The Best Seats
In The House

There are plenty of gadgets out there today, all created with the goal of helping hockey players become the best on their team, but what’s really necessary?

Out of all the techniques and tactics being employed today to help young hockey players prove their worth in the rink, cross-ice hockey is among the most successful of them all.

Why Cross-Ice Hockey?

For younger players, cross-ice hockey came to the forefront back in the 1970s although it wasn’t adopted into American and Canadian hockey leagues until just recently. It sprouted from a study that realized for amateur youth hockey games, players had an average of .5 shots per game.

As the year progresses and the colder months approach, the need for winterization and protection of athletic fields and equipment must be considered. Regardless of the field’s purpose, be it football, baseball, soccer or any other athletic use, anyone in the athletic industry knows the importance of being vigilant and actively planning and preparing for the winter months is crucial in protecting and prolonging the life of outdoor athletic areas and equipment.

While a large majority of the products on athletic fields are designed to withstand the harsh winter temperatures, there are steps that should be taken to further protect some items.

The playing field itself is one of the most important for outdoor sports venues. Any groundskeeper or coach realizes the need for a field to be kept in optimal condition whether during peak season or any other time. The additional maintenance and investment will pay off.

Administering Roman Catholic schools scattered throughout the western portion of eastern Ontario, the Algonquin Lakeshore Catholic District School Board is comprised of over 30 elementary schools and 11 secondary schools in the region.

As part of their equitable and inclusive education standards, the schools residing within the board are built on the foundations of discipleship, scholarship, and stewardship. As such, a number of the schools are equipped with specialized rooms that allow for a quiet or safe place for students who sometimes thrive by being temporarily removed from the often noisy and busy environments characteristic of the classroom.

Taking a different approach to traditional child care, Children of America is education-focused in caring for the next generation. Following structured curriculum, Children of America has grown to become the number-one preschool in the United States and currently serves children and families in 12 states across 64 individual locations.

During the winter months of 2018, our team was in contact with key stakeholders from within the organization as they were in the market for some durable and safe wall padding for their location in Woodbridge, Virginia. The location had a specialized playroom for children that had become a slight safety concern as the room contained a variety of corners and pillars that could pose potential hazards for children at play.

A facility founded firmly on the Kanien’kehá:ka (Mohawk) value of interrelatedness, Step by Step Child and Family Centre on the southern banks of the St. Lawrence River in Quebec provides care for children between the ages of 12 months and 6 years.

Utilizing a holistic approach to both child care and development, the facility has been aiding the community since its inception. With emphasis placed on each and every child who enters their programming, Step By Step always aims to be completely inclusive, believing that every child has the right to be a part of the mainstream and a contributing member of society.

One of our recent projects landed us in coastal New England, home of chowder, warm hospitality and some of the world’s most formidable sports franchises. While the region spans a total of six diverse U.S. states, this project took place in the picturesque state of Maine.

Located in Westbrook, a suburb of Portland, is the Spring Harbor Hospital, a 100-bed non-profit psychiatric hospital offering services for both children and adults.

Part of Maine Behavioral Healthcare, the facility has three adult units totalling 60 beds, a child unit with 14 beds, an adolescent unit with 14 beds and a 12-bed unit for patients with developmental disorders.

After some unfortunate water damage to certain areas of the hospital, the facility was undergoing some fairly heavy-duty renovations. During the process, stakeholders from within the organization got in contact with members of our team in search of fire-rated wall padding for one of the rooms in the hospital.

With campuses in both Vancouver and Kelowna, the University of British Columbia (UBC) is the province’s oldest and most established post-secondary institution. With a strong background in scientific advancements, the Vancouver campus is located a mere 10km from downtown and is home to roughly 65,000 undergraduate and postgraduate students across its two campuses.

In addition to housing the world’s largest cyclotron in the school’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics, it is also home to the Thunderbirds, representing UBC’s student athletes, with teams in football, basketball, soccer, rugby, swimming and baseball. As part of a complete redesign to the Thunderbirds’ baseball park, our team was enlisted through our partners at RecTec Industries to lend a hand with the seating and customized padding for the stadium.

Long known as the heart of any school, the gymnasium means much more than a place in which to play sports for many students and members of the community. These facilities are now hubs for meetings, assemblies, athletic competition and community events. As such, more schools and other facilities are quickly recognizing the branding power these areas possess.

In addition to customized flooring, score boards and bleachers, facility operators often look to the permanent wall padding installed on the walls of the gymnasium as a safety precaution as another place where their message, logo or team colours can be presented.

One of our more recent projects brought us back to the historic city of Montreal. Nestled along the St. Lawrence River, the vibrant city is a pleasure to not only visit but to do business in as well.

The call came in a few months ago from a general contractor who was looking for assistance in designing some highly-customized wall padding for the high school located just outside of the city’s downtown core.

Before organizing our first on-site visit to the school, we were provided with some technical drawings to help our team better understand the challenges ahead. Given the complexity of the design of the space we were immediately connected with the school-commissioned architecture firm with whom we visited the location with.

Nestled along picturesque Lake Champion in northern Quebec lies the small Cree community of Nemaska. Located nearly 1,100KM north of Montreal, the community is a wonderful place to relax and enjoy the area’s outdoors and diverse wildlife.

Nemaska, which means “Place to Fish” is well known as a premiere fresh water fishing locale and promotes sustainable methods of tourism in the area with help of the local residents.

Born and raised with a strong connection to the outdoors, residents are well versed in hunting, fishing, trapping and other outdoor pursuits and continue to cherish and pass down this heritage to the next generation. Serving as home to such a diverse selection of outdoor activities, the community is known for camping and canoe tours during the summer, ice fishing, dogsledding and snowmobiling in the winter and various other events and activities throughout the year.