Chandos Construction celebrates the completion of okimaw peyesew kamik (King Thunderbird Centre), a purpose-built facility developed in partnership with Boyle Street Community Services in Edmonton.

Located on a redeveloped 2.5-acre site in the McCauley neighbourhood, the centre brings Boyle Street’s previously dispersed services into one place.

The 85,000-square-foot facility repurposes an existing commercial office building into a modern community and staff centre. The new space now serves as Boyle Street’s primary hub, bringing more than 200 staff members together to better support thousands of individuals each year through housing, health services, system navigation, and wraparound care.

The project involved extensive upgrades and site redevelopment, including improvements to the exterior building envelope, a complete interior fit-out, new building systems, and the installation of the geothermal field.

Exterior work included land re-grading, removal of an existing ramp, and the creation of new walkways, private outdoor spaces, and community gardens. Landscaping influenced by Indigenous art and design supports intuitive movement through the site and helps manage the flow of clients, staff, and visitors.

“The intent of this building was to bring Boyle Street’s services together into one home base, allowing their teams to work more collaboratively and serve the community more effectively. We are excited to help see this goal come to fruition,” said Matt Gustafson, project manager with Chandos Construction. “The existing building structure and tight project footprint made for a challenging project that demanded ongoing planning and collaboration between Chandos, our trade partners and Boyle Street.”

The centre attained Zero Carbon Building Design v3 certification, which was accomplished by reusing the existing structure and leveraging the existing embodied carbon, giving it a second life and avoiding the addition of more carbon intensive materials to achieve the build.