funding was essential for the completion of the interior exhibits so that the museum could officially open in 2014, already two years behind schedule. Architecture The building's ground floor provides orientation and meeting space, a gift shop, restaurant, and visitor services. Galleries on different levels are linked by dramatic backlit alabaster ramps, including the Hall of Hope. There is also a Garden of Contemplation, which has still-water pools punctuated by dramatic black Mongolian basalt. Beginning with the Great Hall, the visitor experience culminates in the Israel Asper Tower of Hope, a 100-metre glass spire protruding from the CMHR that provides visitors with views of downtown Winnipeg. Design and construction process In 2003, the Friends of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights launched an international architectural competition for the design of the CMHR. 100 submissions from 21 countries worldwide were submitted. The judging panel chose the design submitted by Antoine Predock and Chris Beccone, architects from Albuquerque, New Mexico. His vision for the CMHR was a journey, beginning with a descent into the earth where visitors enter the CMHR through the "roots" of the museum. Visitors are led through the Great Hall, then a series of vast spaces and ramps, before culminating in the "Tower of Hope", a tall spire protruding from the CMHR. He has been quoted as saying: "I'm often asked what my favorite, my most important building is.... I'm going on record right now... 'This is it.'" Predock's inspiration for the CMHR came from the natural scenery and open spaces in Canada, including trees, ice, northern lights, First Nations peoples in Canada, and the rootedness of human rights action. He describes the CMHR in the following way: The Canadian Museum for Human Rights is rooted in humanity, making visible in the architecture the fundamental commonality of humankind-a symbolic apparition of ice, clouds and stone set in a field of sweet grass. Carved into the earth and dissolving into the sky on the Winnipeg horizon, the abstract ephemeral wings of a white dove embrace a mythic stone mountain of 450 million year old Tyndall limestone in the creation of a unifying and timeless landmark for all nations and cultures of the world. The base building was complete since the end of 2012. Throughout the foundation work of the CMHR, medicine bags created by elders at Thunderbird House, in Winnipeg, were inserted into the holes made for piles and caissons