"If you put the wrong thing in the right place you're dead, and if you put the right thing in the right place at the wrong time you're dead -- you can't read these kinds of things in a textbook," says Love, on the phone from Toronto.

He recalls how he and brothers John and George Poole -- sons of Ernest Poole, who created construction giant Poole, later to become PCL Construction -- first dipped their toes into the business when they formed Oxford in 1960 after collaborating on their first development, the Baker Clinic on 105th Street.

"Early on it became pretty obvious to me that capital was an important part of the business," says Love, who originally trained as a mechanical engineer, then worked in investments with Dominion Securities in Edmonton in the mid-1950s before turning to development.

The company built McCauley Plaza and some shopping centre projects across the Prairies in partnership with Loblaws. But the development of Edmonton Centre in the late 1960s together with TD Bank and Woodward's, the then-department store chain, was "the major, major deal" that kick-started the business, which was soon making forays into Eastern Canada and the U.S., developing large commercial properties in Denver, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago, Phoenix and Louisville.

"PCL/Poole were our contractor partners wherever we went ƒ there were some pretty big deals," says Love, of the heady late 1970s and early 1980s, when Oxford's assets grew to $3 billion amid some huge projects, including Citicorp Plaza in Los Angeles, Quaker Centre in Chicago and BCE Place in Toronto.

"We had some problems, too," he admits.

Between 1985 and 1987, Oxford was selling assets to pay off debt. It also sold most of its U.S. subsidiary for $1.2 billion.

Since the late 1980s, when the commercial/office market collapsed, Oxford hasn't built an office building in Canada except for the Ernst and Young Tower in Calgary, says Love.

"From the end of the war till the late 1980s, it was taking raw land and old buildings and putting new buildings up," he says.

"Today it's taking real estate you have and trying to make it more efficient. There's not huge demand for new things.

" Love has called golf his second career since his son Jon took over as president and CEO in 1997. He bought out the Poole brothers in 1979.

What is Oxford's presence in Edmonton today?

It continues to own Edmonton Centre and bought Eaton Centre in downtown Edmonton in 1999 with a pension fund partner. Some $20 million in renovations have been put on hold until a tenant is found to occupy the former Eaton's space.

As well as its retail presence downtown, Oxford's office leasing arm handles properties including Canada Trust Tower, Laurentian Bank Office, Merrill Lynch Tower, Metronet Tower, Oxford Tower, TD Bank Tower, TD Call Centre and Twin Atria in east Edmonton.

The company also has 26 industrial properties around the city.

Across Canada and in the U.S., Oxford now owns about half of a 44-million-square-foot portfolio of commercial properties and manages about 66 million square feet of commercial real estate.