sustainable seafood—including wild sockeye salmon—at a time when most people still thought farmed Atlantic was the responsible choice. Then they pushed the ship even farther out by using the whole fish and all its trimmings for stocks, sauces, and garnishes.

“People thought it was crazy,” says food writer Sid Cross, recalling a few of C’s more esoteric dishes, which included apple-glazed fois de saumon, skin chips, and tofu salted with crushed cartilage. “But it turned out to be pretty good foresight.”

Those were swashbuckling days all around for the Vancouver restaurant scene. At Lumière, Rob Feenie was reeling in international awards and accolades.

David Hawksworth had just returned from overseas to captain the kitchen at West (then called Ouest).

Pino Posteraro was casting new nets around modern Italian cuisine at Cioppino’s. And this magazine’s restaurant awards were doing their best to turn dining into high drama. C Restaurant and its trendsetting sibling, Raincity Grill, were there at the forefront, breaking ground with not just sustainable seafood but support for small artisan farmers, B.C. wines, and elevated service. I was there, too, lapping (and writing) it all up with hungry abandon.

Now, that ship has sailed. Swamped by financial struggles after several rocky years, C and Raincity closed last fall. Both businesses were sold to Viaggio Hospitality (owners of the Moda and Waldorf hotels), which plans to renovate and reopen them with new concepts and names. But as with intrepid explorers who charted new courses, their legacy will live on.

harry kambolis was born in 1968 in Denville, New Jersey. He was nine years old when his father died and his mother, Georgia, moved them to Vancouver to be with her family, which was deeply immersed in the restaurant industry. “Casual dining, diners, catering facilities, my uncle’s souvlaki place—that’s just what we did,” he says.

Restless by nature and obsessed with fast autos, Kambolis went through the motions of studying biology at Capilano University while holding onto the dream of becoming a race car driver. He was close to getting his racing licence when his family convinced him to give up his university studies to run a new restaurant they had purchased. It was 1992, and Reds, located on Denman just north of Davie, was a greasy

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

Feature.Kambolis.FINAL.N1.indd 51

51

15-01-29 2:53 PM

Past glories (clockwise from left): cumin-crusted tuna, a onetime Raincity entrée; the Grill during its early-aughts heyday; C Restaurant inaugural chef Soren Fakstorp, general manager Cate Simpson, and Kambolis, in 1997; with Raincity manager Peter Bodnar Rod, the “patron saint” of B.C. wine, and opening chef Gregory Walsh, in 1995; Dungeness crab and sea urchin risotto, one of C’s characteristically audacious dishes

52

chicken diner. Within a year, it was renamed Raincity Grill and well on its path to reinventing local dining.

The restaurant’s radical overhaul wasn’t given much forethought. “We were just young and somewhat naive and doing what we wanted,” says Gregory Walsh, the original chef. At first, the food was all about the grill. They’d cook everything on it, from peaches to endive and hearts of romaine—the latter for a dish that would eventually become a signature, the grilled Caesar salad. “People were always sending it back in the beginning,” Walsh says with a chuckle.

“They thought we were serving rotten lettuce.”

The “Raincity” half of the name was in reference to the at-hand seasonal ingredients that formed the basis of the regularly changing menus, which were based on whatever Walsh and Kambolis found while shopping at Granville Island Public Market. “People said, ‘Why don’t you bring in Dover sole or mahi mahi?’ To me, it wasn’t necessary,” says Kambolis.

Adds Walsh: “You have to remember how different things were back then. When people ordered scallops, they thought it was going to be scalloped potatoes.”

Both men credit a positive review in this magazine with bringing diners around. “It is a place of such remarkable fidelity to its prescribed purpose— to serve the best grub from the city’s markets in a seasonal manner—that it’s hard to believe the idea hasn’t been worked over for decades,” wrote Brad Ovenell-Carter in March 1993. A year later, the New York Times’s Bryan Miller called Raincity “the hottest restaurant of the moment in Vancouver.” There was no looking back.

An already extremely rare and exclusive West Coast wine list was expanded to a staggering 100 selections by the glass. (Some say, quite seriously, that sommelier Peter Bodnar Rod was the B.C. wine industry’s patron saint.) A succession of chefs, which included Scott Kidd, Sean Cousins, and Andrea Carlson, kept forging relationships with area farmers to source products that weren’t available anywhere else in the city and to create special menus around such ingredients as heirloom tomatoes, edible flowers, and wild mushrooms. The crowning feather of the initiative was Carlson’s 100-Mile Menu, launched in 2006, which used only foods and wines that were grown, raised, or processed within a 100-mile radius.

With C Restaurant, opened in 1997, Kambolis was determined to push contemporary fine dining even further. At first, he refused to serve coffee, insisting instead on loose-leaf tea service, which he felt paired better with seafood. Caviar spoons were stored individually in felt holders, and there was special glassware for every type of wine. There were always two or three managers on the floor, so every guest would be “touched” in some way; there were warm hand towels, and dim sum lunches when dim sum could be found only in Chinese restaurants. The menu covers were hand-stitched from rubber boots (which, unfortunately, melted if the candles got too close); the bread with baked-in seaweed was formal service; the martini glasses were rimmed with gold dust. Kambolis was at the forefront of Canadian restaurateurs choosing to retain a publicist, because he recognized the importance of reaching out to media directly.

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Feature.Kambolis.FINAL.N1.indd 52

15-01-29 2:54 PM

From left: Bruce Law (x3); Raeff Miles

THE NEW YORK TIMES CALLED RAINCITY GRILL THE HOTTEST RESTAURANT IN VANCOUVER. THERE WAS NO LOOKING BACK

L A S T SER V ICE

CRITICAL PATH Vancouver was among the first to comment on each of Harry Kambolis’s rooms. Here’s what we said.

RAINCITY GRILL “Raincity, a name so succinctly evocative that Vancouver ought to take it as an official nickname, is one of the better realized restaurants to open in the last 12 months” March 1993

From left: Bruce Law (x3); Raeff Miles

C RESTAURANT “In the evening you may spot some straight-to-video starlets, an X-Filer or two and a salting of ventless VSE types” Summer 1997 NU “I think it will be the most interesting dining room to open in Vancouver since Chambar a year ago” September 2005

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

Feature.Kambolis.FINAL.N2.indd 53

53

15-01-29 3:03 PM

L A S T SER V ICE

in 2005, kambolis opened a restaurant called Nu directly across the seawall from C. It was an expensive ($1.8 million) expansion for a company that may have already stretched itself thin by buying out the strata lease for C from its previous owner. (Nu was rented, not bought.) The eclectic room—with its hand-blown Italian chandelier, gilded ceiling of stamped brass tiles, and carousel wine bar—was an elaborate showboat.

People either loved it (the plate-glass patio railings that provided unobstructed water views were popular) or hated it (the tight turquoise cube chairs were particularly loathed, especially by overweight Americans).

The concept was confusing. Nu (French for “nude”) meant a lot of simply steamed seafood and fresh ceviche, but then there were all the decadent finger foods: crispy fried oysters skewered with a squeeze-syringe of beer; molten foie gras croquettes. Many, including me, were puzzled when enRoute named it the best new restaurant of the year. In retrospect, that magazine was correct in predicting that shared plates in a more relaxed setting represented the future of fine dining. But again, Kambolis was ahead of his time.

“People weren’t ready,” he now reflects. “That’s always (Some say he created a monster.) “He had his hands been my Achilles heel.” Five years later, the ailing Nu on everything,” says Annette Rawlinson, one of C’s was turned into a Greek restaurant—kind of cute for first general managers. “There was always something its mom-and-pop sensibility (mother Georgia helped new going on. He was always raising the bar.” design the menu) but never as modern as intended Kambolis also had a knack for inspiring creativ(what with the cheesy belly dancers). ity in others. When Clark, the original sous-chef, took In the meantime, Kambolis and his wife of 14 over from departed executive chef Soren Fakstorp, he years, Michele, got divorced. It was “a distraction I sought to emphasize sustainability as much as luxury. probably didn’t need,” he says. When asked if he took Kambolis let him run with it. The result? Octopus a big hit from the settlement, he demurs. “I think the bacon (long before either octopus or bacon was trendy) North American statistics on people’s net worth make and urchin soup (not just novel, but also theatrical that answer pretty straightforward.” Although the when served in the shell with its spiky quills quivering divorce gave him more time to work, it also gave him under the heat). more time to play. Former employees say he was less They took the show on the road, travelling to the hands on, often absent. Kambolis, in turn, says he was James Beard House in New York, Epcot Center in kept busy behind the scenes because he had less staff Florida, and California’s Monterey Bay Aquarium. to rely upon.

Back in Vancouver, celebrities came to them. “On any In 2005, C became the founding restaurant day, you’d turn around and find Jeff Bridges, Salma partner for the Vancouver Aquarium’s Ocean Wise Hayek, or an NBA all-star team in your section,” says program, which promotes sustainably harvested one former server. seafood through participating restaurants. Suddenly, But then it all ended, not swamped by one huge chef Clark’s raison d’être ceased to exist. “For the first tsunami but slowly knocked off course by a string of seven years, before Ocean Wise, I spent every hour of hazardous swells. every waking day sourcing new producers,” explains

High tide at C in 2001: Kambolis (left) with executive chef Robert Clark, general manager Annette Rawlinson, and sous chef (now Campagnolo owner) Robert Belcham; an appetizer of spot prawn and shucked oyster cocktail

54

Bruce Law

LOOKING BACK ON EVERYTHING WE DID, THE WONDERFUL THING WAS WE ALL CHOSE TO DO SOMETHING MORE THAN JUST SERVE FOOD

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Feature.Kambolis.FINAL.N1.indd 54

15-01-29 2:54 PM

VanMag_Racinne-FINAL-o.indd 1

2015-01-29 5:36 PM

RacinneMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-30 9:59 AM

In celebration of Spring, Integrative is excited to offer our Cleansing 101 workshop

L A S T SER V ICE

A fun and friendly approach to detoxification with Dr. Katie Leah N.D and Keyrsten McEwan, Holistic Nutritionist.

THE EVENING WILL INCLUDE: Discussion about why cleansing is important and what to expect The tools to get started on a customized program Keyrsten McEwan Registered Holistic Nutritionist

Information package including recipes and meal plans Cleanse friendly refreshments

Wednesday March 25 from 7:00-8:30 730-1285 West Broadway Call 604-738-1012 for more details or to register as space is limited ($25/person)

Beauty. Confidence.

Transformation. model

caring, experienced and professional

BENJAMIN GELFANT Plastic Surgeon & Director 25 years’ experience

#100 - 1333 W Broadway, Vancouver | 604-874-2078

56

drgelfant.com

Clark, who had given his chefs de cuisine free rein long before then.

“For the final five, all I was doing was PR. I wasn’t steering the boat.

I was no more than a figurehead, like the Queen.”

Then, in 2008, the recession hit. “People were suddenly spending $75, instead of $150 or $500, on a bottle of wine,” says Kambolis.

