[blockquote style="blue"]Hey! If you have details about these photographs (the early shots in particular) please leave your information in the comment section or email Trevor.stafford@communitech.ca. [/blockquote]

For over 150 years, the Lang Tannery has defined Kitchener’s triumphs and travails, its entrepreneurial heritage, and its ability to overcome adversity and steer itself toward the new.

From its start in the 1850s, the Tannery married artisan’s skills with assembly-line efficiency, attracting a cluster of businesses and powering Kitchener to its industrial and political apogee. Surprised by a post-industrial world, it recast itself again and again, struggling but determined, (like the city) to find its footing.

Today, it has found fresh purchase in a clever re-fashioning of the skill, ingenuity and hard work that made it — and Kitchener — great. As it did a century ago, the Tannery is attracting and inspiring a new cluster of companies, large and small, successful and unproven. Together, they are finding support in a community that now stretches beyond Kitchener, through Waterloo Region and across the country.

This is a photographic narrative of the Lang Tannery, with an emphasis placed on the Communitech Hub by weight of the available material. It is an incomplete work, but in the spirit of the facility, new photographs are welcome and will be added as they arrive.

I hope this becomes an organic record of the past, present and future of this landmark site.

Looking for more? Here’s a walkthough of Desire2Learn’s new offices at the Tannery

The Beginning

(all images (c) Trevor Stafford unless otherwise noted or clearly taken before he was born)

In 1816 the German Company Tract became the Township of Waterloo. German-speaking europeans flocked to the area, including one Reinhold Lang, who moved to what was then known as Berlin in 1848. By 1849 he had set up shop. Photo Credit: University of Waterloo Library, Charles Belairfonds.

An artist's rendition of what is likely the second Lang Tannery. In 1953, the first Lang tannery burned to the ground. Reinhold Lang then purchased a large plot of land at the corner of Francis and King street.

The Golden Age of Leather

The Lang Tannery produced huge amounts of saddle leather for World War I armies, and by WWII had become the largest sole leather producer in the British Empire. Colouring upper leather for shoes Photo Credit: University of Waterloo Library, Charles Belairfonds.

The Lang Tannery complex was a hodge-podge of new, old and retro-fitted buildings. At its peak, over 24 buildings were utilized in the hide-to-leather process. Photo Credit: University of Waterloo Library, Charles Belairfonds.

After World War II, synthetic materials replaced leather, and the Lang Tannery had ceased operations by 1954. It wasn't sold until 1974, however. Photo Credit: University of Waterloo Library, Charles Belairfonds.

Photo Credit: University of Waterloo Library, Charles Belairfonds.

This fire insurance document from 1938 conveys the size and scope of the Lang Tannery's operations.

Decline

While occupied for much of the next 50 years, the Lang Tannery was by no means a jewel in Waterloo Region’s crown, becoming more of a symbol of the post-industrial rustbelt that plagued much of southwestern Ontario, if not North America. In the 1980s a plan was put forward to revitalize the complex, but it didn’t get far.

The Tannery

What was once the Tannery's boilerhouse. Photograph (c) Dwight Storring http://dstorring.wordpress.com/

The haphazard growth of the Tannery saw materials and spaces blend together, often imperfectly. This awkward-looking area is now occupied by the Hub's professional services tenants..

The Tannery in March of 2009. Communitech had long since put the wheels in motion to transform 30,000 square feet of the moribund facility into a hub of digital media activity. And so the Communitech Hub was named. Image (c) trdsupraturbo2000

[blockquote style="blue] The Hub’s 30,000 ft² is equivalent to an entire hockey arena[/blockquote]

The Tannery pivots towards technology

In 2008, the Tannery Complex was purchased by the Cadan group, a Toronto-based developer. A large building in the Tannery was already home to artists and artisans, but Cadan put forward a more cohesive plan to revitalize the entire complex. Communitech, a regional technology association moved quickly to carve out a unique, 30,000 sq. foot ecosystem that would bring together startups, professional services, mentoring and teams from blue-chip technology companies like RIM, Open Text and Agfa.

