Fall 2013 Thesis Reviews Booklet

thesis reviews fall 2013 nicolas barrette roxane bejjany kate bennett jorge bianchi-vivern Namrita bimbra nathan bishop melissa cao tings chak edith nga-ting cho ji hee choi craig deebank Kristen Duimering Sahar edelkhani kourosh fathi andria y.y. fong gina gallaugher sajed golafshani laura Gosmino Timothy Groot Lap hang Hao Krister Holmes Yoav ickowicz Jessica Ingwersen Steven Ischkin javid jah Naiji jiao francesca joyce

christine kim jennifer lavery louis yi liu han ma marisa maggs Ian Mulder marie Thanh-truc Nguyen Shahryar nozari ola-ife ola-olu ojo Gina Page Christina Pascoa Ngoc Phan Federica Piccone Christian Rutherford Duncan Sabiston Michael Scarborough Negar Seyedfathi Ladan Sharifpour Corey Shiff Christopher Somma Leo Tang Fabiana Todescan Jason VAn Der Burg Paul Van Der Grient Joseph Villahermosa Bingyi Yao Katarzyna Zapoloch

2

introduction This book showcases the provocative, thoughtful, and creative final thesis projects presented by Master of Architecture students at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design in the fall of 2013.

On December 12 and 13, these graduate students will present their theses to a distinguished group of guest critics, a large faculty audience and members of the public. Responding to challenges that are increasingly complex and global in nature, these projects reveal new possibilities, provide fresh perspectives, and explore innovative ways to design and inhabit our built environment.

MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

3

GUEST CRITICS Ila Berman, University of Waterloo

Jeannie Kim, Daniels Faculty

Colin Ripley, Ryerson University

Brian Boigon, Daniels Faculty

Leslie Korrick, York University

Inaqui Carnicero, Inaqui Carnicero Architecture and Cornell University

Bruce Kuwabara, KPMB Architects

Hilary Sample, MOS Architects and Columbia University

Lorena del Rio, Inaqui Carnicero Architecture and Cornell University Hisham Elkadi, Deakin University Mona El Khafif, University of Waterloo Georges Farhat, Daniels Faculty Natalie Fizer, Daniels Faculty Joseph Godlewski, Syracuse University Dean Goodman, LGA Architectural Partners Gordon Graff, DIALOG

Vivian Lee, University of Michigan Christine Macy, Dalhousie University Christos Marcopolous, Daniels Faculty James McGillivray, University of Michigan Carol Moukheiber, Daniels Faculty David Oleson, Oleson Worland Architects Brady Peters, Daniels Faculty Paul Raff, Paul Raff Studio, Toronto Sonia Ramundi, Superkul

Larry Richards, Hans Ibelings, Daniels Faculty and Architecture critic, Montreal WORKshop Inc. 4

Alan Saskin, Urbancorp Roger Sherman, RSAUD and UCLA Drew Sinclair, regionalArchitects Jason Smirnis, Building Arts Architects Inc. Alex Speigel, Windmill Developments Graeme Stewart, ERA Architects Nader Tehrani, NADAAA and MIT Mason White, Daniels Faculty Robert Wright, Daniels Faculty

THESIS ADVISORS George Baird Rodolphe el-Khoury Ted Kesik Robert Levit John J. May Laura Miller Pina Petricone Brigitte Shim

MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

5

6

8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 56 58 60

nicolas barrette roxane bejjany kate bennett jorge bianchi-vivern Namrita bimbra nathan bishop melissa cao tings chak edith nga-ting cho ji hee choi craig deebank Kristen Duimering Sahar edelkhani kourosh fathi andria y.y. fong gina gallaugher sajed golafshani laura Gosmino Timothy Groot Lap hang Hao Krister Holmes Yoav ickowicZ Jessica Ingwersen Steven Ischkin javid jah Naiji jiao francesca joyce

62 64 66 68 70 34 72 74 76 78 64 80 82 84 86 88 90 92 94 96 98 100 102 84 104 106 108

christine kim jennifer lavery louis yi liu han ma marisa maggs Ian Mulder marie Thanh-truc Nguyen Shahryar nozari ola-ife ola-olu ojo Gina Page Christina Pascoa Ngoc Phan Federica Piccone Christian Rutherford Duncan Sabiston Michael Scarborough Negar Seyedfathi Ladan Sharifpour Corey Shiff Christopher Somma Leo Tang Fabiana Todescan Jason VAn Der Burg Paul Van Der Grient Joseph Villahermosa Bingyi Yao Katarzyna Zapoloch

MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

7

8

speculative grounds

nicolas barrette This thesis project examines the financial, human, and eco-technical forces that have accompanied unrestrained development along the 18,000-kilometre-long Chinese coastline.

Seventeen coastal economic zones extend along the coast in an area where 60% of the GDP and 40% of the population is located. These zones have encouraged market reforms in order to promote development.

In the process of short-term gain, coupled with tax incentives, liability reductions, and the shortage of space and resources, these zones have incubated the expansion of ports and the creation of land for new high-value uses. David Harvey refers to this as a spatio-temporal fix, with new territories opening up to productively soak up excess capital and transform its geography.

The 11th Five Year Plan called for the reclamation of 700 square kilometers of land each year. This is 63% the area of Hong Kong, and an increase of a factor of six from recorded land reclamation activities in 2002. This does not include illegal dredging and sand smuggling which exists, particularly in the absence of any maritime law that stipulates the legal liability of such activities.

This project analyses and responds to the multi-directional forces originating from both land and water that have mediated the tenuous coastline. In particular, the Bohai Economic Rim exists at the centre of neoliberal accumulation with its proximity to China’s second largest oil field; the capital, Beijing; and China’s point of entry to the Northeast Passage shipping route.

ADVISORs: laura miller & adrian blackwell MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

9

10

gestalt of the in-between

roxane bejjany This thesis is a design proposal that investigates transitional spaces as a reconciled gestalt of the twin mutual opposition of the collective and the individual, and the interior and the exterior through a formal and programmatic transparency and porosity. In particular, it investigates the liminal condition of the individual, the collective, and the environment by bridging exchanges and connections through the narrative of the modern hotel.

The site of exploration is the Toronto Islands, a site located off the Toronto waterfront. Historically a place where Aboriginal peoples sent their ill for healing, it began as a retreat destination away from the hustle and bustle of urban life.

It was prosperous with hotels and entertainment throughout the 19th century. In the 20th century, the City of Toronto had taken over and demolished all hotels and most cottage homes leaving only a few hundred homes that still remain to this day.

The Islands remain a getaway for local Torontonians and a hotspot for tourists in Toronto. However, land ownership, new developments, and overnight activities are highly regulated and nearly impossible. With its own set of cultural conditions and norms, the separateness and the otherness of the Islands distinguish them from the urban core of Toronto through their marginality, both literally and figuratively.

Using the narrative of the hotel as the setting for human experience and as a testing ground for social change, this proposal sets the stage for mediating selves, boundaries, and environments through a facilitating process of separation, transition, and integration.

ADVISOR: laura miller MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

11

12

timber toronto

a sustainable prototype for housing the urban family kate bennett

German Architect Eckhard Schulze-Fielitz once explained that densification need not have a negative connotation if it generates synergetic advantages in the urban context. In Toronto, the conviction is that densification has a detrimental effect on the city. This frame of thought is likely due to the proliferation of one bedroom units in homogeneous podium towers, the scarcity of appropriate family units, and the environmental degradation caused by steel and concrete systems. Henceforth, single family house owners cry “Not in my backyard!” when developers threaten to destroy their charming low rise neighbourhoods.

By 2030, Toronto will need to accommodate an extra 500,000 occupants, and thus, we must experiment with better models for growth. The Avenues & Mid-Rise Buildings Study, conducted by The City of Toronto in 2010 has outlined a possible solution. The study identifies 162 km of Toronto’s main commercial streets, with access to transit, schools, green space, and employment as appropriate locations for urbanization. The Avenues are intended to accommodate new midrise housing, retail, employment, and community facilities all linked to improved public transportation, and an emphasis on an improved public realm. The goal for Toronto is to have the individual elements of our urban fabric not be diminished by their urban integration and densification — but rather, enriched by it.