Although Vancouver was partly protected by the Olympic bubble, he had to make up the lost revenue somehow. He began cutting staff, issuing Groupons, extending his catering operations, and stretching his resources. “There was a time when we only had one working ice machine between the three restaurants,” a former staff member explains. “Somebody from Raincity would come by every day to pick up a load. Or sometimes we’d send it over in a taxi.” A taxi? It made perfect sense to Kambolis. “Why would we buy ice from 7-Eleven wrapped in plastic—a form that was terrible in a cocktail—if we had ice at Nu?” In the struggle to survive, there was little room for the creativity and passion that had flourished in the early days. “Looking back on everything we did, the wonderful thing was we all chose to do something more than just serve food,” says Kambolis. “And maybe, by pushing that envelope and trying to have a bigger impact, it made us a bit weaker.”

Others are harsher in their assessment. “At the end, he let the restaurants rest on their laurels,” says Cate Simpson, Kambolis’s first general manager at C, now working in restaurant PR. When Clark left in late 2012 to open the Fish Counter, a seafood shop and casual takeout on Main Street, things really began falling apart. “Harry’s not a chef,” explains Cioppino’s Posteraro.

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

Feature.Kambolis.FINAL.N2.indd 56

15-01-29 3:19 PM

“After a catastrophic event, the ones that survive are rats, cockroaches, and chefs. All your costs are in the food. Every day, a billion decisions are made in the kitchen.

That’s the key to success.”

Staff members say they sometimes had to wait weeks to be paid their tips, which was a large portion of their income. Suppliers gave up. “I had to start hounding him,” says Paul Healey of Hannah Brook Farm in Maple Ridge. “It was like pulling teeth,” adds Joe Salvo, president of Ponderosa Mushrooms, noting that the problems went back at least five years. “One or two invoices would be paid, but then he’d go right back to the same old BS.” Nu closed in October 2011.

When C followed suit in September 2014, the occasion went sadly unremarked. No one in the media even noticed. In the final days of Raincity Grill, before it closed last November, the restaurant was a shadow of its former self, with a menu that included a hamburger and fries.

Although Kambolis was ultimately the victim of his own mistakes, overall shifts in the dining landscape—to casual, to value consciousness, to safe uniformity—arguably would have left his restaurants behind anyway.

But his efforts won’t soon be forgotten. “The changes Harry made were groundbreaking,” says Rob Feenie, who knows what it means to lose an empire. “He and Rob Clark changed the way people eat seafood across the country. That legacy will never go away.”

Kambolis has no plans to open another restaurant. For now, he wants to spend time being a dad to his two sons. “I feel like I missed out on so much. I want them to understand where I was when they were growing up.” VM

Feature.Kambolis.FINAL.N1.indd 57

DR. SHANNON HUMPHREY, DR. ALASTAIR CARRUTHERS & DR. JEAN CARRUTHERS answer your questions about today’s cosmetic advances & issues

With the bloom of spring time I’m hoping to renew my skin.

What can I do to get a fresh start?

Jennifer B, Vancouver

Spring time is the perfect time to turn over a new leaf and to focus on skin renewal.

For most patients there are really two areas where we can concentrate.

The first is choosing the right evidence-based and individualized skincare regimen. We’ve come a long way with evidence-based cosmeceuticals – the key is to find the right regimen for every patient, depending on their needs.

A cosmetic dermatologist is the best person to help you devise an active and optimized regimen to meet your goals.

As an example, for renewal, we would focus on adding vitamin A to improve skin cell turnover, alpha hydroxy acids (like glycolic) to slough dead skin and provide a healthy glow, and growth factors to stimulate new collagen production, improving skin’s radiance.

To accelerate the renewal process, energy-based treatments can be incorporated. Our patients prefer treatments that are easy to incorporate into their busy lives. A combination of photo rejuvenation and gentle non-ablative fractionated laser provides excellent results with minimal downtime. When used together, treatments like Lumenis One and Clear & Brilliant® can restore a youthful, healthy glow; reduce unwanted sun damage pigmentation; even out areas of blotchy redness; and even minimize pore size.

– Shannon Humphrey, frcpc – Alastair Carruthers, frcpc – Jean Carruthers, frcsc

Suite 820-943 West Broadway, Vancouver, BC 604.714.0222 reception@carruthers-humphrey.com www.carruthers-humphrey.com M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

57

15-01-29 2:54 PM

COS.Essay.FINAL.indd 58

15-01-29 1:12 PM

There are as many ways to slow the clock as there are people seeking protracted youth.

Here, a road map to immortality with ponderings, procedures, payments, pastes, and some of the city’s key practitioners making artistry out of our appearance

photogr a phs: Pooya Nabei st y li ng: Joanna Kulpa h a ir/m a k eup: Sonia Leal-Serafim models: Ashley Diana (Lizbell Agency) & Darien Martin (Richard’s International Model Management)

COS.Essay.FINAL.indd 59

FOREVER YOUNG

cov er story

15-01-29 1:12 PM

FOREVER YOUNG PAGING DR. FEELGOOD Time come for a little of local surgeons to share the strategies and tips they offer patients, decade by decade “A lot of younger women are starting to ask for Botox for forehead lines and crow’s feet. If someone comes in and asks for something they don’t need, we don’t do it.”

“I perform a lot of localized liposuction on girls in their 20s.

They’re not overweight, but they’re struggling with inherited areas unaffected by diet and exercise: the inner knee area, or thighs and saddlebags.”

“People in their 30s begin preventive strategies like baby Botox: small doses allow patients to retain facial expressions but help prevent etched wrinkles. Studies with twins have shown that one who has a bit of Botox never formed crow’s-feet wrinkles, while the other did.”

“At this age women are often dealing with genetics. They’ve inherited puffy lids and want to remove extra skin and fat from the upper and lower eyelids, as it makes them look prematurely aged.”

60

t w en ties & thirties

THE NEW NEW YOU When you’re just starting out, says Stacey McLachlan (age 27), is the most pressing time to put your best face forward

E

ven as part of a generation that values personal choice so fiercely (“You do you” is our rallying cry), I feel embarrassed as I hand over my credit card to the receptionist and head in to have my front tooth shaved down and covered with a pearly white composite. Has vanity got the best of me? I wonder as my dentist chisels away gleefully. That tooth may be dead, but it’s perfectly functional. His own grill is gleaming and capped and perfect, and I can tell he is pumped to Change My Life. During our consultation he showed me books of before-and-after photos, of men and women who had been ashamed of their smiles but now have the confidence to get the job/get the girl/tell off that coworker. He also offers Botox treatments. I politely decline.

Your face is your first impression, whatever your age, so it makes sense that we strive to present the best version possible. We can’t help taking stock of our fellow humans this way, as much as we fight it. There are evolutionary forces at play that make us find symmetrical faces attractive and a healthy smile appealing.

Your 20s are a time of finding your place in the world, so putting your best, most confident self forward is arguably most important now. You’re searching for a mate, making the connections that will shape your course over the next decade or three, starting your career. It’s a critical time to be appealing, and as much as we all want that appeal to be due to good genes and good luck, sometimes Mother Nature lets us down and we need to take matters into our own hands with makeup or zealous plucking. My peers aren’t getting cheek implants, but that may well be less about age than about income. Given the financial opportunity that usually comes with becoming a real grownup (fingers crossed), would we know where to stop?

It’s odd that these types of procedures can find an audience in Vancouver at all, where the natural carries so much cachet. Culture here is a farm-totable dinner, ideally enjoyed while wearing organic-fibre sportswear; juice cleanses are a competitive sport. But it’s the same socioeconomic demographic snatching up these premium, chemical-free products that keeps my dentist’s Botox side business booming (though not everyone who gets a SPUD delivery is itching for a nose job, obviously). These are two very

% IS THIS INTERVENTION FOR ME? *

Women, how have you tried to improve your appearance?

Creams & lotions

32% Yoga

22% Juice cleanse

12% Cosmetic surgery

5% Electronic devices for fat loss

4%

*

Results are based on an online study conducted by Insights West from December 10 to 12, 2014, among 645 adult residents of Metro Vancouver.

Results have a margin of error of +/- 4.0 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Insightswest.com

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

COS.Essay.FINAL_N.indd 60

15-01-29 2:41 PM

Gutter Credit

work? We asked a batch

Gutter Credit

We can’t help taking stock of our fellow humans this way, as much as we fight it.

There are evolutionary forces at play that make us find symmetrical faces attractive and a healthy smile appealing

COS.Essay.FINAL.indd 61

15-01-29 1:13 PM

FOREVER YOUNG PAGING DR. FEELGOOD “We begin using Thermage for patients in their 40s. It’s a twohour procedure, and people like it because there’s no downtime.”

“We see sun damage,

different pursuits of perfection—one achieved through needles and scalpels, the other with human interference of only the most artisanal nature—being upheld by the same social groups. Is it irony or two sides of a coin? What could be more ideal than an organic apple? What could be more ideal than a face that never ages?

I’m happy with how my tooth looks, but I feel guilty about it. Back at work, no one even notices my shining new incisor, or that there was anything wrong with it to begin with. I show them my own before-and-after pictures, though no one specifically requests them, and then I stand in the bathroom doing double takes in the mirror, smiling whenever I catch myself by surprise, until someone knocks to make sure everything’s okay in there.

visible blood vessels, signs of wrinkling, brown spots. The very thin show more changes in their face than their fuller-faced contemporaries: thinner, lighterskinned women tend to show aging sooner, but it’s an individual thing.”

“Patients start to notice volume loss at this age, but it is still early enough that a reasonable-sized, digestible treatment of soft tissue filler yields a natural-looking, meaningful outcome.”

“This is when aging starts to take its toll on the face. Short incision (mini) facelifts can tighten the jawline and improve contours near the mouth. Brow lifts return the brows to a more elegant and youthful position.”

“In the menopausal period the collagen content of the skin can drop by half. If there has not been preventative work done, you find people turning to plastic surgery.”

62

forties & fifties

THE WONDER YEARS If these little grooves and tiny sags are marks of a life well lived, asks Amanda Ross (age 43), why does it feel like I’m wearing someone else’s face?

A

Norms of beauty have become more complex and cosmopolitan.

Before and after photos of upper-eyelid surgery on an unnamed patient, 42, courtesy Andrew Denton

re you mad at me?” my husband asks. “What? No! Geez.” But no amount of ambient light can alter what the mirror reveals: I’ve developed resting bitch face. Small wonder he’s confused. I’d say it crept up along with the insidious blossoming of tiny lines and creases. Have they always been there or are they from a spate of recent work deadlines? Or the militarylevel planning of kiddie carpooling and operatic a.m. sandwich-making?

“It’s called being 43,” my husband says reassuringly. “Plus, you can barely notice… Wait, you’re sure you’re not mad?”

If these little grooves and tiny sags have turned up thanks to a combination of life experience and the inevitable forward motion of biology, why don’t we see them as a beautiful Braille map of past and present, hardearned badges of merit that read Devoted Mother! Two Decades of Marriage! Satisfying Career! Well, they’re that too, but those marionette lines (distractingly called nasal labial folds) can undermine it all with a blunt “You look old and tired.”

