Bill Downing

Structurlam has a long history in the Okanagan, being founded in 1962 by brothers Al and Gordon Kenyon. Through trial, error, and discovery, they built up a business in laminated wood beams, the over-sized Expo hockey stick, now a fixture in the Vancouver Island town of Duncan, being an example of the earlier technology. They also penetrated the Japanese market where their glulam beams began to replace traditional timbers in Japanese post-and-beam housing. Ownership of the company was transferred to Al Kenyon’s two sons in the 1980s and to their brother-in-law, Mark Rufiange, in 2000. Rufiange automated production by bringing in CNC technology and in 2007 sold to the Adera Group, a Vancouver development company. Adera embarked on an expansion program that almost tripled glulam capacity and in 2012, opened Western North America’s first cross-laminated timber plant at Okanagan Falls. Bill Downing, a registered professional forester with a diverse background in manufacturing and and a former head of B.C. Wood, came in as president in 2007.