The construction of the Crosstown LRT and the impending growth along Eglinton Avenue — the longest east west axis in the city — will have a transformative effect on mobility, economic organization, and settlement patterns, resulting in new building types and an ever-evolving urban form. Eglinton’s prosperous future would be an ideal backdrop for a new midrise mass timber prototype to house the urban family.

ADVISOR: george baird MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

13

14

the other side

jorge bianchi-vivern An urban boundary, whether natural or artificial, is a fracture in the landscape.

Boundaries can accentuate a stark difference in spatial patterns, as they fragment our landscapes and create pockets of disparity and contrast. As a boundary dissects through a neighbourhood, it inherently shapes and transforms the city. It reinforces a differentiation in space which can enable two distinct urban forms to co-exist parallel to one another. As seen in numerous cases located in Toronto, these contrasting adjacencies can accentuate different land uses, built forms, and socio-spatial patterns within the city. Boundaries can be strategically used to define a neighbourhood and to retain its unique social and urban elements. However, when does a boundary become a barrier, and how does this barrier affect the way we use urban space?

This thesis will explore how architecture can dismantle the perceptual barriers that divide a community. It will explore a new means of urban accessibility, porosity, and social engagement to reimagine how a fragmented urban landscape can be connected and re-introduced to its other side.

ADVISOR: george baird MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

15

16

desired space + co-habitation

namrita bimbra With an average household size of 4.55 people in the rapidly urbanizing city of Delhi, a pervasive phenomenon is the unauthorized alterations and additions to apartment units for accommodating the evolving needs of a family. Given the disparities in household and dwelling size, along with India’s urgent housing shortage, architects and planners are faced with interesting challenges in assessing the minimum requirements and standards for housing in Delhi. A large part of Delhi’s population lives in units less than 60 square meters where provisions have been made for only one or two rooms. Evolving family needs under these strict space impositions leave few options apart from either moving or altering their current dwelling. Traditional joint family structure, sense of belonging, and archaic legal obligations make it difficult for one to move, forcing occupants to choose the latter option.

With the current housing landscape dominated by private developers, the model of the highrise tower has been sweeping across the city, applying a “one size fits all” approach to those in the higher income demographic, the middle class and even the poor. Most importantly, the “one size fits all” approach erases the notion of housing that is capable of absorbing change.

This thesis explores opportunities to provide occupants with an open floor plan without binding them to standard minimum space requirements. Here, the occupant can purchase square footage as per their current requirements and can upsize or downsize as their household needs change. In addition to providing residential space, the open floor plan can accommodate other programs that can co-exist with housing, such as student or shared accommodations, artist studios, and other spaces for income generating activities. The resultant housing scheme, with an integrated building system, attempts to fulfill the occupant’s desire for space and co-habitation. The project allows for creations rather than transformations as is prevalent in the current housing schemes in Delhi.

ADVISOR: ted kesik MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

17

18

simultaneous instantiations

nathan bishop Architecture has historically been circumscribed by a spatial paradigm where only one space can exist in one place at one time. There are, however, other possibilities.

This thesis seeks to develop a space where multiple spatial states exist in one place concurrently, a space with visual bandwidth where observers shift from one state to another by tuning-in to different spatial channels. These spatial states do not exist in a virtual domain, rather they are instantiated completely in our material reality. Through the development of a spatial technology enabled by prosthetics and highly specific interactions of light, material, and geometry, a new architectural potential is illuminated.

ADVISOR: rodolphe el-khoury MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

19

20

flood:

Daylighting the urban wetland

melissa cao My thesis is concerned with re-shaping the edge condition of the Don Valley ravine, where privatized areas have encroached. The goal is to return these sites to publicly accessible spaces within water and bridge infrastructure that will provide protection during urban flooding.

The site for my architectural intervention is the Don Valley Narrows, which is the straightened portion of the Don Valley ravine. The channeled area of the Don River runs for nearly 3km from the Riverdale Bridge down to the mouth of the Don and is the most exploited part of the ravine as most of its wetlands are filled and its banks are eroding away. The aim is to create a new north-south axis circulation route between existing green wetland space north and south of the site. This new connection would be in the form of a bridge which ramps onto existing roofs and connects to new public programs below the bridge.

Programs that connect to the bridge structure include: a monitoring station, a rink, and a swimming pool. Together, these programs can act as a tool for enhancing understanding and education of water in different states. The design expresses how the programs transform with the seasons as flooding and the volume of water changes over time. The bridge serves a dual purpose, allowing for circulation and providing needed infrastructure in periods of flooding.

Approaches to designing new wetlands and public spaces include daylighting streams (restoring the natural meander of a watercourse before it is channelized and redirected) and adding underground cisterns to aid in additional sewer flow.

This design thesis has four test sites within the 2-year floodplain that are currently hardscape in the channelized portion of the Don River. The aim is to re-naturalize these urban sites and revitalize the city environment with public spaces, such as recreational facilities, within infrastructure while creating new panoramic views of the city and ravine.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

21

22

the architecture of migrant detention tings chak We live in an era of unprecedented human migration. Mass migration and displacement are processes and conditions driven by global capitalism, neo-colonialism, war and imperialism, and environmental destruction. While the world has become borderless to “flows” of capital, the movement of migrant bodies is restricted as never before.

Consequently, millions of migrants live precarious lives as migrant labourers, as refugees, and as undocumented people.

We are seeing a proliferation of borders, both material and immaterial, that highly regulate mobility among stratified populations. Migrants’ journeys are commonly portrayed as linear progressions from home to host nations. In reality, however, these spatial movements are replete with interruptions and discontinuities, occupying spaces of hiding, waiting, diversion, escape, and settlement – spaces which are largely invisible to the public. Among these are spaces used for mass detention and deportation.

This thesis explores migrant detention centres in Canada, the fastest growing incarceration sector in North America’s prison industrial complex, and questions the role of architectural design in the control and management of migrant bodies in such spaces. Migrants are detained primarily because they are undocumented. Likewise, these sites of detention bare little trace — drawings and photos are classified; access is extremely limited. The detention centres, too, are undocumented. The purpose of this investigation is to make visible the sites and stories of detention, to bring them into conversations about our built environment, and to highlight migrant detention as an architectural problem.

Through the loosely defined medium of the graphic novel, this thesis presents an architectural tour of the genericized migrant detention centre. Using the conventional architectural tools of representation — plan, section, axonometric and perspective drawings — presented sequentially and accompanied by text, we confront the silenced voices of those who are detained and the anonymous individuals who design spaces of confinement.

ADVISOR: laura miller MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

23

24

sonic veneer

edith nga-ting cho It is time to start designing with our ears. – Julian Treasure This thesis explores how acoustics can and should be designed within the discipline of architecture. It is evident that sound can affect our sense of space, our social behaviour, and our quality of life. For that reason, we should be designing not just spaces, but also the sound that will occur within those spaces.

The Sonic Veneer is a proposed method for designing sound space in the 21st century. With the integration of embedded sensors and active sound technologies, we can treat sound as a layer or veneer that can be applied to the surface of any material. This project will demonstrate, through a working prototype, how we can deliberately manipulate and create a contextual sound augmentation that enhances our surroundings.

ADVISOR: rodolphe el-khoury MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

25

26

conserving the hidden layer of high park ji hee choi Architectural Conservation: the management of a building to prevent its decay, destruction, misuse or neglect; preserving a building purposefully by accommodating a degree of beneficial change.

Building conservation is an architectural operation applied to older buildings that are under pressure from new development in many expanding cities in order to accommodate new programs and to conform to the changing urban fabric. This careful operation requires negotiation between the value of older elements and the requirements of the newer ones and entails careful architectural design that merges the two in an effective way. High Park is such a site requiring this negotiation, not only for its ecological value, but also for its lesser-known aboriginal culture and history.

This thesis is a proposal designed to protect the hidden cultural layer of High Park’s landscape while accommodating new uses of the park, in the hope of enriching the cultural experience it provides and its influence on the public’s awareness of the park’s longer history and place within society.