We’re all aging together, but that’s small consolation when our culture colludes to pretend otherwise. Glossy magazine spreads (ahem), commercials, TV shows, and big-budget movies assault our self-worth daily: flawless, taut skin from both young and old, with apple-planted cheeks, bee-stung lips, perky boobs and bums, and concave stomachs surround us.

From the socially sanctioned porn of the Victoria’s Secret runway shows

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

COS.Essay.FINAL_N.indd 62

15-01-29 2:41 PM

by petti fong

A World of Beauty Globalization is transforming the ideal face

could do some reshaping, but she wanted to keep

because it’s common where they’re from. And

her ethnic features—nostrils that sloped down-

from Latin America, they have no problem with it.

ward, a pronounced dorsal hump—intact. “I just

North Americans still have guilt.”

wanted it to be smaller,” says the woman, who

in Vancouver, their mouths and even their but-

wanted her nose to look, well…less Indian.

tocks (don’t be too pervy), and it is clear. What through DNA mixing, plastic surgery is able to

kept the profile but shortened the length. The

do. The higher bridge and narrower-tipped noses

other acquired a nose that was more upturned,

that indicate wealth for Asians are certainly

with a prominent tip. “We don’t like to tell people

visible; ditto, the large breasts and round rear

that we’ve had it done but everyone can see.”

ends prized because of the skin-baring clothes in

white patients would have wanted their noses, eyes, and breasts to be homogeneous (ie, west-

tropical countries like Colombia and Brazil.

Every year, the Canadian Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery brings in surgeons from

ernized). But by the time he began in 2001, the

different countries—usually Brazil—to show-

impact of globalization had begun. Now, while

case new techniques. This year, for the first

they still want to change the structure of their

time, Canadian surgeons will be learning from

features, striving to look more Caucasian is no

their South Korean counterparts. South Korea

longer the only goal.

has long been the plastic surgery capital, with

“They want to retain their identity in some

an estimated one in fi ve women there having

way,” says Denton. “Women are more comfort-

undergone work. (That compares with one in 20

able in their own skin and becoming very aware

in North America.) The country is at the forefront

the world has become more global and beauty is

of pushing boundaries, according to Dr. Nicholas

more global.” He credits that shift to celebrities

Carr, society president.

from different parts of the world taking the spotlight. Forget Jennifer Aniston; his patients bring

The double eyelid procedure (favoured by Asians to create the illusion that their eyes are

in pictures of South Korean rock stars, Bollywood

bigger) remains popular, but there are now surgi-

actors, Brazilian supermodels. Most popular, say

cal techniques to widen and elongate the actual

surgeons in Vancouver, are the vaguely exotic

eye. “Over the last year, I’ve had young women

features of Kim Kardashian.

come in with pictures not of celebrities but car-

Dr. Lorne Brown, who specializes in Asian

toons, those anime characters, and that’s now

patients and has trained in Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro,

the ideal,” says Carr, who, with wife Dr. Frances

and Paris, agrees that cultural aesthetics have

Jang, maintains a practice in Dunbar. These

shifted. “You won’t see Caucasians trying to look

patients want the heart-shaped faces, the big

Asian, but I think you will see much more cross-

wide eyes, and the impossibly smooth skin of a

fertilization where people aren’t shying away from

drawn character, a trend Carr calls horrible and a

their ethnic identity and are quite proud of it.”

total fantasy.

That acceptance is also shown in patients’ comfort with getting work done, says Dr. Thomas

When it comes to appearance, what is acceptable?

genetics and globalization haven’t accomplished

done their noses did look quite different. The first

Denton believes that 20 years ago, his non-

DO AS I SAY

Study the noses and eye shapes of strangers

requested anonymity. Her twin wanted more. She Both had rhinoplasty, and when Denton was

%

of the Asian patients I see, and the ones from the Middle East, are so comfortable with surgery

“When what they want is not even a real person, that’s when I discourage them.”

For Me Teeth whitening

78% Hair colour*

77% Gender discrepancies? Women are cool with wearing shapewear (81%) but men are not (43%). Colouring your hair? Women at 92%, men at 62%

office last year. One sister hoped the doctor

Buonassisi. “Chinese, Korean, Japanese—most

Hair removal

76% Shapewear*

53% Non-invasive procedure

48% Hair transplant

45% Invasive procedure

21% For Others Hair colour

93% Teeth whitening

90% Hair removal

90% Shapewear

87% Non-invasive procedure

76% Hair transplant

78% Invasive procedure

52%

*

Southeast Asian twins walked into Dr. Andrew Denton’s VGH-area plastic surgery

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

COS.Essay.FINAL_N.indd 63

63

15-01-29 2:41 PM

FOREVER YOUNG

by steven schelling

Boy Toys Brotox evens the field

I’m sitting in my neighbour’s newly renovated kitchen, staring enviously at his custom walnut cabinetry.

“You’ll feel a little prick,” he says. We giggle like schoolgirls. This silly exchange happens whenever I get my Botox redone.

“Frown hard.” Needle. “Look surprised.” Needle. Repeat.

Our condos have identical layouts, but his is almost unrecognizable. Upgraded and fresh: the way I’ll feel when I make my way down to my more humble digs.

I began getting regular treatments nearly four years ago. My “11s” (the vertical lines running from nose to forehead) made me look permanently pissed off.

Luckily, I’m gay, so it’s not like there was any stigma for me to overcome. The ’mos have been doing Bo’ since its inception.

However, straight men are expected to have thicker skin than women when it comes to the signs of aging. Increasingly, even that skin has had a little work done.

You can see the shift playing out on drugstore shelves packed with shower gels, moisturizers, and buff puffs all packaged to look like off-road truck tires.

You can see it on billboards displaying the wrinkle-free pouts and six-pack abs of Hollywood stars. And you can see it

to Esquire’s Sexiest Woman Helen Mirren in a bikini, a relentless parade assures us that agelessness is normal, even natural.

As much as I’d like to focus on embracing this next stage, valuing the inevitable cellulite, the soft child-bearing midriff, and the wrinkles, I catch myself switching to autopilot while watching the Golden Globes. “Wow, she looks great for her age!” I marvel at Jane Fonda (she’s 77?), Julianne Moore (such flawless skin at 54!), and J Lo (are those real?). By noticing their static looks, I’m tacitly entrenching the ideal that women are better, more dazzling, when they simply don’t look their age. But hypocrite that I am (and I’m not alone in my moral squirminess), I deride anyone who openly stops the hands of time: the Real Housewives’ joker lips, Renée Zellweger’s newly wide eyes.

It’s so much more comfortable if women have their cosmetic work done discreetly and we can shelve the philosophical gaze. I’m doubtful the Sandra Bullocks, Jennifer Anistons, and Meryl Streeps of the world can remain as unchanged as they do without some artful work from the cosmetic industry and its arsenal of incantations—Banish! Tighten! Smooth!—but it’s easier to delude ourselves into thinking it’s natural. Or better yet, not think of it at all.

So I keep coming back to this: where will I draw the line? If I wear lipstick, shave my legs, and colour my hair, am I not already altering my appearance? Where does it end? Bleaching your hair but not the skin down there? If we’re going to judge others, don’t we need to toss our own makeup bags first? But then, if we accept others’ freedom of choice, does that mean suspending our own hard-won feminist principles? For now, if I squint in the mirror (the encroaching blindness helps), I can stave off the issue. But if and when I decide otherwise, how will that differ from renovating a historic home to restore it to former glory? If I want to put these boobs back where they used to be, am I a shallow, vacuous person? I’m not saying bigger, just where they were. For now I’ll rely on a combination of uplifting bras, Spanx, and the occasional workout to contain the inevitable. Is it fair? No, but trust me when I tell you, I’m not mad.

(or preferably not see it) on the faces of more and more regular guys.

“About 10 percent of my clients are men,” says aesthetic physician at South Granville’s Project SkinMD, Dr. William McGillivray. “Just the other day, we had three men in the waiting room at the same time. Never had that before.”

He’s on trend. According to the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, whose 2,600 members are certified in the U.S. and Canada, 10 percent of all surgical and non-invasive cosmetic procedures performed in North America in 2013 were performed on men—a market segment growing nearly 20 percent per year.

A week later, I mug for the mirror, my frozen forehead smooth as the glass. A monument to my own vanity and insecurity, yes, but one that looks cheerfully well rested. I’m interrupted by the buzzer. It’s the contractor. Kitchen renos start today.

64

sixties & sev en ties

ONE LIFE TO LIVE You and the mirror have agreed to disagree. What now?

There’s no point feeling down, says Michelle Patterson (age 67). Just get the work done

I

was an attractive woman. In my 20s, I modelled. My mother was very fashion-conscious and also very critical of appearance, and I think I have some of that—not to the degree my mother did, but I certainly had vanity.

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

COS.Essay.FINAL_N1.indd 64

15-01-30 9:04 AM

You can see the shift playing out on drugstore shelves packed with shower gels, moisturizers, and buff puffs all packaged to look like off-road truck tires

%

Gutter Credit

WORD OF MOUTH

It’s likely that I’ll keep my procedures secret

Women

40% Men

15% M O N T H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

COS.Essay.FINAL.indd 65

65

15-01-29 1:14 PM

FOREVER YOUNG PAGING DR. FEELGOOD “These decades are the right time to start combination treatments that include an evidence-based antiaging skin-care regimen with photo rejuvenation, laser, neuromodulators, neurotoxins such as Botox, and filler.”

“We’re looking at rejuvenating facelifts, as well as eyelid, forehead, and neck procedures.

Usually these come with adjunctive fat injections: taking fat from one part of the body to restore volume in another.”

“Procedures at this stage tend to be blepharoplasty, brow lift, and facelift, followed by breast lift and augmentation, and tummy tuck.”

“I have patients who are 90 who come in for fillers. You’re only as old as you feel.”

sixties & sev en ties Modelling focuses you on your appearance. It’s just one side of a person, of course, but it was a side that was important to me.

I don’t feel any different today, but then the mirror starts giving a different picture. It’s depressing to feel so young but what you see doesn’t reflect that. That’s not your face you’re looking at. Not the one you remember, anyway.

Things droop. I know it happens. But I didn’t like looking older than I felt; I wasn’t prepared. Everything was going down. My right eyebrow was sagging lower than my left. The corners of my mouth were turning down. My neck was starting to sag. I looked like I was unhappy all the time, and that wasn’t the case! I’m very youthful, very active. I think I should look the way I feel.

My friends told me I shouldn’t bother because I looked fine, but I come from that family that is highly critical of ourselves. It’s a perfectionist thing: it’s beauty or it’s not beauty. That’s it.

You hear horror stories about what happens to people who go in for facial reconstructive surgery—it can go really wrong—but I just had a lot of faith that it would be done right. So I went in and said I wasn’t happy, that I wanted those things fi xed. The doctor was very honest about what he could do and what he couldn’t. I had a facelift, a brow lift, and an eyelid lift—blepharoplasty. It was cutting above the eye and right underneath the lower lashes.

I didn’t know if any of my friends had also done procedures. Did I tell them about mine? Absolutely. I have never been shy about that. It’s just the kind of person I am. I’m pretty open about things—I’ve always been a person who was forthcoming about what I think, and that’s why, when I realized there was something I didn’t like and I knew I could do something about it, it was just a matter of going ahead with it. That comes from having a bit of an engineering mind, I believe. There was a problem that could be fi xed.

