The lake as a vessel for life: an architectural response to connecting leisure landscapes about the Muskoka Lakes

Examining the anthropogenic change over the last two hundred years, Canada’s landscape at large has been molded into that of a globalized society. Often by means of the infrastructure that connects these economies, the people that drive them, drive upon the roads and make use of these same modes of transportation as well. The research will focus on the necessity of providing alternative modes of conveyance about the community at both the local but also provincial scales. As means of connecting urban civilizations become safer, faster and more efficient, our own vision of space and time trend towards that of a compressed reality[1]. A reality whereby one place is just as readily accessible to the average citizen as the next, as if distance and – with any luck – the emissions that coincide with traversing any given landscape are troubles of the past. Now, as we rely upon contemporary technology more and more to provide an immediacy of experience, that very experience estranges perceptions of landscapes and places that are not of their own corporeality[2]. Thus, the question is posed; what subverted intentions do people’s metaphysical preconceptions of one place, impose onto the next when engaging in true corporeality? In a period in which transient and trans-local lifestyles are colliding with those of domestic comfort across numerous temporal and spatial agendas. How then, do local populations perceive and interpret the globalization of space brought upon by these trans-local residents – daytime or seasonal – that are more often imposed upon localities rather than discussed? In a manner of collaboration rather than apprehensive co-existence, can local, year-round architectural programming begin to reimagine the vernacular practices within a given context, provided a history of translocality? Without affecting the landscapes that continue to facilitate these exchanges of people, knowledge, and economics amongst these different populations in an adverse manner, but rather instill a context specific sense of year-round resiliency? How might the design of civic spaces within these inherently trans-local destinations act as an inclusive space for all to experience? Extrapolating from the brief yet thorough history of Ontario’s cottage and lodging culture about the Muskoka Lakes. Colonial-European settlement has played a significant role in how the ethnography of rural and urban Canadian lives at large, have taken form – both in architectural and societal manifestations. Inadvertently, the privatization of lake-frontage within the Muskoka Lakes has been a subject of historic subversion and contemporary discussion since discovery. Still to this day, finding no sustainable resolve. On a seasonal basis, the area has become so saturated with an industry that depends upon the influx of non-permanent residents, such that it promotes exclusivity upon the lakes, as the further privatization of lodging ensues. Both, as the translocal “cottage” and archetypal Muskokan “resort” establish themselves as globalized commodity, rather than corporeal experience. In examining the past, with contemporary and historic modes of lodging upon the lakes acting as both access and destination, how can the reinterpretation of the architecture and social structuring of past resorts provide a new paradigm to act as precedent at larger scales, advocating for interconnected communities and landscapes. In that the implicit biases assumed by each of three populations – the local, trans-local, and day-visitor – trend towards solidarity and sustainability for all. The overt position that this paper will take is that of the apprehensive resident, concerned with the privatization of the Muskoka Lakes so that generations to come may transcend temporal constraint of travelling to and from the area to enjoy the rejuvenating, embodied experiences that this unique landscape provides those who reside upon it.

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