ARCHITECTS Julien Hébert and Jean-Louis Lalonde  ARTISTS Jacques de Tonnancour Julien Hébert Joseph-Arthur Vincent  OPENING DATE 28 April 1980

This graceful and beautiful station is centred around a very deep internal volume. The ceiling of this space over the platforms is planned as a succession of stacked vaults, each higher than the last, whose forms are mirrored on the facing wall.

The platform is made even more dramatic by forcefully separating the escalator wells from the main vault of the platform, which makes the latter all the more striking to a passenger reaching the bottom.

The triangular shafts are a repetition of the motif of hexagons and equilateral triangles found in the mezzanine and kiosks, such as in the floor tiles, the support pillars, the ceiling and skylight caissons, and the forms of the kiosks and entrance stairways.

The lower walls at platform level are decorated with an attractive progression of colours. Starting with aqua green at either end, they move through blue, violet, red, and orange to meet in the large yellow expanses at the centre. This brightens up the platform level even for travellers just passing through.

Returning to the station's upper levels, the main kiosk, a split-level building that repeats the hexagonal theme of the mezzanine, stands in a bus loop. The kiosk's wide staircase leads to a bridge over the escalator well to the concourse just in front of the turnstiles.

This broad concourse is also connected via a long hallway to an exterior but underground gallery, whence exposed staircases lead up to either side of rue Saint-Jacques. This station is one of only three (along with Square-Victoria and Bonaventure) so equipped.

Unlike open-air metro entrances in other cities, however, these are not narrow openings in the sidewalk, but broad, substantial stairwells that take full advantage of the wide spaces (a parking lot and the place Saint-Henri) where they are located.

Back inside the mezzanine, a long row of turnstiles divides the broad concourse from the equally broad control zone, which overlooks the stairwells on either side. The top of the stairs are located near the end of the mezzanine.

This rear wall accomodates one of the station's artworks: a subtle and often-overlooked mural in glazed bricks by Julien Hébert. It commemorates the title of Gabrielle Roy's famous novel Bonheur d'occasion (The Tin Flute), which is set in the neighbourhood of Saint-Henri.

A recent addition is a statue of the explorer Jacques Cartier, who claimed Canada for France in 1534. The beloved statue by Joseph-Arthur Vincent had stood since 1896 atop a fountain in nearby parc St-Henri. It had fallen apart and been repaired several times due to exposure when the decision was made to move it to this more protected location and replace it with a copy. It now stands atop a cantilevered pedestal in the lighting shaft mentioned above, looking out onto the mezzanine.

The most prominent work of art, however, is a massive and cheerful mobile by Jacques de Tonnancour. It is suspended through the floor of the mezzanine, with the upper element in a glass-walled enclosure in the middle of the concourse, and the lower element hanging down into the vault over the tracks.

It was formerly motorized, but the motor no longer functions; however, a strong wind from train motion (or a helping hand from a passenger in the concourse) can spin it slowly, a startling and amusing sight.