Nobody can tell I’ve had work done. I have to explain it to them; they don’t see it. Yes, I have some scars, but they’re right in the crease behind my ears. No one looks there anyway.—As told to Petti Fong

%

NEVER SURRENDER

Age 55+ At my age I’d be interested in:

Women Tummy tuck

34% Teeth whitening

25% Facelift / Neck lift

19% Arm lift

15% None of these

32% Men Teeth whitening

33% Hair implantation (head)

15% Tummy tuck

12% Liposuction

10% None of these

39%

It’s depressing to feel so young but what you see doesn’t reflect that.

That’s not your face you’re looking at.

Not the one you remember, anyway 66

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

COS.Essay.FINAL_N1.indd 66

15-01-29 2:52 PM

SPONSORED REPORT

Getting the Skinny on

BEAUTIFUL SKIN QUEUE CONFIDENCE The subject of cosmetic medicine—invasive or non-invasive—is a sensitive one. But at Skinworks the mandate remains simple: cultivate self-confidence through natural looking aesthetic enhancement.

It’s no coincidence that dermatologist, Dr. Frances Jang, and plastic surgeon, Dr. Nick Carr, have such complementary fields of expertise. They combined their specialized practices over a decade ago wanting to provide genuine, unbiased solutions. Dr. Jang’s knowledge in both areas makes her uniquely equipped to provide an honest assessment.

“If I think surgery is their best option, I can facilitate a recommendation to Dr. Carr. The same goes both ways. We want to offer people what best suits their comfort, budget and lifestyle.”

TECH-SAVVY Both doctors are ahead of the curve when it comes to technological advancements and the shifting needs of their field. Dr. Jang has developed a particular niche in industry knowledge. Having recently attended Maestro Summit, an international conference for collaboration and education among the world’s best injectors, she lists safety awareness high among her skillset. “Most non-invasive procedures are considered benign, and for the most part they are, however we are seeing some long-term effects that prove the importance of utmost safety. Cosmetic medicine is no time to sacrifice expertise.”

Another shift Dr. Jang has witnessed firsthand is the clientele. “Traditionally over-40’s have been most active, but there is definitely a trend towards a younger age group,” she says. Whether unhappy with a specific feature, or proactively fighting the effects of aging (proper sunscreen falls under the cosmetic umbrella, she reminds) the stereotypes are changing; a demographic worthy of recognition.

Dr. Jang has recently introduced CoolSculpting and PicoSure to the clinic, two treatments designed to meet the evolving needs of cosmetic medicine. CoolSculpting permanently freezes fat cells, offering a non-invasive alternative to liposuction while PicoSure shatters tattoo ink into sand-like particles that are more easily absorbed into the skin. According to Dr. Jang, this typically halves the number of required treatments and is suitable for darker skin types that have previously struggled to find an effective removal method.

Dr. Frances Jang, MD, FRCPC, Dermatologist

Dr. Nick Carr, MD, FRCSC, Plastic Surgeon

THE COMPLETE PACKAGE CoolSculpting and PicoSure barely graze the surface when it comes to the numerous options available at Skinworks, a state of the art facility accredited by the B.C College of Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Jang and Dr. Carr feel fortunate to witness positive results each day.“We are excited to go to work every day and we truly appreciate the trust our patients put in us,” claims Dr. Jang.

“It’s not just about the wrinkle, but about building enduring connections.”

51yo Skinworks before/after patient following combination treatment with Sculptra, filler, & neurotoxin treatment”

SkinworksMAR15FP_sc.indd 1

3568/3578 West 41st Avenue skinworks.ca | 604-737-7100 Created by the Western Living advertising department in partnership with Skinworks.

15-01-29 5:22 PM

OTOPLASTY

BLEPHAROPLASTY More commonly known as “double eyelid surgery,” this procedure entails an incision to deepen the lid crease, creating a wide-eyed look.

Cost: $2,500 to $3,000 Downtime: Two weeks Risks: As otopolasty

BREAST LIFT Often performed in conjunction with a breast augmentation, this procedure promotes perkiness.

Cost: $4,000 to $6,000 Downtime: One to two weeks Risks: Bruising

and numbness are common. Rarely: infection, asymmetry, permanent numbness, raised scarring

BREAST AUGMENTATION Doctors recommend saline implants as a relatively safe and natural-looking ticket to a more pneumatic self.

Cost: $5,000 to $10,000

Downtime: One to two weeks Risks: Bruising and numbness are common. Rarely: infection, hardening of scar tissue around implant causing unnatural shape, asymmetry, rupturing and deflation, permanent numbness, raised scarring

BOTOX Cosmetic use of this muscle paralyzer has become tediously standard maintenance for many.

Cost: From $300 Downtime: None Risks: Pain, tenderness, bruising, temporary drooping

FOREVER YOUNG

Also known as “ear-pinning.”

Cost: $2,000 to $4,000 Downtime: One to three weeks Risks: Bleeding and bruising are common. Rarely: infection, raised scarring, blood clot that may need to be drained, asymmetry, recurrence of the protrusion requiring repeat surgery

RHINOPLASTY

COS.Gatefold.FINAL.indd 4

SCLEROTHERAPY

FAT INJECTIONS

Spider veins are injected with a solution that collapses them, permanently.

Cost: $150 to $250 Downtime: None Risks: Bruising/ skin discolouration, non-serious blood clots, slight blistering

Recycles fat from where you don’t want it (belly, thighs…) to wherever a little extra is welcome.

Cost: $500 and up Downtime: Up to two weeks Risks: Swelling, redness, scabbing, asymmetry

COOL SCULPTING This non-invasive lipo relative melts a fifth of the fat cells in any bulge.

Cost: $700 to $3,000 Downtime: None Risks: Temporary numbness, redness, swelling, bruising, firmness, tingling, stinging, and pain

First performed to repair disciplinary amputations in 800 BC, nose jobs hardly require introduction.

Cost: $4,000 to $7,000 Downtime: Two to four weeks Risks: Bleeding and bruising are common. Rarely: infection, asymmetry requiring repeat surgery

2015-01-29 1:44 PM

EVERYTHING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT PLASTIC PAGE 3 SURGERY

*

Our appreciation of beauty has always reflected the ideals we hold most dear. Here, a glimpse at those fantasies of perfection by a drien n e m atei

Open here for the full (ahem) spread

photogr a phs: Pooya Nabei st y li ng: Joanna Kulpa h a ir/m a k eup: Sonia Leal-Serafim

*

but were afraid to ask

COS.Gatefold.FINAL_N.indd 1

2015-02-02 10:34 AM

Forget about Jennifer Aniston.

Most popular, say surgeons in Vancouver, are the vaguely exotic features of Kim Kardashian THERMAGE

ARM LIFT

BEE VENOM

AEYGO SAL

LIPOSUCTION

FILLERS

This radio-frequency treatment stimulates columns of heat deep within the skin, shaking awake lazing collagen production.

Cost: $2,000 to $3,000 Downtime: None Risks: Blistering and scabbing

Some lift, others get a lift to sluice off bemoaned “batwings” from shoulder to elbow.

Cost: $2,500 to $5,000 Downtime: One to two weeks Risks: As liposuction

Topical applications of “nature’s Botox” (an electrical current is used to freak out the bee till it squirts poison) surged in popularity after endorsements from Kate Middleton and Victoria Beckham.

Translating into “happy fat,” this Korean treatment celebrates the cuteness quotient of little under eye fat pouches.

Cost: $1,000 (injections) to $3,000 (surgery) Downtime: Three to seven days Risks: Swelling, bruising, asymmetry

Fat encamped in a specific area is first melted by an injected solution, then vacuumed out.

Cost: From $1,500 Downtime: Five to 10 days Risks: Bruising and numbness are common. Rarely: infection, asymmetry, permanent numbness, rippling of skin, raised scarring

Hyaluronic-acidbased fillers, these ladies (Radiesse, Juvederm, Restylane) pump up the volume in cheeks, lips, and jawlines.

Cost: $500 to $800 per injection Downtime: Up to two days Risks: Swelling, redness, bruising, numbness, skin tightening

QI FACIALS If needles freak you out, consider this treatment, which uses clusters of tiny 24-karat-goldplated magnets to encourage cell rejuvenation.

Cost: $200 Downtime: None Risks: None

COS.Gatefold.FINAL.indd 5

Consensus is doubtful that this returns women to some kind of likea-virgin state.

Cost: From $2,000 Downtime: One to two weeks; four to six abstaining from intercourse Risks: Swelling, redness, scabbing, infection, asymmetry

WHAT ARE YOU DISSATISFIED WITH?

Women Abs

27% Legs

12% Breasts

8% but 12% for 35-54

Men Abs

26% Hair

15% Penis

8%

PAGE 5

GENITAL SURGERY

%

but 14% for 18-34

ULTHERAPY This non-surgical facelift uses ultrasound technology to kick-start collagen production for up to six months post-treatment. (It beats a really tight ponytail.)

Cost: $3,000 to $5,000 (full face) Downtime: None Risks: Burns, blisters, redness

BLU-U

BUTT LIFT

A couple months of bi-weekly exposure to this antibacterial blue light can nix frustrating breakouts.

Cost: $40 per session Downtime/Risks: None

Few body parts have inspired more impassioned lyrics. Tell the office after recovery, you’ll get back.

Cost: $2,500 to $8,000 Downtime: Two to four weeks

Risks: Bruising and numbness are common. Rarely: infection, asymmetry, permanent numbness, rippling of skin, raised scarring

2015-01-29 1:44 PM

MALE BREAST REDUCTION Those aren’t pecs.

Cost: $2,500 to $6,000 Downtime: One to two weeks Risks: Bruising and numbness are common. Rarely: infection, asymmetry, permanent numbness, rippling of skin, raised scarring

FRA XELING

ACUPUNCTURE

The sci-fi laser zaps deep into your dermis to coax out latent youth.

Cost: $1,575 Downtime: 1 week Risks: Pain, burning, swelling, changes in skin texture, scarring

Best doled out over time, can combat frown lines and crepe by boosting collagen production.

Cost: $58 to $115 Downtime: None Risks: Fatigue, soreness, bruising at needling site, muscle twitching, lightheadedness

PAGE 4

This small incision tightens and slims the little triangle of skin (some call it a wattle) from chin to neck.

Cost: $3,000 to $7,000 Downtime: Four to six weeks Risks: Bruising, swelling, infection

COS.Gatefold.FINAL.indd 6

SNAIL SLIME Snails use their mucin to heal scrapes on their squishy foot. Its soothing effect on human skin contributes to the substance’s popularity as a cosmetic ingredient.

Downtime/Risks: None

DERMAPLANING Feeling fierce?

Exfoliate with a razor blade. Shear peach fuzz and dead cells, leaving skin silken and exceptionally receptive to serums and creams.

Cost: $65 Downtime: None Risks: Increased sensitivity

CHEMICAL PEELS A prickling burn is the cost of smoothed wrinkles and faded blemishes.