I didn't figure the colour of innovation to be powder blue, but Desire2Learn and Google seem to appreciate it. The companies now occupy 3 huge floors in the northern end of the complex. Credit: Cory Battler

The future 'deep end' startup area, not quite ready.

What looks like a slumber party for insulation is actually the Tannery Event Centre. See below for finished images.

As the move-in deadline neared, Communitech strongly encouraged the local trades to Think Inside the Box.

The Communitech Hub's mezzanine in its mesozoic phase. Note the Michelangelo-like finger in the bottom right...another dazzling example of genius by a photographer who's better off writing.

One of the startup 'suites'. Now inhabited by the University of Waterloo's Velocity Program.

An early look at the Communitech Hub's partner spaces, now occupied by RIM and Open Text. See the finished product below.

A shot of the future 'common area'. These meeting rooms are free to use and thus not usually free at all.

The original bricks from demolished buildings were saved and integrated back into the restoration. No, this photograph was not taken during an earthquake.

A Revitalized Tannery and Communitech Hub beckon new entrepreneurs

[blockquote style="blue"]The Hub’s original name was Digital Media and Mobile Convergence Centre. Yikes.[/blockquote]

The Tannery is now home to dozens of technology companies and an ecosystem of businesses that include a daycare centre, boxing gym, music school, pharmacy, and restaurants, with room for more. Local company Desire2Learn and global giant Google have taken up three floors in the complex’s north end.

Communitech has taken that idea one step further by building a three-pronged ecosystem for technology companies in the Communitech Hub. Enterprise giants like RIM, Agfa, OpenText and Christie have small teams at the Hub, who mingle and collaborate with its 30+ digitally-minded startups . Communitech’s Executives in Residence consult and mentor these startups on a daily basis.

Finally, several professional services firms, including accountancies, lawyers, advertising agencies and government partners have offices at the Hub, and are ready to engage the startups when needed.

In addition, outside companies and groups are brought in to interact with the Hub’s residents at regular ‘collision’ events, and at larger events held in the Tannery Event Centre, which boasts 3D-capable projectors.

The Communitech Hub is also the headquarters of The Canadian Digital Media Network (CDMN), which it helped create. As a CDMN node, the Hub looks to connect with other Canadian incubators and accelerators – sharing resources and ideas and solving the universal challenges faced by Canadian entrepreneurs.

The Main Tannery Entrance, pre-restoration. Image (c) Brian Douglas http://bdouglasphotographyblog.blogspot.com

How many world-changing ideas will get their tickets punched inside these doors?

Inside the Hub's main entrance is a soaring foyer, with a staircase and elevators leading to Desire2Learn and Google's offices

A great juxtaposition of old and new, with entrepreneurialism bridging them. Photograph courtesy Jim Beretta

Looking down at the staircase that leads to Google offices. Photo (c) Brian Douglas

The Executive Briefing Centre boasts video conferencing via a huge, 500 lb. screen, because every tech company understands that it

Looking up at the mezzanine from the kitchen. The doors at the far end lead to the Hub

Conestoga College conducts classes alongside startups and teams from blue-chip enterprise

A view into the 'Partner' area at the Hub

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The partner area has 30 foot ceilings and so much sunlight that residents requested blinds. Those blinds are very, very large.

The (H)ub (I)nteractive (V)irtual (E)nvironment (HIVE) is an immersive 3D + user manipulated programmable workspace. It's currently being used for data visualization, aerospace engineering, and medical imaging. In the simulation shown here, participants can lift and move objects.

A startup suite before....

...And after.

More pictures are welcome! If you’ve got photos, particularly old photos of the Tannery, please contact trevor.stafford@communitech.ca.

(Looking for more? Here’s a walk though Desire2Learn’s new offices at the Tannery )

Helping Companies Start, Grow and Succeed

Communitech’s mandate is to help technology companies of every size. Its vision for the Communitech Hub is that of a commercialization engine, an environment that produces successful, market-ready companies while connecting larger companies to ideas, energy and each other.