ADVISOR: pina petricone MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

27

28

eternal toronto

re-inventing the urban cemetery

craig deebank The demographic shift toward an aging population will challenge many current social, political, and urban norms. In particular, an aging population will lead to an increase in frequency of deaths, which poses a problem for traditional landscape cemeteries that are nearing capacity. This thesis looks ahead to the year 2030 when the “Baby Boomer” generation will be completing their life cycles, creating an urban crisis within the death care profession.

It is argued that current landscape cemetery typologies physically, psychologically, and socially sever regions and connectivity within the city, creating an undesirable series of barriers. Given the projected increase and frequency of the deceased, one must re-examine how existing low-density cemeteries situated in areas of high land value within the City of Toronto will respond to the challenges — or risk becoming obsolete.

Is there an opportunity for urban cemeteries to architecturally re-invent themselves?

Exploring Toronto’s “death network” the new urban cemetery proposal will be strategically situated adjacent to Mount Pleasant Cemetery to contrast the old typology with the new. It will attempt to integrate public and private programs, the historic Beltline Trail, interment density, and will address shifting afterlife treatments while still accommodating the diverse religious and cultural traditions of Toronto.

ADVISOR: george baird MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

29

30

adaptive archipelago: evolving infrastructures in dynamic systems

kristen duimering When Toronto’s Ashbridges Bay Wastewater Treatment Plant was first built in 1910, it was built on the edge of the city with an “out of sight, out of mind” mentality. As Toronto has expanded to surround the plant, prohibitive fencing has maintained the separation of this vital piece of infrastructure from the city, and perpetuated the ignorance of residents regarding the vital role this treatment factory plays in our city.

My thesis will use education and awareness as a driving force for the design of an evolving, multifunctional corridor along the waterfront by the Ashbridges Bay Treatment Plant. This site and program will be used to investigate ways in which new wastewater infrastructures can also function socially and ecologically.

Over the last century the plant has expanded into the lake on artificial fill produced as a by-product of Toronto development projects. Despite occupying 100 acres of waterfront, public use along the water’s edge is prohibited. Consequently, the plant represents one of the largest obstacles to a continuous corridor of public space along Toronto’s Eastern Waterfront. Plans are currently underway to expand a further 200m into the lake, increasing this obstacle.

Current lake filling practices struggle to create static edge conditions in a constantly evolving system. This thesis proposal explores how future lake filling for the treatment plant’s expansion, can capitalize on existing dynamic processes to achieve functional landscapes and public space.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

31

32

co-live-work community

a new program in response to the domestication of the public sphere and its impact on the notion of home sahar edelkhani This thesis proposes a collective live-work program as the basis of a new residential layout in response to the domestication of the public sphere. The success of the domestication of the public sphere in the urban realm acts as a starting point in a search for a new social structure, highlighting the importance of neighbourhoods where one can experience a sense of intimate social support. My proposal also recognizes the ever-growing self-employment resulting from the formation of the cyber sphere, which has created a demand for collective workspace.

My project combines two models into a co-live-work program of collective housing intended for young professionals, mostly self-employed, who want to share their resources to achieve a better life quality. These self-employed professionals will take full advantage of the cyber sphere by creating their own cyber identity and providing social services within the cyber sphere. They may avoid the social isolation that comes with this lifestyle by having an active presence in the public sphere, by sharing a work space, and by taking advantage of the close proximity and support of others living within the collective atmosphere and joining forces with them.

ADVISOR: ted kesik MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

33

34

CITYPLACE:

FAILING ENVELOPES AND NEW OPPORTUNITIES FOR ARCHITECTURAL INTERVENTION IN residential point towers kourosh fathi & Ian mulder a proposal of renovation possibilities in cityplace, toronto Overwhelmingly, the largest proportion of new units in the GTA have been condominium point towers, with more towers under construction in Toronto now, than in any other city in the Americas. 70% of these units are one bedroom or smaller.

There has been criticism of the quality of these buildings, particularly the glass window wall systems, and the perception, shared by many building scientists, that the longevity of the envelope is in doubt, possibly requiring retrofit in advance of the timed replacement set forth in condominium reserve funds.

This gap between the lifespan of the window wall component, and the funds required to pay for retrofit, along with the desire for more energy efficient, and typologically flexible spaces, is where we begin our project.

We examine the capacity of these structures for renovation, focusing on the building envelope, positing that a thickened skin can both reflect existent factual anomalies and arrangements within these buildings, but might also enable a multitude of new planometric and sectional relationships.

We posit that this future intervention into the building skin should also have broad implications on the environmental performance, formal strength, and overall appearance of the tower from current baselines. We seek to increase the resilience of these residential structures and their capacity for other future renovations and lives yet unknown.

ADVISOR: robert levit MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

35

36

i-rise

andria y.y. fong With new transportation infrastructure connecting adjacent regions in Toronto, the city will become a closely-knit network of culture and activity. While suburban regions outside of the city grow speedily, Toronto’s population rate is quite low. It is important to attract families back into the city to healthily increase the population while sparking diversity and vitality.

Unfortunately, the city does not have the spacious family friendly qualities of the suburbs. Despite new condominium developments, there is a lack of supply and not enough demand for three bedroom units downtown. Some inventive mouldable units may accommodate the size of a family but what many developers constantly ignore is that this demographic is unique. It is very different than its regular target demographic of singles, couples, and investors.

Ideally, a demand can be created by designing a condo tower that primarily focuses on the family, its lifestyle, and its needs: examining what happens within the domestic realm, how families interact internally and externally, and what qualities would improve their lives within an urban context. This thesis project is a proposal for a condo building typology that welds the expectations of a family home with the opportune urban context of Allen Road and Eglinton Avenue West. It is a proposal for a new type of urban family lifestyle allowed by challenging the typical condo typology and its programmatic norms in hopes to inform a better design for a successful high rise family neighborhood.

ADVISOR: robert levit MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

37

38

howdy neighbour!

gina gallaugher Howdy Neighbour! is a proposal for the re-zoning and intensification of Toronto’s postwar suburban neighbourhoods. These neighbourhoods are rezoned to find hidden spaces in which to insert new suburban homes, while maintaining existing homes and ownership. As a result, the individual homeowner is liberated to act as their own developer — choosing to rezone, divide and sell the hidden spaces on their property (and in the process acquire a new neighbour). The resulting interventions are a series of new typologies, which aim to reduce the dream of suburban home ownership to its essentials, making it affordable and accessible to those that desire it.

ADVISOR: robert levit MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

39

40

living bubble

sajed golafshani The aim of the thesis project is to propose a solution to bring greenery into today’s compact living spaces. Living Bubble acts as a hybrid product which performs as a planter, light pendent, aquarium, and living air purifier. The idea is to design a product that could be purchased in lighting stores in the near future. A 1:1 scale prototype has been developed to fully understand the design.

As our living space becomes smaller, there will be little space to grow plants inside.

Maintenance and watering is another factor that makes it even harder for people to grow plants indoors. Researchers have studied the physical and psychological benefits of indoor plants for many years, and have proven that plants can reduce sickness rates, sharpen one’s focus, and purify the air. Therefore, the existence of greenery in indoor space can significantly affect one’s perception of that space, and it is essential for architects and designers to find a solution to address this issue.

Living Bubble is a solution that will provide a space for storing plants, while leaving floor space free for other purposes. It also benefits from an Aquaponic system, which solves the watering problem and makes it very easy for people to keep plants indoors. It also uses artificial lighting to ensure that every plant receives enough light during the day.

ADVISOR: rodolphe el-khoury MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

41

42

resourceful skins

laura gosmino The rising aspiration to produce renewable energy and recycle renewable resources at the point of demand calls for architectural innovation. Representing about 40% of primary energy consumption, buildings are main points of demand and thus ideal candidates for utilizing sustainable energy and resources.

The geometry of a design that aims to incorporate a sustainable technology can both enhance its efficiency and make it an integral part of the architecture.

Physicists help us understand how environmental phenomena, like sunlight, rain, and wind, interact with specified geometries.

Engineers experiment with how certain geometries can increase the performance of a sustainable technology that relies on a given environmental phenomenon.

Computer scientists create parametric tools that allow one to virtually modify such geometries while testing their performance in real time.

Architects should contribute to the development of meaningful parametric tools by developing design methods that bring environmental performance into the initial phases of the design process.