Cost: $1,000 to $5,000 Downtime: One to three weeks Risks: Redness, crusting/scabbing

SKIN TIGHTENING This broadband light treatment keeps you plump against the loss of collagen.

Cost: $500 to $3,500 Downtime: None Risks: Rarely: burning, pigmentation changes, scarring

For dozens more procedures, with costs and recovery times, visit

Vanmag.com

2015-01-29 1:45 PM

Gutter Credit

PLATYSMAPLASTY

FalseCreekHealthCareMAR15FPGatefold_sc.indd 1

15-01-28 5:02 PM

FOREVER YOUNG

FACE TIME

If the eyes are windows to the soul, then don’t you want a nicelooking frame around them? Here, 12 locally produced anti-aging/ antioxidant creams to keep your visage looking museum worthy

by da n ielle tsa ng a n d gi nger jefferies

%

SKOAH

BELMONDO

Local spa empire Skoah makes hay with wellness: the Gold Kream ($130/60ml) and Gold Serum ($105/50ml) duo work in tandem to stimulate collagen and elastin production. That’s something that the pharaohs would have been into—and look how well preserved they are.

1007 Hamilton St., 604-6420200. Skoah.com

Natural skin-care line Belmondo may be based here, but its driving principles hark back to Italy. The Petal: Delicately Firming Almond Oil Eye Cream ($45/30ml) targets under the eyes with an blend of organic avocado and almond oils, which gently plump the skin with natural fatty acids. Lynnsteven Boutique, 225 Carrall St., 604899-0808. Lynnsteven.com

RIVERSOL To combat sun exposure, dermatologist Jason Rivers harnessed local ingredients. (Beta-thujaplicin, from the oil found in Western red cedars, was originally used by First Nations.) Riversol’s Protective Repair Serum Plus AntiAging Formula ($140/60ml) acts as an anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer, and antibiotic balm.

Beautymark, 1268 Pacific Blvd., 604-642-2294. Beautymark.ca

WOULD YOU UNDERGO SOME FORM OF COSMETIC PROCEDURE?

Women Teeth whitening

40% Tummy tuck

28% Laser hair removal

26% Liposuction

18% Breast surgery

14% Men Teeth whitening

40% Hair implantation

16% CHERLYN

Cherlyn’s Clarifying Serum night treatment ($109/40ml) uses ingredients derived from potent bilberry (a cousin of the blueberry) and citrus fruits to intensively brighten tired morning skin. Alpha hydroxy acids, vitamin C, and sugar maple help diminish the march of time—doing the heavy lifting while you sleep. Available online at Cherlyn.ca

NATURAL BEAUTY SKINCARE

Anti-Aging Wrinkle Reducer ($99/10ml) by Natural Beauty touts its organic and vegan approach in combining vitamin C, jojoba, and the botanical benefits of Damask rose—a feelgood/look-good combo. Nature’s Creations Aromatherapy & Wellness, 205 Lonsdale Ave., North Van, 604-990-0833.

Naturalbeautyskincare.ca

REASSEMBLY Local brand Reassembly is all about—well—reassembling.

The company blends nine organic oils (including must-haves argan and marula) in its Elixer Facial Oil ($45/30ml) to chart a path toward skin nirvana—a return to healthy, smooth skin texture. Use a few drops alone or in tandem with your favourite moisturizer.

Walrus, 3408 Cambie St., 604-874-9770. Reassembly.ca

Laser hair removal body

12% Tummy tuck

11% Liposuction

11%

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

COS.Products.FINAL_N.indd 73

73

2015-01-29 2:39 PM

FOREVER YOUNG Age Gracefully Age Gracefully

We are a specialized medical aesthetics clinic offering a variety of Health Canada approved anti aging aesthetic services administered by a team of highly trained and experienced medical professionals.

OUR SERVICES INCLUDE: Neuromodulators & Fillers • Scars & Stretch Mark Revision • IPL Photo Rejuvenation • Microdermabrasion • Body Contouring & Skin Tightening

✳

Over 20 years experience

✳

706 - 1160 Burrard Street Vancouver BC T. 604.558.4558 www.LaDerma.ca 74

DI MORELLI

LINACARE

A derivative of vitamin A, retinoids (they kick-start cellular function, help decrease brown spots, and lessen wrinkles) form the backbone of Di Morelli’s Retinol Serum ($110/50ml), which promotes collagen, reduces hyperpigmentation, and provides moisture with water-based ingredients.

La Jolie Spa, 2041 Stephens St., 604-879-1407. Dimorelli.com

Local success story Linacare Cosmetherapy (see owner Carol Lee in “High Minded,” pg. 88) keeps the price low on its Transforming Face Cream ($25/15ml), which specifically targets mature skin along with chapped, itchy, and eczemaprone zones for a healthy approach. Linacare Cosmetherapy, 127 E. Pender St., 604-899-5462.

Linacare.com

GET CREAMED BODY

BEAUTY THROUGH BALANCE

Packed with superstar all-natural ingredients like bearberry, frankincense, and licorice root, Get Creamed Body’s About Face ($35/15ml) regenerative serum trumpets its use of hyaluronic acid, which produces natural skin-plumping effects, while marine collagen replenishes your natural connective tissue to keep skin strong. Granville Island Soap Gallery, 104-1535 Johnston St., 604-669-3649.

Getcreamedbody.com

Thicker skin equals thinner wrinkles. This is the promise of Vancouver’s Beauty Through Balance’s Mineral Boost Restorative Serum $60/30ml)— and if that’s not enough, the pledge throws in visibly smaller pores to boot. The secret is UFC-calibre cellular fighters Renovage and Matrixyl, which accomplish it all.

Sense: A Rosewood Spa at Rosewood Hotel Georgia, 801 W. Georgia St., 604-6737045. Rosewoodhotels.com

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

COS.Products.FINAL_N.indd 74

2015-01-29 2:45 PM

HELENA LANE

Helena Lane’s Rose & Argan Moisturizer ($44/30ml) targets broken capillaries—a sign of damaged and aging skin—as well as visible scar tissue and wrinkles. This rich moisturizer is packed with ingredients like organic rose (evens skin tone, reduces redness), argan oil, and shea butter. Whole Foods Market, various locations.

Helenalane.com

DR. MARCIE ULMER

DR. JASON RIVERS

Clinical Instructor, Department of Dermatology and Skin Science, University of British Columbia

Clinical Professor, Department of Dermatology and Skin Science, University of British Columbia

NOW IS THE PERFECT TIME TO ERASE THE SIGNS OF SUN DAMAGE FROM LAST SUMMER WITH FRAXEL®

Before

SCENTUALS

Scentuals’ Anti-Aging Facial Oil Serum ($59/30ml) is packed with powerful essential oils that penetrate your skin to stimulate collagen production and target those fine lines caused by premature aging. And you won’t have to worry about any harsh chemicals, either—this line is made with 100 percent natural ingredients!

Whole Foods Market, various locations. Scentualsbodycare.com

For regular tips on local beauty products, visit Vanmag.com/Shopgirl

After

PDA patient results after one treatment

Fraxel® laser therapy can treat a wide range of skin issues, including removal of sun spots & sun damage, minimize fine lines & wrinkles, and improve the appearance of scars.

Treatment is best performed when the skin is not tanned.

We know skin.

Call to book a consultation with one of our Dermatologists Suite 1790 - 1111 West Georgia Vancouver, BC 604.682.7546 | vancouverskin.com

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

COS.Products.FINAL.indd 75

75

15-01-29 1:21 PM

FOREVER YOUNG

DOCTORS IN THE HOUSE Beauty is in the eye of—wait, who exactly are these beholders? Here, some of Vancouver’s top specialists, captured in their natural habitat, share tips and tricks compiled by jess burton

COS.Surgeons.FINAL_N.indd 76

2015-01-30 10:34 AM

From left: Jean Carruthers, Alastair Carruthers, Thomas Buonassisi, Andrew Denton, Frances Jang, Nick Carr, Jason Rivers, Shannon Humphrey, Richard Warren (standing), Cameron Bowman, Nancy Van Laeken, Benjamin Gelfant, and Peter Lennox Photographed on location in the Georgian Room at the Vancouver Club on January 21, 2015

photogr a ph: Pooya Nabei fa shion st y li ng: Joanna Kulpa h a ir/m a k eup: Sonia Leal-Serafim prop st y li ng: Nicole Sjรถstedt M O N T H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

COS.Surgeons.FINAL_N.indd 77

77

15-01-30 9:10 AM

These docs, all College of Physicians and Surgeons of B.C.-certified, are tops in their fields

Drinking eight glasses of water a day makes no difference to your skin: it’s an urban myth. It may be good for your kidneys, but it won’t hydrate dry skin. Your three best bets? Genetics, avoiding the sun, and smoking. Sunscreen and topical retinoids help everyone too. —Dr. Jason Rivers, medical and cosmetic dermatologist

CAMERON BOWMAN Fairview Plastic Surgery Expert in reconstructive surgery for women with breast cancer and post-trauma THOMAS BUONASSISI 8 West Cosmetic Surgery Reconstructive and cosmetic surgery of the neck, face, eyes, and nose; head of otolaryngology at Lions Gate JEAN & ALASTAIR CARRUTHERS Carruthers & Humphrey Cosmetic Medicine It all started with this couple—he, a dermatologist; she, an oculoplastic surgeon—who pioneered the cosmetic use of Botox ANDREW DENTON West Coast Cosmetic Surgery Outside his private facial plastic

There’s no such thing as a lunchtime facelift. You’ll see ads sometimes for “pop in” procedures, but a standard facelift has a minimum of two weeks’ downtime and up to four weeks for the swelling to dissipate. It’s the same with machines that claim you can lose inches and pounds with two lunchtime sessions: they rarely perform to that degree. If it seems too good to be true, it probably is. —Dr. Nancy Van Laeken, plastic, cosmetic, and reconstructive surgeon

If some physical thing about your appearance bothers you, there’s nothing wrong with getting it fixed up. But truthfully, a smile is a great facelift. —Dr. Cameron Bowman, plastic surgeon On November 18, 2014, the FDA and Health Canada approved a new breast implant, the Ideal implant, which may profoundly change the augmentation landscape. —Dr. Benjamin Gelfant, plastic surgeon

At all costs, avoid sun exposure on your face. This is by far the most significant, modifiable factor for skin aging. Second, sleeping on your back is a good idea to prevent wrinkles. To stop rolling to your sides, you can use a maternity wedge pillow (I use two) and wedge them on either side of your rib cage.

