Design

A Modernist Gas Station With a New Purpose

How an architecture firm turned a Mies van der Rohe-designed Esso in a remote section of Montreal into the La Station community center.

“[Mies] had an idea of beauty which was linked to the classical tradition, and values that are deeply rooted in our culture,” says Montreal architect Éric Gauthier. “Some thought he was only a technician, which he was not at all. He was an idealistic person who tried to communicate an idea of beauty.”Steve Montpetit/Les Architectes FABG

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By Tracey Lindeman

March 14, 2019 at 9:00 AM EDT

Most gas stations are architecturally forgettable, but not this one.

A squat, unusually minimalist service station on Nuns’ Island—a sector of Montreal that was exclusively inhabited and farmed by a religious order for nearly 170 years until its sale in 1956—holds the distinction of being the only gas station Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ever built.

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