As geometry is a major link between environmental performance and design, architects should study the geometric parameters that will be incorporated into parametric tools to generate a comprehensive sustainable design.

By incorporating relevant geometric parameters into parametric design tools, architects can not only create performance-based designs but creatively employ sustainable technologies as a new integral element of architecture.

This experimental thesis tests a methodology to research and design the geometry for three faรงade systems, each belonging to a different building typology and featuring a specific sustainable strategy.

ADVISOR: ted kesik MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

43

44

a new healthcare paradigm: the urban healthscape

timothy groot In the next half century the world’s population will continue to rapidly urbanize.

During this time in North America, the proportion of the population aged 65 and over will increase dramatically. The current urban environment is predominantly based on auto-centric design principles and presents barriers that isolate the elderly, who are limited by physical mobility as well as an inability to independently operate automobiles.

There is an impending need to establish an urban condition that weaves the requirements for independent, community engaging, elderly-living within the design of the urban fabric.

The aim of this project is to develop a new urban healthcare paradigm that provides the necessary supportive infrastructure for in-place ageing, and in doing so supplies the essential foundations for an urban community.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

45

> 46



>

siren:

the mechanization of tone and the distribution of the emotive voice

lap hang hao The contemporary city is vastly overwhelmed by “noise” in every aspect of our urban living. With the advent of communication technology, sound is increasingly perceived as manufactured and reproduced, converted and transmitted, amplified and intensified, as signals exchanged between sonic bodies.

The subjectivity of voice — the emotive quality of sound — often falls under the threshold of any perceived meaning. Unwanted and suppressed, sound seeks to be heard and understood in all its emotive qualities beyond the objectivity of communication.

“The siren is a lyric voice, a voice without a message”, critic Steven Connor describes, on his BBC broadcast program Siren Sounds. More importantly, the siren embodies the unignorability of sound itself. Operating through simple texture and tonalities, the siren “noisemaker” possesses the ability to gradually penetrate, temporarily suspend, and slowly dissipate into the complex flow of sound in noise — the aesthetic medium of sound and the production of the social.

Through archaeology of the siren machine and the siren sound, this thesis investigates at different scales the changing relationship between the production and consumption of sound, as well as the extents to which the artifact and the spatiality of sound is materialized and de-materialized, contextualized and recontextualized, perceived and transformed by technology, culture, and subjectivity.

From a mythological creature whose seductive voice must be resisted, to a warning signal that must not be ignored, the siren measures our perceived proximity between different tonalities in space and examines in the state of exception the possibilities of enactment through sound.

A series of maps and audio sampling is orchestrated to reveal the changing perception of siren sound as spatial phenomena in response to different sociopolitical context. More specifically, the passing of sound from one sonic body to another, situated respectively in the everyday emergency response and the cold-war air raid siren infrastructure in the city of Toronto.

A device is designed to speculate the convergence between the speaking voice and siren sound, at the threshold of disembodiment in meaning and emotion.

ADVISOR: laura miller MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

47

48

expanding integration

krister holmes Modern Canadian medical facilities reflect the historical imagery of a technoscientific utopia, but contemporary health concerns are actually in a state of epidemiological flux. While few could argue with the efficacy of the medical project for treating contagion or in acute circumstances, health care dollars in Canada are largely spent on the treatment of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) like heart and lung disease, cancer, and obesity. Medical intervention largely comes too late and with limited power in these circumstances. The contemporary neo-liberal medical establishment seeks to offload the risk and responsibility of healing onto patients by defining NCDs as ‘lifestyle’ diseases — ones whose cause and cure, the story goes, lies in the patient’s relationship to the statistical definitions of a machinic conception of health.

Given these circumstances, and the power of the built environment to provide access to more physically demanding (hence NCD preventing) lifestyles, it seems that the best answer to contemporary healthcare architecture would not be a hospital, but rather a centre for preventative and alternative therapies, whose modalities allow ongoing interaction between provider and patient as well as earlier opportunities for intervention — well before medical science is prepared or capable of stepping in.

Such a centre would provide space for the practice of diverse non-medical modalities not permitted in hospitals due to their noise, smell, or spatial requirements. It would be located centrally to afford access to the most hospitals, and adopt a radically expansive definition of health. It would be iconic and authoritative in form to assert the importance of these health modalities in the face of resistance from the entrenched systems.

ADVISOR: John J. May MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

49

50

small lots, big change

developing toronto’s main streets

yoav ickowicZ Despite Toronto’s recent building boom, development activity on its main streets has been largely stagnant. This phenomenon was recognized as early as the 1980s and has been studied widely by architects, planners, and the city proper, with little in the way of results. The latest of these studies suggests that new buildings on main streets should follow a strict zoning envelope based on textbook urban design principles. However, the underlying assumption is that land assembly is a prerequisite for development — a parcel is simply not worth developing if it is less than fifty feet wide. But how can this be the case?

By identifying a typology of small parcels on Queen Street and developing workable schematic building proposals, this project seeks to challenge the assumption of requisite land assembly. The proposed building schemes on challenging yet typical sites satisfy the current zoning and legislative frameworks and also provide a high quality and diversity of commercial and residential spaces. The study’s results therefore lead the question: Can a strategy of enabling small-parcel landowners be the key to stimulating new growth on Toronto’s main streets?

ADVISOR: george baird MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

51

52

the catalyst:

towards a new mobility culture

Jessica Ingwersen My thesis seeks to create a sustainable pedestrian/cycling link, connecting the densely populated neighbourhoods of Riverdale and Riverside East of the Don Valley ravine to the westerly neighbourhoods of Cabbage Town and Regent Park. This commuter corridor will act as a recreational node in the city, serving as a citywide piazza and gateway to the under-accessed trails of the Don Valley Ravine. This corridor will also serve to reconnect urban dwellers to nature and the city to its ravine ecology. The infrastructure proposed is based on an investigation of the state of the urban cycling infrastructure embedded in Toronto’s Victorian grid. The goal is to integrate a new, connective infrastructure centered on sustainable mobility into Toronto’s cycling network, ultimately connecting the trails of the ravine to the urban cityscape.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

53

54

berkeley tomorrow

steven ischkin The central focus of this thesis is the study of programmatic flexibility and the reduced reliance on fixed paradigms in contemporary architecture. The two qualities in question are manipulated in order to determine if their alteration could generate a space that is more suited to the polyvalent ways we live our lives today. A series of thickenings, cuts, grafts, and reconfigurations contribute to the adaptive reuse of the former Berkeley Street Church in Moss Park and project its future as a multifaith centre, an emerging typology for a time when the individual agency of strict building typologies and traditional hybrid programs continue to erode in favour of synthesis.

ADVISOR: george baird MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

55

56

graffiti and architecture in the digital age javid jah Graffiti and Architecture in the Digital Age is a series of experiments that imagine how graffiti influences architectural design given the emergence of ubiquitous computing and the Internet of Things. Motivated by the interesting ways in which digital culture aligns with graffiti, such as hashtags, which simultaneously represent individual expression and collective connectivity, this research project explores new forms of agency latent within responsive architecture. If architectural design is moving towards smart building (embedded technologies and responsive design), how can the social phenomenon of graffiti and the rise of open-source communication technologies affect how individuals participate in the appearance of the built environment?

This research project thrives on the contentious nature of graffiti. It is not intended to assert what graffiti is or should be. Rather, a series of prototypes produced through experimentation orchestrate the evolution of graffiti, formally and as a network.

A key principle of the research is that no aspect of the concept of graffiti is to be left unchallenged, particularly the oft sited critique that graffiti is fundamentally an illegal activity. Instead, experimentation is geared toward challenging orthodox positions. The ultimate goal is to discover systems of participation and expression in the public realm that unleash the social character of responsive architecture. #JAHREALITY is an app that utilizes street art to trigger augmented realities. It invites participatory activity in the public realm fueled by graffiti and open-source technologies. Through this mobile application, graffiti artworks become portholes through which users can access an interactive augmented reality: information in the form of video, animation, 3-D objects, and chat forums can be accessed, shared, and altered as the virtual and physical collide on the surfaces of our public realm.