—Dr. Shannon Humphrey, medical and cosmetic dermatologist

surgery practice, he is an assistant professor of surgery at UBC BENJAMIN GELFANT Broadway Cosmetic

At present there is no effective treatment for cellulite other than procedures such as a tummy tuck and breast lift, which excise and tighten the affected skin. —Dr. Nick Carr, plastic surgeon

Plastic Surgery Specializes in facelifts, breast augmentations, and lipoplasty

78

One of the biggest problems we have in the cosmetic surgery field is managing the expectations of our patients. Plastic surgery is not an exact science, and “perfect” results rarely, if ever, occur. If patients are expecting perfection, they will be disappointed. —Dr. Richard Warren, plastic surgeon

WARDROBE JEAN CARRUTHERS Tadashi Shoji dress (Holt Renfrew), Elsa Corsi bracelet & earrings (Jeweliette), Stuart Weitzman shoes (Browns); ALASTAIR CARRUTHERS Pal Zileri tuxedo, Valentino shirt, Lewin bowtie, Monte Cristo cufflinks, Prada shoes; BUONASSISI Versace Collection blazer & slacks (Quorum), Zara shirt, Dion bowtie (Holt Renfrew), MCMLXXXIX cummerbund (Holt Renfrew); DENTON J.Crew suit, shirt & bowtie, Rolex watch; JANG Aidan Mattox dress (Holt Renfrew), Vintage Chanel bracelet, René Caovilla Veneza shoes; CARR Versace Collection suit (Quorum), Armani shirt, dion bowtie & cummerbund, Messori shoes (Quorum); RIVERS Canali blazer & slacks (Holt Renfrew), Zara shirt, MCMLXXXIX bowtie & cummerbund (Holt Renfrew); HUMPHREY Laundry dress (Holt Renfrew), Elsa Corsi earrings & bracelet (Jeweliette), ring stylist’s own, Michael Kors shoes (Browns); WARREN Pal Zileri tuxedo, Polifroni shirt, Park lane bowtie & cummerbund; BOWMAN Etro suit(Holt Renfrew), Calvin Klein shirt, Italo Ferrelli bowtie & pocket square and Messori shoes (Quorum), cummerbund stylist’s own; VAN LAEKEN Aidan Mattox dress (Holt Renfrew), Elsa Corsi bracelet & earrings (Jeweliette); GELFANT Versace Collection suit (Quorum), Valentino shirt, Armani cummerbund & bowtie; LENNOX Ferragamo tuxedo, Eaton shirt, Dion bowtie. Makeup/hair by Sonia Leal-Serafim (THEYrep) using Giorgio Armani cosmetics and TRESemmè hair care products

FOREVER YOUNG Meet the Crew

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M O N T H 2 O 15

COS.Surgeons.FINAL_N.indd 78

15-01-30 11:46 AM

SPONSORED REPORT

What’s in a name?

Metta is Sanskrit for loving kindness

Y

our oasis-like escape begins the minute you step out of West Broadway’s bustle and into Metta Rest Spa’s nurturing space.

Soft lighting and a calming atmosphere guide you down the hall past seven private flotation rooms and an intimate yoga studio to a spacious change room where a cozy robe invites you to leave the outside world behind. Their suggestion to arrive at least 45 minutes early is well worthwhile in order to take full advantage of your visit—a unique experience that has been called a return to the womb.

• It is a meditative practice of filling yourself and others with love REST stands for Restricted Environmental Stimulus Therapy • This terminology was developed

by UBC’s own Dr. Peter Suedfeld

Your first stop is the fully infrared sauna: a clean, co-ed space that will help to release toxins and clear your mind. After warming up (and mentally cooling down), you are led to your private float room for a pre-rinse with oil- and chemical-free cleanser, a local product line that shares Metta’s emphasis on sustainability.

As you prepare to float, your pod dilutes 450 pounds of Epson salt, creating water three times as buoyant as the Dead Sea. The result, as you lower yourself into your shell-like vessel, is a complete liberation from the effects of gravity, eliminating all pressure points for a thorough physical and mental recovery.

Gentle music and coloured lighting lull you into REST, before all sensory triggers cease, leaving you to float without concept of time or space. An hour later the same stimulants recover your awareness and signal the end of your REST. Though your time in the pod is over, your retreat does not need to be. A full line of products await you in the shower, while ionized water and tea invite you to relax in the library: a warm space that encourages creativity, reflection, or just a little extra “me” time. Stay a while and pamper yourself as your mind wanders, already planning your next visit.

REST re-visited • The goal of REST is to achieve theta state: a relaxed mental state in which your brainwaves are no longer affected by external stimuli • In theta state, brain workload is reduced by 90%, conducive to proper healing and restoration • 1 hour of REST is equivalent to 4-6 hours of deep sleep • Other benefits include pain relief, injury prevention, improved sleep, a heightened immune system, healthier skin and the ability to overcome phobias, addictions or other destructive habits

Float Spa features Float Spa pods are the most advanced on the market.

• They are sourced from Budapest, Hungary • Their welcoming design is wheelchair accessible • Each pod is fully drained and sanitized between guests • Metta Rest Spa is the official Canadian supplier of Float Spa pods

MettaRestSpaMAR15FP_sc.indd 1

Ultimate Shavasana Co-founder Nicole Stratton offers private yoga classes for up to 5 people, including a unique 1-hour practice that leads you to a pod for your final pose

15-01-07 12:22 PM

FOREVER YOUNG Carruthers & Humphrey Cosmetic Medicine Expert in neuromodulators and soft tissue fillers; also a clinical trialist FRANCES JANG & NICK CARR Skinworks

For centuries people have been trying to find the magic solution to reversing the aging process. Non-surgical treatments are appropriate when small changes are desired; surgery is reserved for patients who want a more dramatic result. Be clear about your objectives, and beware claims that sound too grand. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. —Dr. Thomas Buonassisi, facial plastic surgeon

heads the Canadian

My favourite suggestion is to use daily topical vitamin A on face, neck, chest, and hands. I also feel very supportive of daily topical sunscreen containing the best UVA-blocker—Mexoryl— and also topical vitamin C to block infrared. —Dr. Jean Carruthers,

Society of Aesthetic

oculoplastic surgeon

She brought laser hair removal and microdermabrasion to town; he

Plastic Surgery

President of the

Sun avoidance and regular use of vitamin A acid-containing creams (such as Retin-A or StieVAA) will make a great difference in the long term. I don’t believe that drinking excessive amounts of water makes any difference, and cellulite cream does not work except from the massage effect associated with its application.

Other creams for facial application do help but are less effective than sun avoidance and Retin-A. —Dr. Alastair Carruthers,

Canadian Society for

medical and cosmetic dermatologist

PETER LENNOX Private practice Specializes in cosmetic surgery and breast reconstruction JASON RIVERS Pacific Dermaesthetics

Dermatologic Surgery NANCY VAN LAEKEN Private practice Specializes in plastic, cosmetic and reconstructive surgery; volunteers with victims of violence and domestic abuse in Southeast Asia RICHARD WARREN Vancouver Plastic

There’s a saying in rhinoplasty surgery that the result of a good rhinoplasty is seen in the eyes. By bringing the nose into balance with other facial features, the nose learns to share centre stage: the eyes become brighter, the lips become fuller, and the smile more brilliant.” —Dr. Andrew Denton, facial plastic and reconstructive surgeon If you want the look of push-up bra but don’t want to wear a bra with a certain outfit, a couple of pieces of strategically applied 3M microfoam tape will do the trick! —Dr. Peter Lennox, plastic surgeon

PROP STYLING Vintage Bergere chair ($2,395), Josephine tufted sofa ($2,395) and round Ottoman ($895), and white Tibetan lamb throw ($1,425) by The Cross Decor & Design. Metallic ceramic vase ($39), silk peonies ($24.99 per stem), and fresh cut peonies ($9.99 per stem) from West Van Florist. Styling by Nicole Sjöstedt (Lizbell Agency)

SHANNON HUMPHREY

Surgery Centre Director of the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery; author of the textbook The Aesthetic Volume in Plastic Surgery

For me the satisfaction is seeing we can keeping the face looking healthy and elegant for the age of the person. Nobody wants to look 25 when they are 50. You want to look 50, but a great 50!”

—Dr. Frances Jang, cosmetic dermatologist

80

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M O N T H 2 O 15

COS.Surgeons.FINAL_N.indd 80

15-01-30 9:09 AM

“The Best Injectable is Undetectable.”

Dr. Shehla Ebrahim

Medical Aesthetics is all we do.

Our trusted, skilled & dedicated team is focused on providing safe, affordable, non-surgical face and body treatments to help you look your best.

Lunchtime lift!

BEFORE

AFTER

Ultherapy An Uplifting Ultrasound

DR. SHEHLA EBRAHIM

MD, CCFP, FCFP Special Interest in Dermatology

DR. CHRISTOPHER PAVLOU MD, CCFP

We are the only clinic on the north shore offering this revolutionary treatment.

BEFORE

Non-Surgical Brow, Jowl and Neck lift.

No Downtime!

Results in One Treatment.

TERRY ALMEIDA

MAROUSKA SMITH

LAURA LAWRENCE

BUSHRA SALVINO

DIONE GILLETT

CAROLINE BACIC

Laser Practitioner

CoolSculpting® Specialist

90 DAYS LATER

Freeze Your Fat Away!

BEFORE

Laser Practitioner

Laser Practitioner

CoolSculpting® is FDA-cleared and delivers undeniable results in as little as one treatment.

16 WEEKS AFTER

Client Coordinator

Client Coordinator

BOTOX • DERMAL FILLER • PHOTOFACIAL • COOLSCULPTING • LASER RESURFACING • GENERAL DERMATOLOGY

Suite 22 – 285 17th Street West Vancouver 604.925.3376 info@amblesidedermedics.com AmblesideDermedics.com

AmblesideDermedicsMAR15FP_sc.indd 2

Call us today for a Complimentary Consultation

Suite 140 – 2609 Westview Drive North Vancouver 604.980.3993 info@afterglowskincare.com AfterglowSkincare.ca

15-01-30 12:28 PM

OPENING SOON!

Lose up to 10lbs a month while eating a nutritionally balanced diet combined with a fitness program designed to maximize you results.

SECURE 1 OF ONLY 400 EXCLUSIVE MEMBERSHIPS • • • • • •

All-Inclusive Membership Only 400 Exclusive Memberships Available State Of The Art Training Methods Unlimited Small Group Personal Training 1:8 Nutrition Tracking 24/7 First in Canada - Shockwave Total Body Workout

• • • • •

Towel Service and Keypad Lockers On-Site Registered Nutritionists On-Site Registered Kinesiologist Medical Grade Infrared Sauna Free Parking

ENTER TO WIN 1 OF 4 90-DAY PASSES | 604-559-1321 info@ozonefitness.ca ozonefitness.ca

OzoneFitnessMAR15FP_sc.indd 1

Visit vanmag.com/contest for details.

CLUB HOURS Monday – Friday 6:00am – 11:00pm Sat & Sunday 8:00am – 10:00pm

15-01-28 4:47 PM

PERSONAL

MODEL CITIZEN

MY SPACE

SW E AT EQUI T Y

FIELD TRIP

THE

“Sadly, my technique is judged too sloppy for fast lope rides, and I’m sent back down to the walk/trot minors” PG. 92

The best shops, fashion, beauty, design, travel & fitness

Hang Tight no one likes a monday morning quarterback, least of all right after Valentine’s Day. But if we could let you in on a little secret? We have a special drawer reserved for those lacy, corseted, pushup contraptions bestowed upon us in the name of love, worn once for show and then banished. Too often, “look good” and “feel good” play in different divisions. Which is why we’re so happy to welcome Lululemon’s new spring bras in cherry blossom hues: the Free to Be and Free to Be Wild both get the job done but allow for freedom of expression and a little frolicky fun, too.

