The new Red River College Polytechnic?s Manitou a bi Bii daziigae has officially opened in Winnipeg. Designed by Diamond Schmitt and Number TEN Architectural Group, the 100,000 sf facility will house a combination of Indigenous and international student spaces.

The facility unites a repurposed downtown concrete framed heritage building and new construction to create an engaging crossroads in Winnipeg?s historic Exchange District. The Centre is also home to long distance teaching equipped classrooms, digital media labs and special events spaces and faculty offices.

Manitou a bi Bii daziigae atrium.
Image provided by Diamond Schmitt and Number TEN Architectural Group
Photography by Gerry Kopelow
The Centre?s new Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe) name, Manitou a bi Bii daziigae, translates to where creator sits (Manitou a bi) and brings light (Bii daziigae). RRC Polytech Elders-in-Residence, Paul Guimond, Okonace (Little Eagle Bone) from Sagkeeng First Nation, and Miss Una Swan, Black Eagle Woman, from Fisher River Cree Nation utilized their own traditional ceremonial protocols for the naming process as their teachings instruct, given to them by their Elders and Spiritual Guides. The form of the building interprets the principal features of the district with a strong relationship to ground floor and articulations that acknowledge the scale, band courses and parapet of the heritage building. The form also identifies program areas where a curvature signals the importance of the Ro...