As reported in the Edmonton Journal, Edmonton is home to only a handful of architectural feats that could truly be labelled iconic. Among them are the Muttart Conservatory, the Walterdale Bridge and the Alberta legislature.

But, if history had taken a different path, that list could have been much longer. That’s the idea behind Unrealized, an exhibit at Edmonton City Centre mall that digs into the history of Edmonton buildings and infrastructure that were proposed but never brought to fruition.

“It’s about Edmonton’s unbuilt heritage. We spend a lot of time talking about and living among the projects that happened, that have shaped our city, but I think you can learn just as much about the city from what didn’t get built,” said Max Amerongen, a board member at Media Architecture Design Edmonton, the group which put on the exhibit.

One development that would have had a major effect on the city’s skyline was the proposed Centennial Pylon, a 300-foot observation tower that would have sat at the site of the former Royal Alberta Museum in Glenora. Pushback from residents led to its cancellation, but the idea of a tower to celebrate Canada’s centennial in 1967 ended with a realized building elsewhere in Alberta — the Calgary Tower.

The exhibit stretches from buildings proposed in 1912 — like the Royal Alexandra Hotel, which would have been a central Downtown landmark — to the Edmonton superlab, cancelled by the United Conservative government this fall.

Keep reading in the Edmonton Journal