Eydis Einarsdottir

Caption

Lululemon’s Free to Be Wild ($48) and Free to Be ($42) bras in highperformance, sweat-wicking Luxtreme fabric. Lululemon.ca

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

GoodsOpener.FINAL.indd 83

83

2015-01-28 2:24 PM

THE

GOODS

PERSONAL SHOPPER

Best Buys

In Bloom With winter almost gone, spring’s fresh picks burst forth by a ma nda ross

Put a feather in your cap with the oversized slouchy Licious hat ($58)

by Nobis—perfect in burnt orange for the last breaths of winter. Nobis.ca A good trench effortlessly straddles classic and contemporary, and this Babaton Nicky trench ($185) has the line covered perfectly. Aritzia, 701 W. Georgia St., 604-681-9301. Aritzia.com

Designed by local Raif Adelberg (former Herschel Supply Co. designer, Wings + Horns founder, and global fashion-cognoscenti darling), new Vancouver-based Mezzi’s Italianleather luxury accessories, like the Vedova Nera shoulder bag ($1,200), all feature an integrated GPS tracker that allows wireless connectivity between your bag and smartphone. Mezzi.com Come cruise season, it’s all hands—and feet—on deck with the wedge: set sail with Geox’s new D Thelma sandal in biscuit ($160). Geox, 650 W. 41st Ave., 604-263-3630.

Geox.com

84

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

PersonalShopper.FINAL.indd 84

15-01-29 12:12 PM

***

L’ORÉAL’S NEW MAKEUP GENIUS APP USES FACIAL-MAPPING TECHNOLOGY SO YOU CAN TRY OUT PRODUCTS ON YOUR REFLECTION

(free on Apple.ca)

It’s all checks and balances this spring when gingham figures large: the Lake dress by Delpine ($235), a yarn-dyed block check, arrives mid February. Much & Little, 2541 Main St., 604-709-9034. Muchandlittle.com

Loosen up with the new handmade Pyramid leather belt in sandshell ($120) by Amsterdam-based Denham.

For shipping information, Denhamthejeanmaker.com

Vancouver-based Nomi designer Jullianna Smith tucks hand-inscribed inspirational quotes into the seams of all of her pieces, like the breezy pink Jules jacket ($249) fresh from her spring 2015 line. Nomidesigns.ca

The first home fragrance collection from Hermès (from $185) comes in five luxe scents and corresponding colours: Taupe, Celadon, Lagoon, Sulphur, and Pumpkin. Hermès, 755 Burrard St., 604681-9965. Hermes.com Shopkeeper Glyn Lewis, of Vancouver’s new online Kent Street Apparel Co., named many of his accessories after city streets and parks; the rest of the line—like the canvas Dapper toiletry kit ($47)—evokes a young, confident professional.

Kentstreetapparel.co

EASY RIDER Natuzzi’s Revive chair ($3,600) adjusts, rocks, and reacts intuitively and fluidly to the body’s movements for better circulation and posture. Inspiration Furniture, 1275 W. Sixth Ave., 604-730-1275.

Inspirationfurniture.ca

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

PersonalShopper.FINAL.indd 85

85

15-01-29 1:38 PM

THE

GOODS

***

THIS HANDMADE SUIT BY VANCOUVER MENSWEAR DESIGNER YENTING CHEN TOOK OVER 100 HOURS TO COMPLETE

MODEL CITIZEN

Personal St yle

(Dulyequipped.com)

SEBASTIEN LE GOFF SERVICE DIREC T OR AND SOMMELIER, CAC TUS CLUB RESTAUR ANT S

The Propaganda Lilou top ($56) from Plenty looks lovely and light in lace. 1107 Robson St., 604-689-4478.

Getplenty.com

there are trends and there are classics. Sebastien Le Goff, an irrepressible Frenchman, straddles the two well.

“Food and fashion are very similar to me,” he says. “Things change, there is an evolution, but you can always come back to the basics and execute well with fresh ingredients cooked simply.” His style? Eclectic with a dose of classicism.

What’s the most beautiful piece in your closet?

This tailor-made suit by Yenting Chen.

One item in your closet you couldn’t throw away?

Alexis Bittar’s new marquis cluster ring ($260) is a brass, 10k-plate, and Swarovski crystal crown of glory.

Holt Renfrew, 737 Dunsmuir St., 604-681-3121. Holtrenfrew.com

My grandfather’s hat.

Best style advice?

Less is more.

Three things that are always in

The gold-plated Chinoiserie teapot ($4,500) and sugar bowl ($1,680), made exclusively for TWG Tea, comprise just four elements: feldspar, quartz, kaolin, and water.

The Urban Tea Merchant, 1070 W. Georgia St., 604-692-0071.

Urbantea.com

your fridge?

Cheeses (I let them sit on the table before consuming them), a bottle of bubbles, and a jar of Sambal sauce.

Where is your favourite vacation destination?

Tokyo. I’ve been there fi ve times. The food and the service are incredible; the culture is fascinating.

Most interesting souvenir?

A pair of handmade boots (to ride

Catch the full interview with Le Goff at Vanmag.com/Shopgirl

86

Favourite brand and style of jeans?

I’m not much of a jeans guy. VM

Evaan Kheraj

horses) that I bought in Nicaragua.

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

PersonalShopper.FINAL.indd 86

15-01-29 1:38 PM

SPONSORED REPORT

ThroughConversation™ Retreats: Your Ticket to Health and Happiness Whether you’re looking to improve your emotional health and stability or wanting to enrich your interpersonal relationships, and consequentially your life, a carefully crafted dialogue with ThroughConversation will help you to unlock a happier, healthier, more powerful you.

In addition to their one-on-one programs, ThroughConversationTM offers European retreats, giving you the chance to reach your emotional and physical potential and start developing strong relationships in a safe group setting while discovering an exciting new part of the world. The picturesque sights of Europe provide the ultimate setting for a transformational experience as you shed emotional weight and regain your personal freedom.

Learn more as we chat with ThroughConversationTM founder, Jean-Paul Gravel.

1. Describe the unique methodology of ThroughConversationTM. Our one-of-a-kind practice helps uncover and address the obstacles that have been holding you back for years. We use a unique methodology that involves communicating with both the conscious and subconscious mind to shift the limiting beliefs that are causing your emotional and physical health to decline.

Instead of simply addressing symptoms, we look for and dissolve the root cause of what is stopping you from achieving your goals. We offer customized one-on-one programs focusing on Emotional Freedom and Physical Health, as well as group retreats.

2. What are the most common reactions or results following the completion of a program?

People are always amazed that significant life changes can be achieved in such a short period of time. We see our clients enter a completely different world: one with less worry and sadness and a lot more happiness and opportunity.

Watching them realize that there are solutions to problems that have been with them for years, sometimes even decades, is very rewarding. Most of our clients also report substantial improvements in their physical health.

3. What are the European retreats all about?

This immersion program dramatically shortens the path to emotional well-being as you discover a more loving, compassionate, free and ultimately happy self over the course of several consecutive days. It is the perfect experience for those who are inspired to shed their old skin and recreate a more powerful version of themselves.

ThroughConversationTM retreats will give you the knowledge, tools and awareness to systematically dissolve the limiting beliefs that hold you back in life. Guided experiential conversations and supported self-examinations will open your mind and your heart as you relax, rejuvenate and step into your power.

4. Your unique programs take place at retreat centers near Paris, Amsterdam and Stockholm. Why did you choose these specific locations?

We hand-picked these locations because they are perfectly suited for powerful transformational experiences and include beautiful nature, ecologically sound venues and Zen-like parks. These particular destinations are world favourites, giving you an opportunity to further explore after you have uncovered a healthier mindset.

Tel: +1800-936-1534 retreats.throughconversation.com Created by the Western Living advertising department in partnership with Through ConversationTM.

ThroughConversationMAR15FP_sc.indd 1

15-01-29 2:00 PM

THE

GOODS

M Y SPACE

Storied Homes

High Minded For entrepreneur and philanthropist Carol Lee, the benefits of her therapeutic creams complement the benefits of her volunteer work to preserve Chinatown by john burns || photos by tr acey ay ton

88

when carol lee was still a young B.Comm. grad from the UBC Sauder School, she worked for her father, noted local real-estate mogul Bob Lee, helping to put together financing deals from the family’s Prospero offices in Coal Harbour. “I always thought if there was ever a time this area actually became residential, not just railway tracks, I’d like to live here,” she says today.

Lee did move—onto an upper floor of the Shaw Tower when it opened a decade ago. By then she’d graduated from Harvard Business

School, and with business partner Henry Fung founded the Linacare Cosmetherapy line she steers today.

The therapeutic creams were developed to soothe dialysis patients’ dry skin (Fung is a noted nephrologist), and Lee still finds meaning in her products’ healing qualities. “I was always searching for something that improved the lives of people.”

Meanwhile, with travel for work, plus multiple board commitments, she’s still working on the décor of this Coal Harbour aerie… but its expansive views are her own brand of therapy. VM

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

MySpace.FINAL.indd 88

15-01-28 1:00 PM

***

THE GOOD CHINA

Last year, Lee, a booster of Chinatown, bought Foo’s Ho Ho to save it from gentrification.

She’s also opening a teahouse/bakery designed by Forbidden City installer Michael Lis

LIGHT BOX

A frequent entertainer, Lee makes full use of the 1,600 sq. ft. condo’s open plan FORAGER

The black side table came from her grandfather’s store, Foo Hung; the coffee table and silver tray were salvaged in Hong Kong; the painting is by Montreal artist Jim Gislason LOCAL HERO

Her brand’s name, Lina, dates back to her nickname born out of a Spanish class at Sentinel Secondary SMALL PACK AGES

A few examples of a lifelong collection of small boxes GIVING SPIRIT

Lee prefers working vacations, like one in 2011 when she ran errands for NBC at the wedding of Will and Kate. There, a former staffer of Diana, Princess of Wales, taught her to make the perfect G&T (hint: Plymouth Gin) FAMILY ALBUM

Portraits of Lee’s grandmother, Gin King Choon (centre), and the Lee base on East Pender (right; now home to Linacare) will grace the relaunched Foo’s Ho Ho

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

MySpace.FINAL.indd 89

89

15-01-28 1:01 PM

THE

GOODS

S W E AT E Q U I T Y

Workout Plans

***

ARRIVING FEB. 25, THE ULTRA BOOST BY ADIDAS ADAPTS TO ANY SURFACE IN ANY ENVIRONMENT THANKS TO TECHNOLOGY USED BY NASA

($210, Adidas.ca)

Shell Game An Olympic hopeful prepares for the tough row brendan hodge spent most of his youth rowing for his high school, then Harvard and the Canadian under-23s. But after a decade, he refocused on law school at UBC, then a legal career. Weekends on his bike satisfied his itch— until he watched the Canadian crews race at the 2012 Olympics.

So he dug his rowing machine out of his parents’ garage and began arduous before-work sessions.

