HASHMAN BUILDING

Firm: John W. Long

Address: 888 7 Avenue SW

Date of final plans: 1961

Sam Hashman was the quintessential self-made man – a high school dropout who made millions in construction. His company, Hashman Construction Limited, began building homes, and later moved into larger projects. During the 1960s, he built many of Calgary's downtown offices. Sometime that decade, he bought Great West Saddlery and renamed it Great West International Equities, using it as a holding company for his interests. In 1971, Trizec acquired his businesses.

In 1961, Jack Long designed this brutalist office tower for Hashman. It was to be built on a vacant lot on the northeast corner of 7th Avenue and 8th Street. As a standalone work of art it's quite impressive, but this sort of building makes for bad urbanism. By necessity, it has to be unconnected from neighbouring buildings, thus creating vacant space in the "wall" of a city street. I have no idea why it wasn't built.