The app was developed during a period of research in Colombia during the summer of 2013. Collaborating with designers, graffiti artists and social workers in Comuna 13 (Medellin) and Ciudad Bolivar (Bogota), this research plays a critical role in the development of the thesis. Architectural innovation within the informal characterizes the development of areas of poverty in Colombia, and an analysis of the social impact of this strategy has been of paramount influence to this research project.

ADVISOR: rodolphe el-khoury MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

57

58

slow motion_space

naiji jiao Two hundred and thirty highway interchanges have been built in Beijing since 1972.

In the central city, located within the Second Ring Road, there are 33 interchanges, occupying approximately 6% of the total land. In 2010, the population density of the central city was 23,635/ km², which is approximately 6-times that of the population density of Toronto (3968/ km²). One major issue with the central city of Beijing is the huge lack of public space. As a result, highway interchanges waste valuable land, as they only serve traffic. This thesis explores designing spaces for these interchanges to make them more valuable for the city. In contrast to the high-speed traffic that currently dominates these interchanges, the re-designed spaces will be pedestrian oriented, hence the name: Slow Motion Space.

ADVISOR: pina petricone MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

59

60

bridge building/building bridge

francesca joyce This thesis intends to connect neighbouring communities which have been historically isolated from one another by the challenging topography of the Don Valley ravine system.

Thorncliffe Park and Flemingdon Park, 1950s developments of the Toronto post-war housing boom, were originally designed with mixed housing typologies and vast open green spaces which were to be supported by local shops and services. The original design also provided community spaces, but due to economic circumstances these were never realized.

As one drives along the Don Valley Parkway one can see the tall towers of each apartment block community engulfed by the vegetation of the Don Valley ravine.

Cutting through the communities, these ravines have the opportunity to provide ample centralized park space to support a population which is now twice what the original development was designed to sustain.

Both Thorncliffe Park and Flemingdon Park have been disconnected from one another through the steep topography and vastness of the ravine. Seen as dark, difficult to access, and purposeless, the ravine has many features that inhibit members of both communities from trekking down to the valley floor.

The sole existing connection between the two communities — the Charles H. Hiscott Bridge of Overlea Boulevard — has generally been considered unpleasant due to heavy volumes of vehicular traffic with little consideration for the pedestrian.

This thesis project intends to connect members from both neighbourhoods by means of revitalizing the Charles H. Hiscott Bridge. Bridge Building / Building Bridge responds to the high rate of unemployment, lack of space for community activities as well as a lack of outdoor space. The project utilizes multiple strategies including: developing access to the existing ravines, creating classrooms, studios, and retail space, and inserting athletic facilities, in order to provide space for outdoor and group activity and to create job opportunities. This multipurpose community center connects Flemingdon Park and Thorncliffe Park both physically and socially.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

61

62

reconfigure

affordable housing through flexible design

christine kim The city of Toronto has over 6000 condominiums; 65% of them are one bedroom or smaller in size. Space comes at a premium in the city, but access to amenities is invaluable. The standard condo building is constructed as a highly static object with a predetermined program or function. The introduction of polyvalency through flexible design allows families, both nuclear and extended, to adapt to these spaces. This thesis, in the form of a manual, provides guidelines for retrofitting these condominiums to prevent housing obsolescence.

ADVISOR: ted kesik MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

63

64

(re)generative design

exploring the boundaries between environment, building, technology and human experience jennifer lavery & christina pascoa This thesis investigates a radical rethinking of the way we produce and consume resources in our built environment. Marc-Antoine Laugier presented the primitive hut as a model for a rational architecture based on natural principles. Nature here stood for an abstract logic, a philosophy, and not for a material living entity. Made from organic materials such as timber, straw, and mud, the primitive hut is a provocation to rethink our current state of how we build and our relationship to the natural environment.

Regenerative processes, as described by Pete Melby, enable a species to maintain life within a natural ecosystem, and can be broken down into five categories: Conversion, Distribution, Filtration, Assimilation, and Storage. We have investigated how these processes can be adapted within the built environment in order to blend technical development with the natural ecology. This thesis begins to unfold regenerative processes through the five key attributes of a human-support system: Shelter, Water, Food, Energy, and Waste Processing.

ADVISORs: ted kesik & rodolphe el-khoury MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

65

66

the superhero courtyard

louis yi liu The courtyard has been one of the most widely used architectural typologies. In some civilizations, courtyards have been in existence for thousands of years. They can be as small as a garden in the middle of a house, or cover an entire city with courtyard-type blocks (as seen in Barcelona). They can provide a piece of sheltered nature, a gathering space, and are the oldest form of passive sustainability. Overall, courtyards have been extremely important in the development of architecture.

The paradigm for present day cities is the building of high-rise towers on a fixed grid, causing a disconnection between the people at the pedestrian level and the architecture. This thesis seeks to create a way to enhance architectural experiences by exploring of the possibility of having the courtyard as the superhero that provides relief space in the dense urban fabric.

ADVISOR: pina petricone MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

67

68

inside-outside-inside living

han ma From 1980 to 2012, China’s urbanization rate increased from 19.4% to 52.6%. As a result of this rapid urbanization, more and more high-rise residential towers have been built to accommodate the increasing urban population. Driven by real estate profit, urban housing development is a production-based process that attains a highdensity outcome. Floor Area Ratio (FAR) guides the design process, while much less effort is invested into considering the dwellers’ lifestyle or the local climate, culture, community, and environment context.

Since the Chinese lifestyle has been forced to fit into a western-style housing form, the conflict between the stringent, western, function-based style and the free interpretation of space in typical Chinese culture has caused many problems. While some zones in a residential building are occupied for unanticipated functions, other zones remain underused.

The aim of this project is to reinterpret Chinese lifestyle through units designed in a compact, collective western housing form. By making analytical drawings of vernacular Chinese housing, by examining the spatial arrangement and the relationship between indoors and outdoors, and by understanding the conflict between the contemporary urban city and Chinese lifestyle, an alternative set of units are generated. The existing rigid division between private and public zones are softened, while the threshold zone and the informal quality of the spaces are elaborated. This proposal intends to create a living space that inspires people to reconnect with the outdoors and their surrounding neighbours.

ADVISOR: john j. may MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

69

70

infrastructure redefined

marisa maggs To accommodate both the projected population growth and pressures of climate change in cities, there will be an inevitable investment in transport infrastructure in coming years. These major changes present an opportunity to reconsider the infrastructure that has shaped our city, dividing rather than connecting communities for decades. The future of cities depends largely on the ability to adapt transport infrastructure and find creative ways to meet the structural demands of all transport networks: the car, public transit, cyclists and pedestrians.

While government investment in infrastructural projects has been increasing, public engagement in civic improvement has been decreasing. What does this mean for the future of public space in the urban metropolis? How can we find new ways to provide community projects and new places to integrate social public space into our urban fabric?

This thesis identifies opportunities in existing transit spaces in the city. Looking specifically at Toronto’s underutilized regional rail lines, it proposes a reconsideration of these existing corridors to be used for more local transit and a revitalization of these corridors by integrating public domain. Though these rail lines provide important commuter connections to suburban areas, they segregate urban neighbourhoods, creating edges and enclaves of lower-valued residential or industrial use.

Using strategic programming and public connections, this project focuses on ways to activate and reconnect these pieces of the urban fabric. This thesis is a study and design exploration of an ideal urban site that demonstrates a prototypical rail condition in Toronto. The site is located in an area bound for accelerated development, with potential to become not only a major transportation hub, but an important cultural hub, due to its rich history and strong community leadership and involvement. My project builds on these developments by providing more public connections, and it explores a method allowing for community-based growth over time. The thesis proposes both a design and an urban choreography of multiple stakeholders, both public and private, that could bring this rail corridor to the forefront as a valuable public space and connective node in the city.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

71

72

the chinese mall of toronto ethnoburb

a space of transnational identities and acculturation marie thanh-truc nguyen

I am a Chinese immigrant.

I am 1.5 generation Chinese Canadian.

I am a Chinese born Canadian.

I am Canadian.

The first Chinese immigrants landed over 200 years ago in Canada. Since the old days of hard labour in railway construction, the Chinese community has come a long way from segregation to integration. In Toronto in the 1900’s, citizens of Chinese heritage were confined to ghettos. Severely segregated from the mainstream Anglo-Saxon community, their ethnic enclave provided them with support and protection from discrimination. Displaced from block to block in downtown Toronto, the Chinese community was finally recognized by the mainstream community in the ‘70s and they settled along Spadina, marking with no timidity their presence in the city.

