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Best of Vancouver 2011 communities: Gastown keeps on changing

22.09.11

Sali, of course, was talking about entrepreneurs. Back in the 19th and early 20th centuries, Gastown was a ’hood with a boozy after-hours scene thanks to Gassy Jack Deighton (and by the 1930s, 300 other pubs); a food-warehouse district and trendy hotel row; then a busy shopping hub. It declined after 1945, and was nearly demolished to make way for a freeway in the 1960s. In 1971, it won a heritage designation from the province of B.C., thanks to the vision of a handful of Vancouverites (including Lee Poulus, owner of the Old Spaghetti Factory, and modelling and makeup school maven Blanche MacDonald, their faces now immortalized in friezes on the outside of Le Magasin.) Still, the area bumps up against the Downtown Eastside, and attracts a sometimes-raucous club crowd, so it’s been saved from complete sanitization.

Most storefronts are independently owned, many by young innovators. For example, on September 2, brothers John (age 24), Matt (age 17), Chris (age 20), and George (age 25) Gianniakos opened Revolver Coffee (325 Cambie Street). Already that day, the place was packed to capacity with tidily dressed tech workers from the surrounding brick buildings. Boneta restaurant, opened in 2007 by the then-32-year-old Mark Brand, moved from 1 West Cordova this month into The Mews at 12 Water Street. Heidi Schmidt started alt-clothing store New World Designs (306 West Cordova Street) at the tender age of 21, with $500 in her pocket. She found her fixtures in local Dumpsters, painted everything, and 22 years later, Schmidt’s still in business. And John Fluevog and Peter Fox launched their crumbly first store at 211 Carrall Street in 1970, eventually moving the company to its flagship design space for Fluevog’s international empire today at 65 Water Street.

Source: Straight.com