“At first, I was going at a rate that I would not have been proud of in high school.” But he ultimately excelled at the Canadian trials and took leave to train full-time.

Now 30, Hodge is on the national team, with eyes set on Rio 2016. “I’m always trying to find where my limit is, physically and psychologically,” he says. “That makes every day, every workout satisfying.”—Frances McInnis

THE BURN

660

CALORIES/HR* * by a 150-pound person doing long-distance training

WHERE TO GO

The Learn to Row programs ($144 for eight sessions) at the Richmond Olympic Oval take neophytes through the basics at the facility’s stateof-the-art indoor rowing tank.

Richmondoval.ca

BRING FRIENDS

The Delta Deas Rowing Club (annual memberships from $700) offers open sessions for recreational rowers

90

looking to stay fi t, as well as gruelling workouts designed to improve endurance and racing skills for more competitive types.

Deltadeas.com

BRING A DEFIBRILLATOR

In the Row to Podium program at the Burnaby Lake Rowing Club, the young and fi t (and extraordinarily tall) train 30-plus hours a week in hopes of joining the elite.

Rowtopodium.ca

John Sinal

BRING GRANDMA

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

SweatEquity.FINAL_N.indd 90

15-01-28 12:58 PM

TasteforLifeMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-30 11:13 AM

THE

GOODS

FIELD TRIP

Nex t Destinations

Dude, Where’s My Mare?

Trail-riding bliss among the saguaro cacti of the Arizona desert

it’s 7:45 a.m. and we’re already in the saddle, guiding a string of horses up the shoulder of Arizona’s Rincon Mountains. It’s an early start but worth it: the sky is incandescent, the desert scrub a soft grey punctuated by hundreds of saguaro cacti. We can see forever.

My mount, a palomino named Dorado, picks his way across dry washes that only a few weeks ago were rushing cataracts distributing half the area’s 30 centimetres of annual rainfall in a matter of days. Our next stop winks in and out of sight: the circa-1868 homestead house of Tanque Verde Ranch. When we crest the final ridge, Bob Cote greets us from behind the outdoor grill: owner

92

NE ARBY HANGARS ON Conditions make the area storage heaven for hundreds of decommissioned and mothballed jets and fighter planes.

Pimaair.org GET BACK Sir Paul McCartney is said to still own an adjacent ranch; locals can point out where the Beatle once rode FEELING BROWSY Hitting the border?

Stop in at Tubac, an artists’ colony and craft bazaar 100 kilometres south.

Tubacarizona.com

since 1957, he’s cooking up blueberry pancakes, as he does most Thursday and Sunday mornings.

Settled in at picnic tables with pancakes, chili eggs, and coffee, we greet the day like the (okay, pampered) cowboys we’ve become in only a few short days.

Tanque Verde has been a guest ranch for over 100 years; its 640 acres, home nowadays to nearly 200 geldings and 69 Southwesternstyle guest rooms, make it the largest dude ranch in America. Size matters. Having so many horses and staff means every day there are multiple rides, plus many guided activities like mountain biking, nature walks, and even astronomy and cooking challenges. “It’s okay if you just want to sit out on the

patio and watch the sun go up and go down,” Rick Hartigan tells us during a riveting Nature Center discussion of the area’s (many) venomous critters. “But if you like to keep busy, we’re happy to share what we know.”

I want to know more about horses, so I spend hours each day reliving the “Hi-yo, Silver!” dreams of my childhood. Dorado’s awfully placid, but on another occasion I’m consigned a trusty-looking fellow named Boots and we get up a fine froth, shifting smoothly from a trot up to a canter (which, in the Southwest, they call a lope). Sadly, my technique is judged too sloppy for fast lope rides, and I’m sent back down to the walk/trot minors and Dorado, who may not be my

Graddy Photography

by john burns

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

FieldTrip.FINAL_N.indd 92

15-01-28 1:02 PM

***

TIME TO HORSE AROUND WITH THE CLASSIC BLOUSE FROM THE NEW ALFRED SUNG COLLECTION AT MARK’S

($39.99, Marks.com)

CATCH AND RECATCH

You may be in the Sonoran Desert, but the sunfish and largemouth bass are still biting at tiny manmade Lake Corchran FOUR WALLS, NO ROOF

You can ride from sun-up on, but the most breathtaking views happen at dusk, when the full panorama of the mountain ranges at all cardinal points gleams BOYS’ CLUB

The ranch is home to around 200 horses, including many that overwinter from sister ranch Grand View Lodge in Minnesota HERE’S MUD IN YOUR EYE

Graddy Photography

All the lodging—in traditional Santa Fe style with adobe walls—opens onto desert scrub.

Remember to put on your flip-flops before you head for the hot tub: area snakes are rarely belligerent, but no one likes to be stepped on

M A R C H 2 O 15 | VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E

FieldTrip.FINAL_N.indd 93

93

15-01-28 1:02 PM

House margaritas are made with prickly pears grown on site

Aberdeen Store 604.295.9357 2800 Aberdeen Centre 4151 Hazelbridge Way Richmond

UBC Store 604.228.8765 Wesbrook Village 102-3313 Shrum Lane Vancouver

West Vancouver Store 778.279.8822 1560 Marine Drive West Vancouver

20% OFF your first visit *Only applies to services

Soho Nail Boutique Nail. | Skin. | Lash.

2868 W. Broadway 604.336.6877 sohonailboutique.com 94

getaway steed but turns out to be very good at another activity: team penning. In groups, we coordinate our mounts to nudge a herd of calves across a ring and into pens; our foursome easily outpaces the competition to win bragging rights. It may not be Lone Ranger territory, but it’s immensely satisfy ing nevertheless.

Tanque Verde’s slow time is May to August, but even in early November the place is quiet enough that on cookout night, we’re just a few dozen around fires, listening to Bill Ganz sing Johnny Cash as we wash down hamburgers and grilled corn with Barrio Blanco ales and the house special: margaritas made with juice from prickly pears picked on the property. Nogales, Mexico, is only 100 kilometres south, and with the guitar, the crackling fire, a bout of line dancing, and all those brilliant winking stars (Arizona has dark-sky legislation, and up the road 24 telescopes are in service to astronomers around the world), the ancient desert rises up, blotting out the very few modern intrusions to convince us we’ve made it back to the Old West.

My legs don’t see the romance, apparently: after three days riding the trails, I’m a little tender, so I take advantage of one more ranch amenity. Not watercolour lessons or pickup tennis. I head to La Sonora Spa for a deep muscle session that squeezes the soreness out of my jostled body. Saddle-sore no more, I stop by the corral one last time and reach through the mesquite fence to wish Dorado happy trails.

Until we meet again. VM

Graddy Photography

ChefHungNoodle.com

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

FieldTrip.FINAL_N.indd 94

15-01-29 10:01 AM

THEY CAME FOR A MAGAZINE AND LEFT WITH SO MUCH MORE

ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN AT A MAGAZINEyourSTAND own

VISIT A MAGAZINE STAND AND FIND

STARRING

STARRING

DIRECTED BY

PRODUCED BY

SCREENPLAY BY

ART DIRECTION AND DESIGN BY

STORY

ORCHESTRAL ARRANGEMENTS BY

AMY FORCE JEFF SINASAC JAMIE WAY BRUCE SEFTON SUSAN ELSLEY K9 STRATEGY DESIGN KENANDIGOR.COM +

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY

EDITED BY

RYAN HAAS CHRIS DI STAULO

SEE THEIR STORY AT

" CANADASMAGAZINESTORE.CA/ANYTHINGCANHAPPEN %

MagsCanadaMAR15FP_sc.indd 1

15-01-06 3:41 PM

BACK

PAGE

S N A P C H AT T E R

 M A L COLM PA RRY

A b o u t To w n

“How much money do you need? You only need a plate and a bed: eating and sleeping”

— Djavad Mowafaghian, musing on what inspires his multimillion-dollar philanthropy

Emcees Sasa Drover and Chris Gailus

PHIL ANTHROPY

Djavad Mowafaghian and Arya Eshghi

Sherry Doman and Jill Lyall

CRYSTAL BALL Nov. 27 When niece Arya Eshghi chaired the event’s 28th annual run and appealed to attendees to raise the $1.4 million that BC Children’s Hospital Foundation needed for orthopedic imaging equipment, Djavad Mowafaghian, who has supported many medical and educational programs, raised his hand to cover the sum

LUXURY

ROLLS-ROYCE LAUNCH Dec. 18 Soon after the $829,000 Phantom Pinnacle Travel series of 15 cars debuted in Beijing, young pianists greeted one here by reciting on a gold-leaf-covered $535,000 Fazioli.

Looking on was city-based singer Wanting Qu, whose Everything in the World debut outshone the piano by going platinum in China in a week

96

Fred Herzog and Ian Wallace

Pianists Xin Yi Wang and Alex Zhang

Gathie Falk and VAG associate director Daina Augaitis

C U LT U R E

Internationalists Robert Shaw and Martina Lynch

Wanting Qu and Rosemary Siemens

Andy Sylvester and Gordon Smith

GORDON SMITH TRIBUTE Dec. 11 At his launch for the monograph he wrote on the painter and client, Equinox gallery owner Andy Sylvester hosted artists and collectors who came to give their regards to Smith, 93. With studio tasks beckoning, Smith left characteristically early

VA N C O U V E R M A G A Z I N E | M A R C H 2 O 15

SnapChatter.FINAL_N.indd 96

15-01-28 2:44 PM

7 20,000

PR SA EVIE TU W RD S S AY TA FEB RT 14

YEARS OF PLANNING

SF PRIVATE BACKYARD AMENITY

21

STOREYS OF VIEWS

4

WAYS TO COMMUTE: SKYTRAIN, BIKE, BUS OR WALK

25,000

33 $

HIPSTER NEIGHBOURS

DIFFERENT FLOORPLANS

299K

PRICED FROM

1

OPPORTUNITY TO OWN THE FIRST BUILDING OF ITS KIND IN THE HOTTEST NEIGHBOURHOOD IN VANCOUVER

PRESENTATION CENTRE LOCATED AT THE CORNER OF MAIN & BROADWAY

FOR INFORMATION AND PRICING REGISTER AT

INDEPENDENTatMAIN.COM The Developer reserves the right to make changes and modifications to the information contained herein without prior notice. This is not an offering for sale, any such offering may only be made by way of a Disclosure Statement. E&OE.

IndependentMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-22 2:10 PM

Opportunities Such As This Are Rare.

T H E U LT I M AT E W E S T C O A S T A D D R E S S .

A W E S T VA N C O U V E R L A N D M A R K FEATURI N G H OMES WITH U NOB STRU CTE D O C E A N V I E W S A N D U N PA R A L L E L E D AT T E N T I O N T O D E TA I L . T H I S I S A N O P P O R T U N I T Y U N L I K E A N Y OT H E R .

98 Beachside Homes In West Vancouver Register Today at GrosvenorAmbleside.com The developer reserves the right to make changes to the information contained herein without notice.

Rendering is representational only and may not be accurate. This is not an offering for sale. E.&O.E.

GrosvenorMAR15FP_lt.indd 1

2015-01-22 2:08 PM