The 1986 Investment Canada Act played a major role in the shift of socio-economic identity for the Chinese community. With a promise of a facilitated immigration process and potential business investments in Canada, a new class of Chinese immigrants arrived: economic immigrants who are wealthy investors and entrepreneurs with capital and ready to invest in properties. The latter phenomenon induced the creation of multiple Ethnoburbs on the outskirts of Toronto. The Chinese Ethnoburbs proudly showcase the community’s success in Canada via investments, landownership, and construction of amenities promoting Chinese culture and language. Far from segregation, the Chinese suburban ethnic enclaves mark the consolidation of their community in Toronto and their acculturation into the mainstream culture.

This thesis focuses on the process of acculturation and the transnational identities of the members of the Chinese community in the GTA. Since the Chinese mall is an iconic landmark in the Toronto Chinese Ethnoburbs, it will become the architectural medium to explore how the shifting of identity can be articulated spatially and to celebrate the marriage of two cultures, as well as the collective memory of the hybrid identities.

ADVISOR: laura miller MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

73

74

shiraz 2040

shahryar nozari Like many other developing countries, Iran went through the process of urbanization at the beginning of the 21st century; people were moving from rural areas in search of jobs and opportunities to improve their lives. Between 1956 and 2011, the urban population of Iran grew about 6.4 times, from 8.4 million (which accounted for 33% of the country’s total population) to 53.3 million (71% of the total population).

In Shiraz, the fifth most populous city of Iran, fast urban and economic growth has been accelerating in the last 55 years, resulting in a horizontal expansion of the city that is overtaking agricultural land and rural areas. If the current population growth rate of more than 3.5% annually remains steady, Shiraz will be a city of nearly 7 million people by the year 2040 and lose most of its cropland due to urban sprawl.

Accordingly, there is a need for a new type of intensification that responds to the social and economic requirements of the fast growing population while at the same time minimizing the amorphous horizontal sprawl.

This thesis proposes urban transformation through the consideration of a highdensity prototype that fuses contemporary principles of sustainable design with traditional local references. It can be argued that high-density housing is a more viable solution to accommodating an increased demand for housing in Shiraz in the absence of additional land. The goal is to raise awareness of energy resources, energy efficiency, and environmental protection, as well as to seek innovative engineering and architectural solutions to local issues. The intention is to place sustainability principles and renewable energy technologies at the forefront of the design.

The design for this prototype introduces innovative spatial, structural, and energy production solutions, which will create an operational symbol of the future building industry for the city and a hub of urban activity.

ADVISOR: robert levit MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

75

76

t.a.i.c. project

ola-ife ola-olu ojo The definition of architecture, as a “super organism capable of processing disparate extrinsic matter,” is one that exists outside of the discipline proper. It is, however, a definition that accurately defines the role of the contemporary architect and subsequent architecture. Architecture, the super organism, is reminiscent of nature, proposing a possible collaboration compounding in biomimetic action.

Biomimetics is the process of studying nature’s problem solving strategies and thereby engineering sustainable solutions through emulation. Much more than an examination of nature, biomimetics is a philosophy, a process of thought that promotes sustainable and more environmentally appropriate systems and solutions.

The Closed Loop System is an intrinsic concept of biomimetics. These systems, biological in nature, exhibit a spiral metabolism. They tend to be multi-goal oriented, capitalize on the efficiencies of interdependency and utilize the idea of continuous resource cycles. Human systems by contrast tend to be singular goal oriented, linear, and wasteful with open-ended resource-cycles. Biological systems are also accommodating of further system expansion and aggregation, as such, they are not only sustainable but also capable of being restorative. Architectural biomimetics consequently is an evolution of human systems amalgamated with biological systems, an evolution that guarantees a more symbiotic coalescence of the two: an effective architecture.

The vernacular, in the words of Bernard Rudofsky, “Architecture with architects,” has often been described as primitive, native, indigenous, anonymous architecture.

Conversely, in the contemporary architectural reality, the vernacular, with its “peasant” worldview of limitedness, possess many valuable and applicable architectural paradigms. It is a catalyst, both a source code of valuable principles and techniques in passive, status quo environmental architecture, as well as a platform for the evolution of and towards an effective architecture.

Terra Archipelago Infrastructural Commune, the T.A.I.C project, is an investigation of the construction of an effective architecture. Armed with the vernacular and a biomimetic tool kit, it is an architectural response to remedy the overarching hazard of desertification in the Northern Sahel Belt of Africa.

ADVISOR: robert levit MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

77

78

iterate + collaborate

gina page The last several decades have brought about a shift in how people meet their spiritual and emotional needs. Many traditional North American religions are now confronting a significant problem of supply and demand. Although there is more than enough room in the pews, fewer and fewer people are walking through the doors. Consequently, many congregations have to grapple with the overwhelming possibility of extinction, thus leaving magnificent cathedrals uninhabited.

With Toronto’s booming population, many of the city’s congregations have found solace in the pockets of developers. From the Junction to the Beaches, significant religious landmarks are being sold and converted into high-end condominiums.

Amidst this pattern of decline, one particular congregation is struggling with a divergent problem: growth.

In recent years, First Unitarian of Toronto has struggled to find enough seats to welcome the growing number of individuals seeking a liberal faith tradition. On a typical Sunday morning, the worship space can be standing room only and the children’s education rooms are filled to capacity. Although the building at 175 St. Clair Avenue has served the congregation well for over 60 years, in the spring of 2014 a decision will be made regarding the future of the congregation and its current property.

Rather than simply create a larger iteration of the present reality, this thesis expands the essential congregational spaces into an environment built for community collaboration. No longer is a 500-seat auditorium just for Sundays; it’s for concerts, theatre productions, conferences and public meetings. Religious education doesn’t just provide an exciting learning space for the congregation’s children, but also functions all week as an early learning centre. The congregation’s love of coffee is met by a fair-trade cafe that also serves the local neighborhood. Plus, the needed offices and boardrooms become a synergetic co-working community. The building is then pushed further and higher by a collection of co-housing units that might serve seniors, students, domestic violence survivors, hospice patients, refugees in sanctuary or anyone who needs a bed and a bathroom. All this is contained in an architectural form that communicates the values of Unitarian Universalism.

ADVISOR: ted kesik MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

79

80

building envelope in tectonic massing ngoc phan Toronto is a city where density is rapidly increasing with more than 1000 residential towers built between 1945 and 1984. During this time, concrete framed apartment towers were the most popular residential buildings in the city. Thousands of units were built across the city, mixed with single-family homes, industry, retail, and open spaces. Today, these concrete frame towers are aging and inefficient, and the open space that surrounds them is often mis-used (Tower Renewal Implementation, 2012).

In 2008, the City of Toronto recognized the importance of the Tower Renewal program and investigated a number of pilot sites including large publicly traded corporations, family-owned businesses, and publicly owned housing.

From the test pilot site statistics, the major part of the work involved in implementing the Tower Renewal program (67%) involves re-skinning or over cladding existing building envelopes. This is a time consuming and costly process. However, the Tower Renewal program mostly deals with and improves the cosmetic aspects of existing buildings.

Re-skinning the old degrading envelope, better waste and water management, planting more trees or upgrading the heating/cooling equipment will no doubt improve the buildings’ energy efficiency and look; however, user spatial quality or programs are still not addressed. For example, unit and floor configurations remain small and uncomfortable, and open spaces and amenities remain separated from the main buildings.

This thesis proposes a different approach: altering a building’s interior core programming or configuration to improve residents’ spatial and living quality, rather than working from the outside inward as in the City of Toronto Tower Renewal program. The building exterior and surrounding programs will be updated as the result of the interior changes.

ADVISOR: george baird MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

81

82

underlines:

recovering lost landscape with productive infrastructures

federica piccone South Western Ontario’s greenbelt is one of the world’s largest preserved areas, protecting farmlands, forests, and wetlands from urban development pressures.

