The original event, supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, the City of Saskatoon and by a contribution from the Department of Canadian Heritage Museums Assistance Program, also incorporated a one-day symposium titled "Homemade Modernism: Prairie Architecture Since 1955", with artists, architects and critics describing Wiens' place in the visual arts culture of Western Canada, a panel discussion which featured architecture professors Neil Minuk and Graham Livesey, artist Sky Glabush, and heritage architect Bernard Flaman, the keynote address given by Wiens himself.