When Jim Siemens and Anna Ringstrom struck out on their own, the duo, who are partners in life and work, chose a firm name that reflected a worldview that prioritizes landscape—the term “oxbow” describes the lakes that form along meandering prairie rivers as they shift. Siemens often describes architecture as simply “a subset” of landscape architecture, Ringstrom’s discipline. “I think sometimes we, as architects, think of architecture as something grander,” he notes.
The name also refers to the way they aim to practice: “It was a beautiful analogy for the type of design process that we were interested in pursuing—one which didn’t see the end from the beginning, and wasn’t a straight line, necessarily, but followed the course it needed to follow, to arrive at solutions that are a result of a project’s inherent logic.”
Oxbow Architecture is now a twelve-person practice. Various members are actively involved in architectural education—Saskatchewan doesn’t have a university program, so they participate through sessional engagements and guest design reviews across the country. The ideas generated though their academic work have filtered into Oxbow’s small-scale interventions and work alongside First Nations and underserved communities across Saskatchewan.
One such project is the Muscowpetung Powwow Arbour, a 17,000- square-foot cultural venue for the Saulteaux Nation currently under construction, designed in collaboration with Dalhousie University professor emeritus Richard Kroeker and Wolfrom Engineering. “It is really a poetically beautiful structural and architectural resolution of a large round roof,” says Siemens, noting that the enclosure is a tensegrity structure that uses round timbers. “The structural proposition could only be realized formally as a circle—a symbolically important geometry for the culture the building is meant to celebrate,” adds Brad Pickard, the building’s project architect.
The practice has always prioritized the human experience as a way of driving innovation. Avenue P Medical Office Building in Saskatoon, one of Oxbow’s first projects, faced the challenges of a deep building footprint, set by the requirements of an underground parking garage. In response, the architects strategically opened up the centre of the building as a skylit atrium covering over the width of the required parking, bringing daylight deep into the interior common spaces.
The project also involved re-conceiving doctor’s suites with separate exam areas and administrative offices on different floors. This yielded a more efficient use of space, reduced overhead, and improvements for patients. “The design of the building—and the overall user experience—aims to be one of openness, clarity and simplicity,” says project architect Sam Lock.
This profile is part of our October 2024 feature story, Twenty + Change: New Perspectives.
As appeared in the October 2024 issue of Canadian Architect magazine