It encompasses four major watersheds and a range of habitats contained within them. These watersheds provide essential eco-services including water filtration, waste treatment, and flood control. As cities continue to grow and draw on the resources provided by the greenbelt, there will be increasing challenges associated with maintaining productive farmland as well as healthy and intact watersheds.

The hydro corridor is an extensive manufactured landscape, foreign to the urban fabric and ravine system it crosses. The constant maintenance and control of vegetation growth along the corridor has resulted in a monocultural landscape lacking biodiversity. With limited area to expand the greenbelt, one solution is to look to transmission lines for opportunities for urban expansion while simultaneously offering increased biodiversity. Without concealing the artificial nature of the corridor, this thesis addresses issues concerning water and food security by layering different uses onto the corridor’s previous singular condition, enhancing social, cultural, and natural capital with green infrastructure and productive landscape and recreation.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

83

84

alexandra park

christian rutherford & paul van der grient Faced with a growing repair backlog and declining contributions from the federal and provincial governments, Toronto Community Housing is relying increasingly on public private partnerships to maintain its aging housing stock. At Alexandra Park, a 7 hectare public housing neighbourhood in downtown Toronto, 1,540 new market condominiums will fund the refurbishment or replacement of 806 affordable housing units.

The revitalization model’s reliance on the private sector means that new housing follows development industry norms, where long term quality is second to short term profit.

A key public site in the downtown core, Alexandra Park represents an opportunity to reevaluate these development norms and set a high standard for new housing: both market and affordable. Using the current revitalization plan for Alexandra Park as a mirror, this project proposes long term oriented design strategies for building quality living spaces and a good neighbourhood.

An alternative to the condo enclave is developed through mixed tenure open blocks: thin buildings are arranged to provide each unit with access to daylight, natural ventilation and meaningful outdoor space, while creating a defined, permeable urban fabric.

ADVISOR: ted kesik MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

85

86

west station:

a case study for infrastructural bundling and civic space

duncan sabiston As public transit in Toronto becomes increasingly accessible through a planned series of extensions to the original cross-system subway, a complex weaving of personal transportation such as pedestrian, bicycle, and car traffic with public transportation in the form of buses, street cars, light rail, subways, and trains will become part of daily mobile life. West Station is an investigation into how these new intermodal stations will develop as a building/infrastructure type, addressing larger urban conditions and networks, not only as a work of planning, engineering, and architecture, but as an aesthetic contribution to the city and new form of civic space.

West Station is a prototype for a station with a stronger sense of spatial continuity, designed around the orchestration of bodies and machines in space. It abandons the customary way of perceiving structure and space as one articulated through basic solids such as planes, cubes, and cylinders, as well as grids, to support them. The topology of its structure is flexible and robust enough to functionally accommodate its multiples programs. Bundling is deployed as both a structural and urban strategy, acting as a primer for the developing discussion surrounding local and regional transit in the Toronto area.

ADVISOR: robert levit MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

87

88

thinking drawing modelling

michael scarborough Leaving hopes and utopias apart, probably the most lucid [gesture] ever written about language are the following words by Chesterton: “Man knows that there are in the soul tints more bewildering, more numberless, and more nameless than the colours of an autumn forest;‌ Yet he seriously believes that these things can every one of them, in all their tones and semitones, in all their blends and unions, be accurately represented by an arbitrary system of grunts and squeals. He believes that an ordinary civilized stockbroker can really produce out of his own inside noises which denote all the mysteries of memory and all the agonies of desireâ€? (G. F. Watts, page 88, 1904).

- Jorge Luis Borges

ADVISOR: john j. May MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

89

90

the architecture of air

rethinking the architectural threshold

negar seyedfathi After the domestication of mechanical systems in the 1930s, providing interior comfort was no longer dependent on the performance of the building envelope.

Liberated from its confined roles as the environmental mediator and the structural support, the envelope was reduced to the thinnest possible building materials, often one sheet of glass, in many modernists’ quest for transparency. Now, imagine the physical existence of an architectural threshold that is close to nothing, an envelope made of nothing but of the lightest, the softest, and the most available substance around us: air. This thesis examines how all that is solid, static, and hard is substituted or supplemented by air.

Exploring the architectural interventions of using air at a monumental scale of an outdoor urban plaza allows for an emergence of a new typology: a “conditioned� outdoor public room. In this typology, invisible environmental separators using air curtains form a microclimate where all the dividing physical barriers between inside and outside, between the conditioned and unconditioned, are dissolved. Nathan Philips square is the testing ground for this new immaterial, ephemeral and nonsubstantial architecture. Although psychologically internalized, the square is left as an agora, a forum and a theatre for the city, an environmentally-controlled landscape of social interactions that attracts various activities all year round.

ADVISOR: rodolphe el-khoury MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

91

92

playlive ladan sharifpour As the world moves toward a democratic future, countries still exist that deny basic human rights. New and distinct social interactions and atmospheres are born from constraints that are enforced on people by their government.

The cultural censorship and limitations on entertainment activities in the public realm in Iran has resulted in the displacement of public activities that have been banned from the visible public domain to invisible private spaces. The formation of remote, out of reach, and hidden away spaces that can cater to wide variety of public activities has been an unquestionable part of life in Iran for the past 34 years. Under these circumstances, the house becomes the protagonist, an ‘enclosed space’ (pairi-daĂŞza/ paradise) which enjoys a level of immunity from government surveillance, and, therefore, an ideal covert platform for the theater, music, art, cinema, and entertainment, a platform for activities that challenge, disagree with or simply differ from government ideologies.

This thesis seeks to explore the role of design not as a tool for social change, rather a tool that is adaptive, embraces the current strategies that respond to a suppressive public living environment, and rethinks the contemporary house design, considering the duality of its character.

This thesis explores traditional Persian architecture with specific focus on Persian gardens and courtyard-type dwellings. The dichotomy between the garden as container that holds a public building and the courtyard house that contains a private garden is employed to inform the design strategy.

The site of operation for this thesis project is among the summer villas of northern Tehran in the village of Laloon. The site is isolated from the excessively controlled state of the capital city because of its remoteness, yet it is close enough to Tehran for a daily commute.

This thesis explores the oscillatory nature of the house(s) as public and private venues, the physical properties of the site, and the realities of building construction.

Finally, this thesis anticipates the evolution and future change of such societies and the possible architectural manifestations of social change, where an introverted, covert, private multi-use house embodies a new, visible public life.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

93

94

the emerging background: densifying the suburbs

corey shiff The population of Toronto will increase by 400,000 in the next 8 years, whereas the population of the surrounding suburbs will increase by 1,531,000 in 12 years1. These areas will have the largest proportion of growth, contributing to urban sprawl. But how can this growth be sustainable? Architectural solutions that are used to limit sprawl in the downtown core are not appropriate for suburban housing, as they are overscaled and contain mostly one-bedroom units. An alternative approach must be taken that incorporates density, family housing, and open spaces. The single-family dwelling is an outdated typology that needs to be reinvented for the future, and the condominium unit needs to be transformed, allowing for enhanced living conditions.

In order to achieve an improved suburban environment, one must understand the features that reside in these developments and filter them into the design. The architecture must be sensitive to its surroundings and not impose a social or ecological burden. A solution must be contextually driven as well as enhanced to sustain the growth of suburbs in the future. The presence of the yard and house must be explored and re-imagined in a way that can allow for a more responsible use of land.

1Government Canada. Statistics Canada: 2011 Census. Metropolitan area of Toronto, Ontario. http:// www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2011.

ADVISOR: ted kesik MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

95

96

infra-body:

addressing the in-between

christopher somma Throughout the 1950s, North America experienced a shift in mobility due to changes in technology and culture resulting in a surge of private automobiles, which led to an extensive highway network (around metropolitan centers and their peripheries).

The geometry of such a network is a result of the standardization of automobile routes based on speed and efficiency to get from A to B. This inflexible, totalizing system based on traffic management rather than urbanism created a series of “inbetween spaces” within the highway interchange. These spaces represent spatial, social, and legal openness allowing not only for the possibility of programmatic diversity (recreation, transport nodes, housing and commercial/retail) but also the ability for these spaces to be meaningfully integrated within urbanism. This project seeks to redefine the interchange through the marriage of architecture, mobility, and landscape, as a means to reclaim that land, reducing marginalization and segregation of communities, and to stimulate new forms of interaction.

Within the next 10-30 years, North America will experience a new shift in highspeed mobility, as highway networks and airports approach their critical mass, and the creation of high-speed rail networks connecting major urban centers becomes a reality. This phenomenon creates an opportunity to integrate these networks within the highway interchange, activating the ‘in-between’ spaces. This will transform the highway from a single purpose and singular access infrastructure into a complex node that will incorporate many services and responsive programs into a coherent mobile node that relates to the broader urban context, creating an Infra-body.

My site is situated in Toronto, specifically the Highway 427 and Gardiner Expressway interchange. This site will encompass a high-speed rail station, a new Go station, and Bus transit terminal. Additional recreational program will also be injected within these ‘in-between spaces’ to serve the projected growth of the neighbourhood due to the introduction of such a transport node.

ADVISOR: robert levit MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

97

98

intensifying greater toronto area’s industrial landscape leo tang The continuing trend of commercial and industrial decentralization from the Toronto core since the early twentieth-century has had a lasting effect on the development of Toronto and its surrounding urban areas. Many of those surrounding areas are characterised by “cookie-cutter houses” and “Big-box” stores, which we associate with the suburbs and exurbs of Toronto. The economic and physical growth of these outer municipalities has been fueled by the creation of commercial and industrial clusters as a direct result of decentralization from the core over the past century.

Consequently, commercial-industrial complexes and clusters continue to grow on the urban fringe to sizes that are comparable to the City of Toronto proper, and are continuing to thin out the public infrastructure that suburbs are able to provide.

However, as industrial functions, especially those within the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), produce a significant amount of the regional and national gross domestic product, it is clear that the provision of spaces for industrial production is vital to our socio-economic integrity. How can we continue to encourage the growth of one of our most important sources of productivity while reducing the negative impacts of industrial land use? In addition, how can we address the issues that stem from our employment lands? The low-rise industrial typology requires a significant building footprint as well as a significant amount of ancillary land to function, which leads to insufficient density for the proper provision of infrastructure (such as public transit for workers), urban sprawl, and congestion. The aim of this project is to develop a strategy for the intensification of the existing employment lands to create a new type of high-density industrial production facility.

ADVISOR: george baird MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

99

100

reconstructing monroe, inside out fabiana todescan The site of the Monroe Palace in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil continues to hold a collective memory of a conflated identity – a connection with multiple sites, associated objects, places, and layers of history. Once the Brazilian pavilion during the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition at the World’s Fair, the Palace was later dismantled and rebuilt in Rio de Janeiro in 1906. Although it was commemorated for its image, the building was eventually demolished in favour of Modern Architecture over the previous colonial style. Today, the people of Rio are requesting its reconstruction as a meaningful tribute to the history of the city.

This thesis proposes an underground museum where several sites evoke human curiosity and create a dialogue between the past and present: a meeting point between history and individual memories. The museum would create a conversation between the inner and outside world, the modern reality and the past. The project aims to resurface the buried Palace through an exhibition located within Rio’s subway system — specifically the station directly below the original site of the Monroe Palace. It reconstructs fragments of individual memories associated with the Palace’s history. These memories, collectively, from the inside out, reformulate a living archive of Monroe.

ADVISOR: laura miller MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

101

102

into the don:

toronto’s ravine link

jason van der burg The vast ravine landscape of forests, fields, and marshes is one of Toronto’s most centrally located — yet perhaps most underappreciated — urban open spaces.

The ravines echo Toronto’s history. The Don Valley was occupied by some of the earliest European settlers who sought to harness the power of its river to operate their mills. Bridges, expanding the city eastward, have long been the greatest architectural landmarks of the valley, while railways and highways define much of its presence today. Layers of infrastructure have inevitably rendered much of the valley disconnected and inaccessible.

As intensification and development of new communities in the lower Don Valley neighbourhoods bring an estimated 80,000 new residents into the city’s core, the demands for places to recreate, commute and travel through will significantly increase.

In this thesis project, fragmented sites of ravine territories are strategically repositioned as sites for civic engagement, environmental education, and the introduction of a pervious public infrastructure: hubs which could encourage the city to opportunistically develop its complex ravine edges.

Looking specifically at the site surrounding Castle Frank subway station and the Bloor Viaduct, the project introduces a new kind of linkage: a hybrid cable railway connecting public transit with the valley below. The proposal calls for “plug-in” architecture — structures attached to each entry station housing cultural and recreational programs — interventions that act as prototypes for broader access to ravine territories. The proposal aims to expand upon the deeper foundations of the site’s multiple histories, looking back at its ecological past while also projecting forward a legacy of a new kind of public experience down into Toronto’s ravine valleys.

ADVISOR: brigitte shim MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

103

104

soundsolid

joseph villahermosa No longer ubiquitously popular, due to the emergence and proliferation of new genres, classical music harbours a deep cultural gravitas that prevents it from becoming an accessible art form.

More than simply relegating it to the intelligentsia, or those who wish to be perceived as such, can classical music reclaim its role as a catalyst for widespread civic engagement with the arts? Perhaps architecture can answer this question, by combining the aural and visual senses involved in musical production with a broader public context.

Hosting a space that mediates between musician, audience, and city requires a grand urban proposition, and more importantly, a site that accommodates such whims. Manhattan’s Hudson Yard is currently one of the few remaining undeveloped sites in New York City, and presents a unique opportunity to occupy the railway void between Midtown and the Hudson River. Beyond the musical cognoscenti, how can the contemporary metropolis participate in this renewal of space and sound? Why, with a concert hall, of course.

ADVISOR: robert levit MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

105

106

re-link:

localization of toronto subway stations

bingyi yao Mobility is a new dimension of contemporary cities. Modern transportation networks that consist of interchange nodes and linking passages are fundamental to urban life and its growth and expansion.

The Toronto Subway system was initiated in the 1950s as a rapid transit system to ease the load on the road. The stations, as physical forms of the transit nodes, house interchange activity and many layers of temporary, anonymous, and transitory events. However the provision of tracks and other required services often dominate the space, which does little to encourage social interaction. Culture is absent in these spaces. Thus, the stations become the “non-spaces,” defined by Marc Augé as spaces isolated from local context and social networks. According to Augé, “Nonplaces turn the subject into a passenger, a user, a customer, or listener, identified by name, address, date of birth, passport and PIN number.”

Architecture is intended to be site specific and reflect and respond to the surrounding context. This thesis proposes a new strategy to resolve the disconnection between the mobility of transit and immobility of architecture.

ADVISOR: george baird MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

107

108

de-monument:

curation in the landscape museum

katarzyna zapoloch The ruin embodies the past, present, and future simultaneously. Imagination thrives here as we envision what once was, as it was most likely greater than what exists now — but what if the ruin has been stripped to its bare bones, and something that once represented a civilization seems underwhelming and unnecessary to preserve?

What if a construct, or architectural intervention, can replace the expectation for what is not there? This is the case made for the Hanford B Reactor in Washington State, where plutonium for the first nuclear bomb was produced as part of the Manhattan Project.

After three decades of abandonment and neglect, the B Reactor has acquired a new sort of vintage, now declared a national monument within the proposed Hanford National Park and attracting more than 60,000 tourists a year. These individuals come to the nuclear reservation with an expectation of grandeur, but unfortunately there is little to see aside from the derelict structures scattered across the site.

The concept of a landscape museum can be applied to this vast site where there is little to see but much to feel, for example, the thrill of dark tourism, fear of contamination in what is considered the most contaminated site in North America, and a sort of intellectual pride in what was once a top secret facility. Here at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, the layering of moments, decaying objects, artefacts that withstand the test of time, and the site itself as an artefact, have the potential to take visitors on a tour through time and space. Through a sort of curation, the site is unravelled as one’s relationship to the relic changes. This relationship can be enhanced through a sort of exaggerated perspective, while other times it is disarmed and vulnerable, as it is left exposed. One comes to the site to affirm an expected view, therefore the landscape museum can become an armature for the conscious and unconscious, what exists and what does not, choreographing one’s experience through this vast and historic site.

ADVISOR: Pina petricone MArch Thesis Reviews Fall 2013

109

thesis

reviews

fall 2013