The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

The Mountain of God Architect and TV personality Graham Argyle explores the exquisite new Har-EI Jewish Synagogue in West Vancouver. architecture D y Q ham ra Argyle The ornamentation is in the joints and the details, not in superfluous decoration. The careful placement o f the building is determined by the site and that which is on it and around it. Some of the markers are clearly drawn from history and a world far away, such as the cedar columns-- Jachin and Boaz-- Solomon's temple. A stylized concrete menorah is the only external mark of the building's purpose. To believers, the symbol is profound. It marks the placement o f the A r k on this site. To travellers speeding along the gray asphalt of Taylor Way, the concrete menorah is a point of visual contact, particularly when rainwater cascades dramatically from the sanctuary roof, over it and then down a vertical concrete sluice to the rocks below--fire and water. Some markers relate to the enviHar-EI Synagogue. View from pedestrian bridge towards courtyard and synagogue entry. Photo: Martin Fessler. Courtesy of Acton, Johnson, Ostry Architects Inc. Al's late on a sunny, unseasonably mild afternoon in January. A s I get out o f my car, I look towards the south-facing wall of Jerusalem stone, warmed by the south western sun. Above the wall, the North Shore mountains have a closeness that is experienced only when the air is clear. I cross onto the covered bridge. Through the glass balustrade, the sunlight catches the clear, cold water as it flows swiftly around the shallows o f Brothers Creek. A l l I can hear is the rush of the water, as if a Native spirit is making itself known. For a moment, 1 stand still to look up at the grand cedar columns as they rise magnificently from the paved courtyard to the roof, far above. I feel spiritual emotions which have long been dormant. I am aware o f each step I take towards the entrance doors. I am in a holy place. I know it. yet within the distance I can throw a rock, cars are rattling up and down Taylor Way. and trucks are roaring along the Upper Levels Highway. He that is without sin let him cast the first stone. 1 ring the door bell, aware of a symbolism. Surely a fundamental function of ecclesiastical architecture is to bring order to the icons of a faith? Thou shall not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness that is in the heaven above or that is in the earth below. M a r k Ostry of A c t o n . Johnson, Ostry, Architects, a few days earlier had pointed out what he called "architectural markers." A s I stand before the doors, I look back to the bridge. They may be markers, I realize, but what I am seeing is a building that comes from the very soul. This is not the puffed-up. popular postmodernism, the meaningless applique extracted from history for decorative reasons and very little else. This is the architecture of our times, architecture of the North Shore. It could not be anywhere else. It is a truthful, human architecture, built on what we have already learned, and so not without its flaws. ronment. The covered bridge-- the walk from the secular to the religious. The waters of the reclaimed creek--the staff of life. The fish in the creek-- the sustenance of life. Rabbi Imre Balla welcomes me into his modest office. The room is reserved: a thoughtful place for the study and dissemination of the scriptures. It is lit by a north facing skylight and the now-frail winter sun bravely streaming through a slit in the south facing wall. "We used to rent space i n Inglewood School and a church. N o w we are here, central to our congregation from Lions Bay to Deep Cove." He pauses, clasping his hands together as if in prayer. "First, the building is a House of Worship, a spiritual place. Second, it is a House of Study, a place to learn and discuss. Third, it is a House of Assembly, a place to meet." We enter the sanctuary. The space is unpretentious, high ceilinged. The congregation faces eastward towards the A r k , housing continued on page 22 = £ < 21