Vancouver Film Studios undergoing production space expansion

Artistic rendering of sound stage E at Vancouver Film Studios. (Vancouver Film Studios)

An expansion of the Vancouver Film Studios (VFS) campus on the eastern border of the city of Vancouver will open later this year.

Construction is now approaching completion on sound stage E for the film and television production studio, providing an additional 21,000 sq ft space — tying with the size of VFS’ sound stage D1, which is the facility’s current largest sound stage.

This will bring VFS to a total of 13 sound stages with a combined total floor area in excess of 200,000 sq ft.

You might also like:

Also currently being built and opening this year will be 28,000 sq ft of new additional production office space — split into a 14,500-sq-ft office, and a 13,500-sq-ft office. This grows VFS’ total office space to about 100,000 sq ft.

VFS also currently has about 42,000 sq ft of mill spaces. The campus is located just north of Vancouver’s only Walmart, next to Highway 1.

Artistic rendering of sound stage E at Vancouver Film Studios. (Vancouver Film Studios)

Artistic rendering of new office space at Vancouver Film Studios. (Vancouver Film Studios)

February 2022 construction progress on Vancouver Film Studios’ expansion. (Vancouver Film Studios)

December 2021 construction progress on Vancouver Film Studios’ expansion. (Vancouver Film Studios)

Location of the new sound stage E and office space expansion at Vancouver Film Studios. (Vancouver Film Studios)

The expansion buildings are being built to a LEED Gold green building design standard. This is partly achieved by the installation of a large rooftop solar panel array to provide a sustainable power supply for the new sound stage, which will feed any extra electricity to the BC Hydro grid, with the studio then receiving credits that can be pulled back at any time throughout the year.

The solar array is classified at 129.6 kW (DC) and is expected to produce about 143,226 kWh of electricity annually.

According to VHS, this will be the first sound stage in Canada powered in part by solar energy, and only the third in the world to achieve LEED Gold certification.

VFS facilities at the location were first established over 30 years ago. In recent years, VFS notably served as the base camp for The CW television series such as Arrow, The 100, and Superman & Lois.

Currently, Metro Vancouver’s film and television production industry is facing a major production space shortage, but projects like the VFS expansion and future brand new studio campuses will serve to help provide much-needed new additional capacity.

Newly installed rooftop solar panel array at Vancouver Film Studios. (Vancouver Film Studios)

Aerial of Vancouver Film Studios. (Vancouver Film Studios)

You might also like: