Canadian Architect November 2022

NOV/22 V.67 N.08

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4 VIEWPOINT

TOM ARBAN

MICHAEL MORAN

ARTS AND CULTURE

CANADIAN ARCHITECT

NOVEMBER 2022 03

How are Canadian architecture firms navigating the balance between remote and in-person work?

7 NEWS

Remembering Blanche Lemco van Ginkel, 1923-2022.

13 RAIC JOURNAL

Celebrating the winners of the 2022 RAIC International Prize and Scholarships.

28

35

28 DAVID GEFFEN HALL

The New York Philharmonic returns to its revamped home, designed by Diamond Schmitt and Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects. TEXT Elsa Lam

35 PLACE DES ARTS

A Sudbury landmark by Moriyama & Teshima Architects in joint venture with Bélanger Salach Architecture brings together seven Franco-Ontarian arts institutions.

TEXT Terrance Galvin

22 LONGVIEW

Thomas Demand’s photography at Toronto’s MOCA.

25 INSITES

Jake Nicholson on what we can learn about the profession from RFP site visits.

60 BOOKS

Adele Weder’s new biography on Ron Thom, reviewed by Odile Hénault.

66 BACKPAGE

43 ACE HOTEL

he first Canadian outpost of the high-design Ace Hotels is an architecturally T ambitious work by Shim-Sutcliffe Architects. TEXT Bill Curran

Sami Kazemi on the brave new world of renderings by AI.

53 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE REVITALIZATION DOUBLESPACE PHOTOGRAPHY

DOUBLESPACE PHOTOGRAPHY

Kohn Shnier and ERA Architects renew the century-and-a-half-old building with a radical space usage rethink. TEXT Pamela Young

Ace Hotel, Toronto, Ontario,

by Shim-Sutcliffe Architects. Photo

by Scott Norsworthy.

COVER

V.67 N.08 THE NATIONAL REVIEW OF DESIGN AND PRACTICE / THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF THE RAIC / THE OFFICIAL

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53

MAGAZINE OF THE AIA CANADA SOCIETY

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VIEWPOINT

BACK TO THE OFFICE – OR NOT? As we head towards the winter, many offices are settling into new patterns of work—some maintaining hybrid work options established during the pandemic, some returning to inperson work in offices. Still others are pushing to move from the former to the latter.

Many smaller firms are back to in-person work—a number of them only left their offices during mandated pandemic lockdowns. In cities like Winnipeg, where many architects live near offices in the downtown core, a full return to in-person work is more common. But many larger firms, particularly in bigger cities where longer commutes are the norm, have been seeing less than half of their staff return to the office.

In cities like Vancouver and Toronto, where housing prices have risen sharply in recent years, some staff permanently relocated outside of the city during the pandemic.

Toronto-based dkstudio architects says that it’s been challenging to bring their 24 people consistently back into the office. “The main struggle is with the younger group,” says cofounder Karen Mak, noting that “they don’t have the experience to work independently, yet they don’t want to come to the office.”

Her strategies for enticing staff to return range from prioritizing those who show up for design-forward projects and raises, to getting an office puppy and bringing in unexpected treats (the other day, mochi donuts).

Maxime Frappier of ACDF, a 100-person firm in Montreal, says that in their case, many of those working from home are senior staff, who feel more productive without the disruptions that come from working in an open-plan office. “But that’s part of the job, you are paid to be interrupted!” says Frappier, who is concerned about the loss of informal mentorship that comes from being able to walk over to a desk to ask a question, and the learning that comes from overhearing conversations. In the meantime, to compensate, he says: “I’m talking louder.”

While working from home can save time on commutes and help in balancing family obligations such as school pickups, it also comes with an emotional and psychological toll tied to higher rates of burn-out, according to a recent study at Simon Fraser University. “Working from home means losing out on those water cooler conversations and casual collisions with coworkers—which have a surprisingly profound impact on well-being,” writes social epidemiologist Kiffer George Card, one of the study’s leads.

“Furthermore, considering how important work-

CA Nov 22.indd 4

places and schools are for finding and building friendships, a loss of these spaces could have serious long-term consequences for people’s social health—especially if the time spent with others at work is now spent at home alone.” His team’s research suggests that hybrid work arrangements offer the best of both worlds—with 87 of those working in a hybrid mode reporting good or excellent mental health, compared to 54 percent of those that worked only in-person, and 63 percent of those who worked only at home.

In Vancouver, VIA—A Perkins Eastman Studio has aligned with their parent company’s policy for staff to work in the office three days a week. “Our office has been experimenting with a number of ways to encourage people to work and connect in the office,” says senior associate Anne Lissett. “My feeling is that in-person collaboration is really valuable, so I hold my team meetings together in the office, and I connect with other project managers informally there too.” She adds that “happy hours, along with occasional office breakfasts, lunches, and other activities that emphasize the fun of being together in real life, are also perks to in-person work.”

Toronto-based MJMA has similarly requested staff to be in the office for three days a week, Tuesdays through Thursdays, with Mondays and Fridays as optional work-from-home days.

“For the sake of office culture, and the vitality of the workplace and business efficiency, we are focused on having everyone back in the office on the same three middle days of the week,” says partner Ted Watson. “Interestingly, what has become clear is that our meetings online have become more and more successful and equitable when we can use Miro, Enscape, and Bluebeam, and have access to all our files and screen-sharing of internet content simultaneously and together,” he adds. As a result, the majority of MJMA’s meetings are held online.

“Our meeting rooms have never been less used—to the point that we are considering if we can delete half of them in order to create higher value space for staff.”

“Conversing, socializing, and learning from proximity are goals we believe in. We’re focused on fostering and retaining this by having everyone back together, sharing space, lunch and stories,” says Watson. “But remote working, in some form, is here to stay.”

“ EDITOR ELSA LAM, FRAIC ART DIRECTOR ROY GAIOT CONTRIBUTING EDITORS ANNMARIE ADAMS, FRAIC ODILE HÉNAULT DOUGLAS MACLEOD, NCARB, FRAIC ONLINE EDITOR CHRISTIANE BEYA REGIONAL CORRESPONDENTS WINNIPEG LISA LANDRUM, MAA, AIA, FRAIC VANCOUVER ADELE WEDER, HON. MRAIC SUSTAINABILITY ADVISOR ANNE LISSETT, ARCHITECT AIBC, LEED BD+C VICE PRESIDENT & SENIOR PUBLISHER STEVE WILSON 416-441-2085 x3 ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER FARIA AHMED 416-441-2085 x5 CUSTOMER SERVICE / PRODUCTION LAURA MOFFATT 416-441-2085 x2 CIRCULATION CIRCULATION@CANADIANARCHITECT.COM PRESIDENT OF IQ BUSINESS MEDIA INC. ALEX PAPANOU HEAD OFFICE 126 OLD SHEPPARD AVE, TORONTO, ON M2J 3L9 TELEPHONE 416-441-2085 E-MAIL info@canadianarchitect.com WEBSITE www.canadianarchitect.com Canadian Architect is published 9 times per year by iQ Business Media Inc. The editors have made every reasonable effort to provide accurate and authoritative information, but they assume no liability for the accuracy or completeness of the text, or its fitness for any particular purpose.

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Savings by Design | Commercial & Multi-Residential

“I love the collaborative aspect of the program” Free expertise and incentives, value up to $60,000* The Enbridge Gas Savings by Design program provides free building science consulting offered over a full-day integrated design process workshop† to help build high-performance and sustainable buildings. BDP Quadrangle’s Director of Innovation, Michelle Xuereb, shares why she’s a longtime participant.

Q

As an architect, what’s the value of participating in Savings by Design?

A: The real value comes from the integrated discussions. The program brings together a diverse group of stakeholders including the client, their design team, subject-matter experts and energy modellers provided

by Enbridge Gas. We spend the day together outside our day-to-day environment, which allows us to focus our attention on solving complex design issues informed by real-time energy modelling.

Q

How is the program different from simply bringing in consultants?

A: I think the difference is that the workshop is peer to peer. For example, a mechanical engineer with sustainability expertise may present new technologies and ideas to the project mechanical engineer in the room. It may be a technology that is new to the team or it may be something they were already considering and now have the support to bring forward. I love the collaborative aspect of the program.

Rewards for building above code After completing the workshop you’re eligible for additional incentives based on the performance of your building.

Energy simulation modelling incentive:

15,000

$

Earn incentives when you complete a pre-construction certified energy model that shows your building will be 15 percent above current code.

Commissioning incentive:

15,000

$ To get the most out of your next project, contact Mary Sye, Energy Solutions Advisor.

enbridgegas.com/savingsbydesign 416-420-9281 mary.sye@enbridge.com

Earn additional incentives by confirming your building is 15 percent above code with a post-construction certified energy model, performed by a professional modeller.

* Projected savings based on energy modelling simulations from the Savings by Design Integrated Design Process workshop. † This has no cash value. HST is not applicable and will not be added to incentive payments. Visit enbridgegas.com/savingsbydesign for details.

To qualify for the program your project must be located in the Enbridge Gas service area. If a participant doesn’t complete construction of a new commercial property in the Enbridge Gas service area that exceeds 15 percent of the OBC’s energy performance requirement within five years of completing the integrated design process workshop, they’re ineligible for performance incentives. During that time, builders are expected to design and construct at least one new construction building based on resulting recommendations. In order to receive incentive payments you must agree to all program terms and conditions, fully participate in all stages of the program and meet all program requirements. © 2022 Enbridge Gas Inc. All rights reserved. ENB 824 11/2022

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The competition-winning design for the new Montreal Holocaust Museum, by KPMB Architects + Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker Architecture.

ABOVE

PROJECTS Montreal Holocaust Museum reveals design

The Montreal Holocaust Museum has revealed the architectural design of its new downtown Museum, opening in 2025. Created by KPMB Architects + Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker Architecture with special advisors Robert Jan van Pelt and Sherry Simon, the winning design was selected following an international competition.

Based on the pillars of memory, education, and community, the new building will contain multiple exhibition spaces, classrooms, an auditorium, a memorial garden, and a dedicated survivor testimony room.

Construction on the new Museum will begin in the fall of 2023.

“Dedicated to the memory of populations that were victims of genocide, the Montreal Holocaust Museum gathers the most important Canadian collection of Holocaust artefacts and survivals’ testimonials, while celebrating the resilience of survivors and bearing a mission of educating future generations of citizens,” says juror Izabel Amaral, director of the Université de Montréal school of architecture.

“The jury made a unanimous choice of this proposal for its sobriety, elegance and its success in conveying a sense of respect and ceremony,” she continues. “It avoided reducing the building to a symbolic representation of the horrors of Holocaust, which included multiple experiences that cannot be condensed in the most known tragedies of the gas chambers.”

“The winning scheme will allow the exhibition to deploy its full potential and communicate the history of the Holocaust to the visitors, at the same time respecting the functionality of the spaces and providing views to an interior courtyard that will allow visitors moments of relief and contemplation during their visit. At the same time, the building integrates respectfully and intelligently to the urban conditions of Montreal’s main street, Boulevard Saint-Laurent,” says Amaral. www.museeholocauste.ca

Beaverbrook Art Gallery opens new addition

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Photo: Mendoza Photography

Beaverbrook Art Gallery, in Fredericton, NB, has recently reopened its doors with a new entry created to accommodate a range of events.

Designed by KPMB, the Harrison McCain Pavilion entry is a multi-functional lobby design that includes ticketing, membership and visitor services, a gift shop, café, and support spaces.

The pavilion is situated directly across from the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick. KPMB describes the “gentle curve” of the precast concrete façade as both a response to the existing urban condition and a welcoming and inviting gesture.

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NEWS

“The precast concrete façade piers are over eight metres in height and are angled radially to maximize views while providing the required solar shading,” says KPMB. The design accommodates the water level of the St. John River, which rises every spring. Taking this seasonal flooding into consideration, the project elevates the ground floor well above the floodplain. www.kpmb.com

WHAT’S NEW Housing Multitudes: Reimagining the Landscapes of Suburbia

The Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto has opened a new exhibition. Housing Multitudes: Reimagining the Landscapes of Suburbia examines common characteristics of the suburb to create a composite “big picture” of how the urbanism that characterizes many North American cities can be transformed for the greater benefit of all.

The exhibition’s experimental format includes films/animations, vast panoramas and maps, graphic novel-like stories, and models that have all been conceived to challenge received thinking about the suburbs.

The curators have purposely brought a degree of fiction to studies that have, in fact, been drawn from real sites and places as well as their histories, in order to engage new audiences and open questions about what the suburbs are and can become.

Housing Multitudes was conceived and curated by Richard Sommer and Michael Piper of the Daniels Faculty in collaboration with Faculty colleagues, students and staff. daniels.utoronto.ca

Prefabrication Perspectives: Architecture Off the Assembly Line

The UQAM Centre de design is opening an exhibition that examines the history of prefabrication in architecture, as it has evolved from the simple prefabrication of elements, to sophisticated industrialized building systems, to offsite construction driven by advanced digitalization.

The exhibition, curated by Carlo Carbone, includes four protoypes presented as scale models, along with a comparative analysis of key projects that examines the continuities and evolutions in manufacturing methodologies underlying prefabricated buildings and components.

Prefabrication Perspectives: Architecture Off the Assembly Line is on display from November 24 to January 22, 2023, and will include daylong conferences with industry and academic partners. uqam.ca

New Registrar for RAIC College of Fellows

Liza Medek, a planner of major projects and facilities at the University of Ottawa, has been elected by her peers as Registrar for the RAIC College of Fellows. She succeeds Claudio Brun del Re. The College of Fellows formally recognizes members and distinguished laypersons who have made outstanding contributions to the profession. Fellowship in the RAIC is an honour conferred on members singled out for their contribution to research, scholarship, public service or professional standing to the good of architecture in Canada, or elsewhere. raic.org

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IN MEMORIAM

Architect, planner, educator, and author Blanche Lemco van Ginkel was a leading figure in modern architecture for more than sixty years.

She died in Toronto on October 20, at the age of 98. She is survived by her two children, Brenda and Marc.

In 1957, Lemco van Ginkel and her husband, H.P. Daniel (Sandy) van Ginkel (1920–2009), co-founded in Montreal their architecture and planning practice, van Ginkel Associates, a firm that became known for bold, modernist design and a sensitive approach to urban planning.

With a steadfast focus on circulation, the firm campaigned for the conservation of historic districts, sustainable solutions, and pedestrianfriendly environments long before these concerns became popular.

Blanche Lemco was born in London, England, in 1923. At age thirteen, she moved with her mother and siblings to Montreal. Her father had been in the garment industry in England, where he owned a small factory, and both her parents were actively interested in the arts. At first, she favoured stage design as a profession, but owing to limited opportunities for theatre education in Montreal in the early 1940s, she chose to pursue architecture instead, drawn to its potential to change the world.

In 1940, she enrolled at McGill University with a scholarship. She was one of the first women students admitted to McGill’s School of Architecture, and in 1945 graduated with a Bachelor of Architecture and several prestigious student awards. She continued her education at Harvard University, obtaining a master’s degree in city planning in 1950.

After graduating from McGill University, Blanche Lemco worked in municipal planning in Windsor, Quebec (1945), and in Regina,

COURTESY BRENDA VAN GINKEL

Blanche Lemco van Ginkel, 1923-2022

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Saskatchewan (1946); in architecture for William Crabtree in London (1947); for Le Corbusier in Paris (1948); and for Mayerovitch and Bernstein in Montreal (1950–51). While working in Le Corbusier’s atelier, one of her projects was the rooftop terrace of the Unité d’Habitation in Marseilles, France, in particular the two iconic concrete ventilator stacks and the nursery. She recalled the experience with humour and clarity nearly seventy years later: “I designed the form of the ventilators (which appeared on initial sketches as a single column), proposing a trefoil plan because I was told by the engineers that there were three extractor fans. When I showed this to Le Corbusier, explaining my proposal, he said. ‘You

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young people are such purists.” I refrained from saying, ‘Where do you think we learned that?’ However, my initial drawing proposed that the ventilators be modestly splayed, which would have been more descriptive of exhaling.”

The design for the rooftop, modelled on a town square, made use of van Ginkel’s urban design education: “I designed the children’s play area and the high parapet around the running track/edge of the roof.

The idea was that the roof was like the square of a small town, with its usual facilities, and that one saw the Alpes Maritimes in the distance as one would over the house roofs. This is why the parapet is relatively high.” In Le Corbusier’s office, she met several influential architects and planners, including Georges Candilis, Shadrach Woods, Jerzy Soltan, and André Wogenscky, an experience that informed her later involvement in the Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne (CIAM).

In 1951, Blanche Lemco moved to Philadelphia, where she practised architecture and taught at the University of Pennsylvania. There, with her colleagues Siasia Nowicki and Robert Geddes, she initiated the Philadelphia CIAM Group for Architectural Investigation (GAI).

Lemco van Ginkel represented the group at CIAM 9 Aix-en-Provence in 1953 and at CIAM 10 Dubrovnik in 1956.

From 1951 to 1957, Lemco van Ginkel taught at the University of Pennsylvania, where she, Nowicki, and Geddes were the first fulltime appointments made by G. Holmes Perkins, Dean of the School of Fine Arts. She taught at the Graduate School of Design (GSD) at Harvard University in 1958, 1971, and 1975 with GSD Dean Josep Lluis Sert. In Montreal, she developed the first courses in urban design at the Université de Montréal (1961–67 and 1969–70) and at McGill University (1971–77). Van Ginkel joined the faculty of the University of Toronto in 1977 after a tumultuous chapter in its history, becoming Dean of the School of Architecture (later the Faculty of Architecture and Landscape Architecture), and continuing to teach there until 1993. For four decades, she was active in architecture education organizations across North America, serving on accreditation committees and on the board of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA), and was president of the ACSA in 1986–87.

Lemco van Ginkel’s career is closely linked to that of her husband, Sandy (H.P.D.) van Ginkel, whom she met in 1953 at CIAM 9 in Aixen-Provence, where they were both involved in the early discussions that would lead to the formation of Team 10. They married in 1956, and in 1957, they formed a professional partnership, van Ginkel Associates, opening an office at 4270 Western Avenue (now Boulevard de Maisonneuve) in Montreal. The practice operated in Winnipeg from 1966 to 1968, when it moved back to Montreal, then to Toronto in 1977.

Her architecture and urban planning are marked by a deep social purpose and a desire to produce comfortable modern environments, emphasizing cultural and collective values. As she has stated, “Architecture is a cultural pursuit and those who practice it, or are allowed to practice it, reflect our culture, our mores, our attitudes, in Canada as elsewhere.”

Drawn to urban planning by its new ideas, Lemco van Ginkel imagined that it might be more open to women. Her collaborations with Sandy van Ginkel on architecture and urban planning projects manifest an early interest and expertise in designing for urban traffic patterns.

The van Ginkels are credited with saving Old Montreal, which is now one of North America’s most successful heritage districts, by running an urban expressway under the neighborhood rather than following the original plan of building it at ground level and demolishing its historic buildings. The success of that project led to the founding of urban planning as a profession in Canada, when she co-authored legislation for the first Quebec Provincial Planning Commission in 1963–67. The firm’s other major projects include the design of Bowring Park in St. John’s (1958– 65), which they presented at the last

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CIAM conference in Otterlo, Holland, in 1959; the vision and prelimin-

ary plan in 1962 for Montreal’s Expo 67; the protection of Montreal’s Mount Royal, saving a larger area of it from development; and a study of urban circulation in Midtown Manhattan in 1970–72.

The van Ginkels’ emphasis on pedestrian movement and on public transportation anticipated the environmental movement by at least a decade. A particularly interesting outcome of the work commissioned by the City of New York was the Ginkelvan, a hybrid-electric minibus designed to alleviate congestion in the core of the United States’ largest city. Later purchased by the city of Vail, Colorado, its bright orange colour referenced modernism’s bold hues, as well as the pop sensibilities of the era.

Film and filmmaking were especially important in Lemco van Ginkel’s career: she frequently used film and exhibitions to communicate research results and design ideas. During World War II, she worked at the National Film Board of Canada; and while living in Philadelphia in the 1950s, she scripted the film It Can Be Done, commissioned by the U.S. State Department. In 1956, she presented it at the International Federation of Housing and Town Planning Congress in Vienna, where it won the Grand Prix for Film. In 1960, she was consultant to the National Film Board and appeared in the film Suburban Living. During the 1960s, she was involved in organizing the Montreal International Film Festival and the Winnipeg Film Society.

Lemco van Ginkel is a giant among modernist planners of the 1960s.

She achieved a number of firsts (or near firsts) as a woman in the architecture profession: She was the first woman to serve as a Dean of an architecture school in North America; the first woman to be elected a Fellow of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC); the first Canadian and first woman to be elected President of the ACSA; the first woman to teach at the University of Pennsylvania (with Siasia Nowicki); the first woman elected to the council of the Town Planning Institute of Canada; and the first woman architect elected as a Member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. She also helped disseminate information about the history of Canadian women architects through her published articles and speaking engagements on the topic. She was open about her own experiences, as, for example, when she attributed the rarity of women students in Canada in the 1940s “to the social climate of Quebec, where my mother could not sign a contract and where women were disenfranchised until 1940.” In 1986, she co-curated an important exhibition, For the Record: Ontario Women Graduates in Architecture, 1920–60, at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Architecture and Landscape Architecture; the records of that exhibition were donated to Virginia Tech’s International Archive of Women in Architecture (established 1985).

Lemco van Ginkel received the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2012, and was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Science by McGill University in 2014. She won the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada’s Gold Medal in 2020. Lemco van Ginkel’s life and work was featured in the 2018 documentary film City Dreamers and was honoured in the 2020 symposium “For Her Record: Notes on the Work of Blanche Lemco van Ginkel.”

Van Ginkel had a quick wit and a sharp intellect and was also quick to point to women’s accomplishments as architects as more significant than their gender; as she said in 1991, “Numbers are not all, and distinction in the profession is more important.”

—Annmarie Adams and Tanya Southcott, adapted from an article originally prepared

for the Beverley Willis Foundation’s Pioneering Women of American Architecture site, co-edited by Victoria Rosner and Mary McLeod.

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Savings by Design | Affordable Housing

Building for affordability — “Financial benefits of the Savings by Design program—capital incentives and reduced operating costs through energy efficiency—have helped our project achieve its high affordability levels.”

Gord Szaszi, Project Manager, Housing Development

Success Story | Niagara

By the numbers* (reference to the Ontario Building Code)

While designing two new apartment buildings, Niagara Regional Housing collaborated with sustainable building experts from the Savings by Design program to optimize energy performance, build better than code and earn financial incentives.†

Niagara Regional Housing Intensification Project — 6388 Hawkins St.

7180 Heximer Ave.

21.0%

18.2%

Projected annual energy savings

Projected annual energy savings

29.9%

29,178 kg CO e 23.3%

9,273 kg CO e

Projected annual natural gas savings

Projected annual GHG reduction

Projected annual GHG reduction

2

Projected annual natural gas savings

2

Visit enbridgegas.com/SBD-affordable to get the most out of your next project. * Projected GHG reduction, projected annual energy savings and projected annual natural gas savings are in reference to the Ontario Building Code. † HST is not applicable and will not be added to incentive payments. Terms and conditions apply. Visit enbridgegas.com/SBD-affordable for details. To be eligible for the Savings by Design Affordable Housing program, projects must be located in the former Enbridge Gas Distribution service area. © 2022 Enbridge Gas Inc. All rights reserved. ENB 823 11/2022

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13 Briefs En bref RAIC Inaugural Showcase Series The RAIC has launched its inaugural Showcase series, a collaboration between the RAIC Continuing Education and Honours and Awards programs.

The series ran from September to November 2022, and showcased a variety of projects and practices receiving recognition today, as well as the people, motivations, and ideas behind them. The series featured case-study presentations and Q&As.

Nouvelle série de l’IRAC sur les projets primés L’IRAC a lancé sa première série Projets primés, une collaboration entre ses programmes de formation continue et de prix et distinctions. La série, présentée de septembre à novembre 2022, a mis en lumière des projets et des firmes remarquables qui sont reconnus aujourd’hui, ainsi que les personnes qui les ont réalisés et les motivations et les idées qui les ont animées. Les séances comprenaient des présentations de projets et une période de questions.

RAIC Climate Action Engagement + Enablement Plan The RAIC Climate Action Engagement + Enablement Plan (CAEEP) Steering Committee is actively engaging the inter-professional community in a collaborative and meaningful process to amplify and accelerate climate action by the architectural community and within the built environment sector. The committee is supported by three working groups comprised of over 30 volunteers, who together are developing a shared vision to inspire transformation as it relates to climate action.

Plan d’habilitation Le Comité directeur sur le Plan d’engagement et d’habilitation en matière d’action climatique de l’IRAC (PEHAC) engage activement la communauté interprofessionnelle dans un processus collaboratif et significatif visant à amplifier et à accélérer l’action climatique au sein de la communauté architecturale et du secteur de l’environnement bâti. Trois groupes de travail comprenant plus de 30 bénévoles apportent leur soutien à ce Comité directeur pour élaborer ensemble une vision commune qui favorise la mobilisation et incite à la transition dans l’action climatique.

The RAIC is the leading voice for excellence in the built environment in Canada, demonstrating how design enhances the quality of life, while addressing important issues of society through responsible architecture. www.raic.org L’IRAC est le principal porte-parole en faveur de l’excellence du cadre bâti au Canada. Il démontre comment la conception améliore la qualité de vie tout en tenant compte d’importants enjeux sociétaux par la voie d’une architecture responsable. www.raic.org/fr

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RAIC Journal Journal de l’IRAC RAIC Digital Contracts are designed to be clear, easy to understand, and most importantly, to save you time.

Confidential contracts are tailored to protect professionals and their clients. Use the RAIC Digital Contracts platform to complete, issue and manage your contracts and professional services with your clients simply and efficiently.

Les contrats numériques de l’IRAC sont conçus pour être clairs, faciles à comprendre et surtout, pour vous faire gagner du temps. Les contrats confidentiels protègent les professionnels et leurs clients. Vous pourrez utiliser la plateforme de contrats numériques de l’IRAC pour remplir, émettre et gérer vos contrats et vos services professionnels avec vos clients de manière simple et efficace.

Reconciliation with Canada’s Indigenous Peoples Réconciliation avec les peuples autochtones du Canada Giovanna Boniface Chief Implementation Officer Cheffe de la mise en œuvre

With the launch of the new strategic plan in early 2022, the RAIC made a commitment to building, rebuilding and strengthening their relationship with Indigenous peoples. In early 2022, the RAIC sponsored a proposal to the International Union of Architects (UIA) to develop the UIA Indigenous Peoples Work Programme (UIA-IPG). The work program was approved, and the RAIC will act as the Secretariat for the newly formed group. The purpose of the UIA-IPG is to provide the UIA and the global architectural community with the requisite Indigenous knowledges, skills, and resources from an architectural standpoint, and to foster and promote the value of Indigenous design and architecture based on Indigenous knowledges globally.

En lançant son nouveau plan stratégique au début de 2022, l’IRAC s’est engagé à bâtir, rebâtir et renforcer sa relation avec les peuples autochtones. Au début de 2022, l’IRAC a parrainé une proposition à l’Union internationale des architectes (UIA) visant à créer un Programme de travail Peuples autochtones (PTPA). Ce Programme a été approuvé et l’IRAC assumera le secrétariat pour le groupe nouvellement formé. L’objectif du PTPA est d’offrir à l’UIA et à la communauté architecturale mondiale les connaissances, les compétences et les ressources autochtones nécessaires d’un point de vue architectural et de favoriser et promouvoir la valeur du design et de l’architecture autochtones fondés sur des connaissances autochtones, partout dans le monde.

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2022 RAIC International Prize Winner Lauréat du Prix international de l’IRAC de 2022 Designed by Talmon Biran Architecture Studio, Woodpile’s firewood walls are used to feed a campfire within the shelter.

Noa Biran and Roy Talmon

Conçus par le Talmon Biran Architecture Studio, les murs en cordes de bois de foyer sont utilisés pour alimenter un feu de camp à l’intérieur de l’abri.

The Royal Architectural Institute of Canada is pleased to announce that the 2022 RAIC International Prize goes to The Warming Huts, Winnipeg, Manitoba. The architect is Sputnik Architecture Inc., Winnipeg, leader of a consulting team that includes Engineers Crosier, Kilgour & Partners, Specialist Consultant Luca Roncoroni, the Forks Renewal Corporation, and a host of other collaborators.

The Warming Huts are the product of a recurring exercise in design and construction that takes place on the frozen rivers of Winnipeg every winter. Playful but significant as works of architecture, they have been created over more than a decade with the support of hundreds of collaborators, both local and international. Conceived, coordinated and often constructed by members of Sputnik Architecture, the Warming Huts are episodic and transformative, linking parts of a city divided by waterways, creating spaces of encounter and exchange, and reconnecting citizens to healthy lifestyles and the history of place. It is a wondrous celebration of winter that engages Winnipeg’s design community and draws the eyes of the world to a small city punching

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above its weight in its commitment to placemaking and city-building.

Sputnik Architecture conceived the project in 2009 to spark public use of sites in and around the confluence of Winnipeg’s Red and Assiniboine Rivers. Known for centuries as Nistawayak, the area is most often referred to as the Forks, a National Historical Site and a key cultural development on a former railyard.

Once central to community life, these rivers were roadways and sources of sustenance for thousands of years before Europeans arrived. In the early 20th century, they were a regular site of daily activity in the form of ice chutes, skating rinks, ice-harvesting areas and festivals. A key intention of the Warming Huts is to connect citizens with this past as well as to the urban potential of these spaces today. The project provides shelter on the rivers that creates spaces to connect with others, and excites the imagination.

Each year, the Forks Renewal Corporation and Sputnik Architecture organize an international design competition to select three

new huts from nearly two hundred entries.

One more hut is designed and built with students from the University of Manitoba’s Faculty of Architecture, and another hut with a local secondary school or training program. While collaborating on these huts, students and members of the community learn about the conception and craft involved in creating the architecture of public space.

In addition, a prominent creator—from fields as diverse as architecture, filmmaking, and music—is invited to collaborate with Sputnik on design and construction of a hut of their own.

Urban space and the role of architecture in it become a subject of conversation every year.

The design competition and invited artist program grab the public imagination—as well as garnering international attention— drawing eyes to a previously neglected urban site. There are many kinds of huts— from a pine-bough shelter to a curling, brilliantly coloured skating path—but all are assembled and placed with a specific urban intention to connect parts of the city that are usually divided by water.

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1 Sputnik Architecture’s Peter Hargraves worked with University of Manitoba students and professor Lancelot Coar to design and build Pavilion Sub-Zero, a 750seat venue to house performances by invited guest composer Terje Isungset.

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1 Peter Hargraves de Sputnik Architecture a collaboré avec des étudiants et le professeur Lancelot Coar de l’Université du Manitoba pour concevoir et bâtir le Pavillon SubZero, une installation de 750 places pour accueillir des spectacles du compositeur invité Terje Isungset.

The Forks Renewal Corporation

2 A night performance at Pavilion Sub-Zero.

L’Institut royal d’architecture du Canada (IRAC) a le plaisir d’annoncer que le Prix international de l’IRAC 2022 sera attribué au projet Les huttes pour se réchauffer (The Warming Huts) à Winnipeg, au Manitoba. La firme Sputnik Architecture Inc. de Winnipeg, est à la tête d’une équipe d’experts-conseils formée des firmes Engineers Crosier, Kilgour & Partners, Specialist Consultant Luca Roncoroni, la Forks Renewal Corporation et de plusieurs autres collaborateurs.

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Résultat d’un exercice de conception et de construction récurrent, les huttes pour se réchauffer sont installées chaque hiver sur les rivières gelées de Winnipeg. Ludiques, tout en étant des réalisations architecturales d’importance, elles ont été créées pendant plus de dix ans avec le soutien de centaines de collaborateurs locaux et internationaux.

Conçues, coordonnées et souvent construites par les membres de Sputnik Architecture, les huttes pour se réchauffer ont un caractère épisodique et transformateur. Elles relient

2 Un spectacle nocturne au Pavillon SubZero.

3 Open Border, designed by Rotterdam-based Atelier ARI, creates a permeable barrier that interrupts the snowy white landscape.

3 Open Border, conçu par l’Atelier ARI de Rotterdam, crée une barrière perméable qui interrompt la blancheur du paysage enneigé.

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The Forks Renewal Corporation

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des parties d’une ville divisée par des rivières, elles créent des espaces de rencontre et d’échange et elles permettent aux citoyens de renouer avec des modes de vie sains et l’histoire du lieu. Ces huttes sont une merveilleuse célébration de l’hiver qui mobilise la communauté du design de Winnipeg et attire les regards du monde entier sur une petite ville qui joue dans la cour des grands et qui se distingue par son engagement à créer des lieux et à bâtir la ville.

Le projet des huttes pour se réchauffer a été conçu par Sputnik Architecture en 2009 pour inciter le public à utiliser les sites situés au confluent des rivières Rouge et Assiniboine de Winnipeg. Connue depuis des siècles sous le nom de Nistawayak, la région est généralement appelée la Fourche, un lieu historique national et un développement culturel d’importance sur une ancienne gare de triage ferroviaire.

Autrefois au cœur de la vie communautaire, ces rivières ont servi de voies de transport et des sources de subsistance pendant des milliers d’années avant l’arrivée des Européens. Au début du 20e siècle, elles ont été un lieu d’activités quotidiennes et les gens s’y rendaient pour voir les chutes de glace, patiner, tailler des cubes de glace et festoyer.

Les huttes pour se réchauffer ont notamment

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1 For the inaugural edition of Warming Huts in 2010, Sputnik Architecture and artist Jon Pylypchuk designed Carcass, a hut inspired by the old barns found throughout Manitoba.

Kristin Koncan

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A sculpture created for the International Prize by Canadian designer Wei Yew will be presented to the winners in the RAIC Celebration of Excellence, an awards ceremony and gala that will take place in May 2023 during the RAIC Conference on Architecture in Calgary, AB.

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2 Seen from above, Robert B. Trempe Jr.’s Shelterbelt reimagines the qualities of planted windbreaks with hundreds of steel rebar “stalks.”

2 Vu d’en haut, le projet Shelterbelt de Robert B. Trempe Jr. réinvente les haies brise-vent avec des centaines de « barres » d’acier d’armature.

Robert B Trempe Jr.

The huts require craft and care in making. They are reused year after year and up to thirty huts are assembled on the frozen rivers each winter. They form an episodic but ultimately permanent architecture, echoing ancient forms like market or temple complexes. Like those, they are transformative: linking parts of a divided city; reconnecting citizens with healthy lifestyles and spirit of place; creating spaces of encounter and exchange; and drawing the eyes of the world to a creative little city in the middle of the Prairies.

The 2022 RAIC International Prize represents the fourth edition of the Prize, established in 2013 by Canadian architect Raymond Moriyama in collaboration with the RAIC and the RAIC Foundation. The jury for the 2022 RAIC International Prize included Susan Ruptash (FRAIC), Farida Abu-Bakare (MRAIC), Amale Andraos (Hon. FRAIC), Peter Busby (FRAIC), WH Vivian Lee, Diarmuid Nash (PP/FRAIC), Sasa Radulovic (FRAIC), Talbot Sweetapple (FRAIC), and Alfred Waugh (MRAIC).

1 Pour la première édition des Huttes pour se réchauffer, en 2010, Sputnik Architecture et l’artiste Jon Pylypchuk ont conçu Carcass, un abri inspiré des vieilles granges du Manitoba.

pour but de relier les citoyens à ce passé et au potentiel urbain actuel de ces espaces.

Le projet consiste à créer des huttes sur les rivières, qui favorisent les contacts et stimulent l’imagination.

Chaque année, la Forks Renewal Corporation et Sputnik Architecture organisent un concours international de design pour sélectionner trois nouvelles huttes parmi les

quelque deux cents candidatures reçues.

L’une d’entre elles est conçue et construite avec des étudiants de la faculté d’archi­ tecture de l’Université du Manitoba, et une autre, avec ceux d’une école secondaire ou un programme de formation local. En collaborant à ces projets, les étudiants et les membres de la communauté se sensibilisent à la conception et à la création de l’architecture d’un espace public.

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De plus, un créateur éminent – issu de domaines aussi diversifiés que l’architecture, la réalisation cinématographique et la musique – est invité à collaborer avec Sputnik à la conception et à la construction de sa propre hutte.

Ainsi, on a chaque année une occasion de discuter de l’espace urbain et du rôle de l’architecture en ce domaine. Le concours de design et le programme d’artiste invité frappent l’imagination du public – et attirent l’attention internationale – en posant le regard sur un site urbain auparavant négligé. Les huttes sont différentes les unes des autres.

Elles peuvent prendre la forme d’un abri en pin ou d’une patinoire sinueuse et brillamment colorée – mais toutes sont assemblées et placées avec une intention urbaine spécifique de relier des parties de la ville qui sont habituellement divisées par les cours d’eau.

d’échange; et elles attirent le regard du monde sur une petite ville créative au milieu des prairies.

Le Prix international de l’IRAC en est à sa quatrième édition en 2022. Il a été créé en 2013 par l’architecte canadien Raymond Moriyama en collaboration avec l’IRAC et la Fondation de l’IRAC et portait à l’origine le nom de Prix international Moriyama IRAC. Le jury du Prix international de l’IRAC 2022 était composé de Susan Ruptash (FRAIC),

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Farida Abu-Bakare (MRAIC), Amale Andraos (Hon. FRAIC), Peter Busby (FRAIC), WH Vivian Lee, Diarmuid Nash (PP/FRAIC), Sasa Radulovic (FRAIC), Talbot Sweetapple (FRAIC), et Alfred Waugh (MRAIC).

Une sculpture créée pour le Prix international par le designer canadien Wei Yew sera remise aux lauréats lors de la Célébration de l’excellence de l’IRAC, une cérémonie de remise de prix et gala qui aura lieu en mai 2023, pendant la Conférence sur l’architec­ ture de l’IRAC, à Calgary, en Alberta.

1 Anish Kapoor’s Stackhouse installation was put on hold due to a mid-winter thaw. Warming Huts have become an indicator of another key global concern: climate change.

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Luca Roncoroni

Les huttes doivent être fabriquées avec soin, car elles sont réutilisées année après année.

Jusqu’à trente huttes sont assemblées sur les rivières gelées chaque hiver. Elles forment une architecture épisodique, mais tout de même permanente, faisant écho à des formes anciennes, comme des complexes de marchés ou des temples. Comme ceuxci, elles sont transformatrices : elles relient des parties d’une ville divisée; elles incitent les citoyens à adopter des modes de vie sains et à se reconnecter à l’esprit des lieux; elles créent des lieux de rencontre et

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1 L’installation de la Stackhouse d’Anish Kapoor a été suspendue en raison d’un dégel au milieu de l’hiver. Les huttes pour se réchauffer sont devenues un indicateur d’un autre problème mondial d’importance : le changement climatique.

2 Warming Huts trail map, showing installations active in 2018.

Sputnik Architecture

2 Carte des sentiers des Huttes pour se réchauffer illustrant les installations actives en 2018.

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RAIC International Prize Scholarships Santa Cruz, this compassionate tale Bourses étudiantes du Prix international Missão illuminates the epic struggles faced by displaced populations seeking spatial expresde l’IRAC sion and agency in their new cities.

In conjunction with the RAIC International Prize, three RAIC International Prize Scholarships of $5,000 and three Certificates of Merit were awarded to students in Canadian schools of architecture on the basis of a written essay exploring the question “How can architecture be transformative?”.

Lewis Canning of Dalhousie University, Fabio Lima of the Université de Montréal, and Jesse Martyn of the University of British Columbia have each won a $5,000 scholarship for their winning essays.

The jury awarded Certificates of Merit to Jerry Chow of Carleton University, Jasmine McRorie of the University of Waterloo, and Saba Mirhosseini of the University of Manitoba.

Jury members included Lisa Landrum (FRAIC), Paul Fast (MRAIC), Odile Hénault, Veronica Madonna (FRAIC), Obinna Ogunedo, Gilles Prud’homme (MIRAC), and Patrick Stewart (MRAIC).

“The many excellent essays on architecture’s transformative potential made the jury’s job challenging yet rewarding,” writes Jury Chair Lisa Landrum. “Every submission shared compelling visions and convictions, some with poetic nuance and allusion, others with zeal and grit. All expressed tremendous hope and an urgent sense of responsibility.

It is heartening to witness so many emerging professionals caring so deeply for how architecture impacts society and the planet. Collectively, the 75 submissions represent a diverse and powerful force bringing change to the future of architecture.”

Scholarship Winners Lewis Canning’s essay, entitled “Transformative vs. Supportive: The Case for Economics in Architecture,” argues against top-down, quick-fix developments, which often disrupt and destroy neighbourhoods of marginalized populations. To resist, this paper urges architects to seize big-picture economics not as an obstacle but as a design tool to lift small-market economies, empower local communities, ameliorate inequalities, and foster cultural resiliency.

As Canning writes: “[I]t’s time for architects to stop looking to be transformative...

Instead, they should be asking how their designs can culturally and economically support their communities in the present, and for future generations.”

Jury comment: Timely and critical. This text expresses well the current struggle in architecture between the false hope that architecture alone can transform communities and the power of finance-driven capitalism.

It highlights the need to respond holistically to economic challenges of local communities—whether for the north side of Vancouver’s False Creek, or any Canadian city.

“Espaces latéraux” (Lateral Spaces)

by Fabio Lima, offers a moving portrait of Montreal’s Portuguese community in the 1960s and 70s. In contrast to the city’s megastructure endeavours, such as Expo 67 and the subway system, “Lateral Spaces” shows the transformative potential of modest buildings to create a truly radical “architecture of gathering” (architecture du rassemblement). Centred on Montreal’s

As Lima writes: “Architecture therefore becomes the vehicle of self-determination…

Like good stories shared around a fire, architecture as a unifying space becomes the guarantor for the preservation of stories on the margins of the dominant narrative curve.”

Jury Comment: Gentle and convincing. This poetic thesis on Portuguese culture in Montreal conveys a sincere sensibility about cultural and spatial invisibility, and the power of even modest architecture to bring people together. Its provocation: good architecture is activated by community!

In “A Thinkbelt Continuum,” Jesse Martyn builds a rousing argument for a mind-bending “anticipatory” architecture of big ideas— which may come in small packages. With a montage of personal reflections, historical anecdotes, cinematographic references, and examples of insurgent Canadian architectural practices, the essay opposes assembly-line Fordism to manifesto-driven speculation. The narrative reveals the potential of imaginative architecture to expand boundaries, embrace tensions, and provoke change.

As Martyn writes, “[A]rchitects shape society through both buildings and speculative ideas… sometimes one’s conviction to disrupt an industry that’s notoriously resistant to change can be powerful enough to spark transformation.

Jury Comment: Thought-provoking, lively, and ambitious. This submission stands out for its compelling breadth of subject matter as well as for its uniquely engaging graphic presentation. Reading the essay is itself a transformative experience.

Lewis Canning’s winning essay looks critically at designing for communities.

Dans son texte primé, Lewis Canning jette un regard critique sur la conception pour les collectivités.

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In his winning text, Fabio Lima writes about Montreal’s Portuguese community.

Dans son texte primé, Fabio Lima écrit sur la communauté portugaise de Montréal.

En plus du Prix international de l’IRAC, trois bourses étudiantes du Prix international de l’IRAC d’un montant de 5 000 $ chacune et trois certificats de mérite ont été décernés à des étudiants d’écoles d’architecture canadiennes pour la rédaction d’un texte tentant de répondre à la question suivante : « Comment l’architecture peut-elle être transformatrice? » Lewis Canning de l’Université Dalhousie, Fabio Lima de l’Université de Montréal et Jesse Martyn de l’Université de la Colombie-Britannique ont remporté chacun une bourse d’études de 5 000 $, leurs essais ayant été primés par le jury.

Le jury a également attribué des certificats de mérite à Jerry Chow de l’Université Carleton, Jasmine McRorie de l’Université de Waterloo et Saba Mirhosseini de l’Université du Manitoba.

Le jury était formé de Lisa Landrum (FRAIC), Paul Fast (MRAIC), Odile Hénault, Veronica Madonna (FRAIC), Obinna Ogunedo, Gilles Prud’homme (MIRAC) et Patrick Stewart (MRAIC).

La présidente du jury, Lise Landrum, a bien exprimé les sentiments de toutes les personnes qui ont participé à cet exercice : « L’excellence des nombreux essais sur le potentiel transformateur de l’architecture a rendu la tâche du jury à la fois difficile et gratifiante. Tous les textes ont communiqué des visions et des convictions éloquentes, parfois avec certaines nuances et allusions poétiques, parfois avec zèle et courage. Tous ont exprimé un immense espoir et un sens urgent de la responsabilité. Il est encourageant de voir autant de professionnels émergents se soucier avec une telle ardeur des impacts de l’architecture sur la société et la planète. Collectivement, les 75 candidatures reçues représentent une force

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diversifiée et puissante, porteuse de changement pour l’avenir de l’architecture. »

Scholarship Winners Le texte de Lewis Canning, intitulé « Architecture transformatrice ou de soutien : Les arguments en faveur de l’économie en architecture » dénonce les solutions d’aménagement rapides et sans consultation qui ont souvent pour conséquence de perturber et de détruire les quartiers de populations marginalisées. Pour résister à cette tendance, l’auteur invite les architectes à considérer les facteurs économiques non pas comme des obstacles, mais comme un outil de conception pour renforcer les petites économies de marché, autonomiser les collectivités locales, réduire les inégalités et favoriser la résilience culturelle. Comme il l’écrit : « Il est temps que les architectes cessent de chercher à être transformateurs … Ils devraient plutôt se demander comment leurs conceptions peuvent soutenir culturellement et économiquement leurs communautés dans le présent et pour les générations futures. »

Commentaire du jury: Timely and critical.

This text expresses well the current struggle in architecture between the false hope that architecture alone can transform communities and the power of finance-driven capitalism. It highlights the need to respond holistically to economic challenges of local communities – whether for the north side of Vancouver’s False Creek, or any Canadian city.

Fabio Lima, dans son texte intitulé « Espaces latéraux », offre un portrait touchant de la communauté portugaise de Montréal dans les années 1960 et 1970. Contrairement aux mégastructures de la ville, comme l’Expo 67 et le métro, « Espaces latéraux » montre le potentiel transformateur de bâtiments

modestes pour créer une « architecture de rassemblement » réelle. Centré sur la Missão Santa Cruz de Montréal, ce texte plein de compassion met en lumière les luttes épiques auxquelles sont confrontées les populations déplacées à la recherche d’une expression spatiale dans leurs nouvelles villes. Comme il l’écrit : « L’architecture devient dès lors le véhicule d’une autodétermination… À l’image des bonnes histoires partagées autour d’un feu, l’architecture comme espace fédérateur devient garante de la préservation des récits en marge de la courbe narrative dominante. » Commentaire du jury: D’une grande douceur et convaincant. Ce texte poétique sur la culture portugaise de Montréal exprime une sensibilité sincère sur l’invisibilité culturelle et spatiale et sur le pouvoir d’une architecture modeste de rassembler les gens.

Sa provocation : la bonne architecture est activée par une collectivité!

Dans son texte intitulé « Dans la continuité de Thinkbelt… », Jesse Martyn présente un plaidoyer enthousiaste en faveur d’une architecture « anticipative » étonnante – qui peut se présenter dans de petits emballages. Avec un montage de réflexions personnelles, d’anecdotes historiques, de références cinématographiques et de pratiques architecturales canadiennes rebelles, il oppose le fordisme des chaînes de montage à la spéculation dictée par les manifestes. Le texte révèle le potentiel de l’architecture imaginative pour repousser les limites, accepter les tensions et provoquer le changement.

Comme il l’écrit, « Les architectes façonnent la société par leurs bâtiments et leurs idées spéculatives …Parfois, la conviction de perturber une industrie notoirement résistante au changement peut être suffisamment puissante pour provoquer une transformation. »

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Jesse Martyn’s winning essay explores an “anticipatory” architecture of big ideas.

Dans son texte primé, Jesse Martyn explore une architecture « anticipatoire » de grandes idées.

Certificates of Merit Composed as a letter from an old friend, Jerry Chow’s “Dear Building 22,” offers a clever and insightful reflection on the imperfect yet profoundly impactful architecture school where he studied at Carleton University.

of flux and stability along the “fluid cosmos” of Tehran’s Lalehzar Street.

As Mirhosseini writes, “the most vital point in the city can become the beating heart of the town… For me, Lalehzar Street in Tehran, Iran is exemplary… every location of this street has told a new story in dialogue with times.”

As Chow writes, “Building 22… I think you changed my life. And not just mine, but also the lives of many other former and future students… you too are an imperfect work of architecture, but perhaps that is why I have found the mark you have left on my life to be so indelible.”

Jury Comment: Compelling narrative and great graphics! The essay reveals time and socio-political context to be crucial agents of transformation and celebrates the codependence of change.

Jury Comment: Creative and personal, the text speaks poetically of the self-transformation of an architecture student as much as the transformative effect of architecture.

Commentaire du jury: Suscite la réflexion, dynamique et ambitieux. Cet essai se distingue par l’étendue de son sujet et par sa présentation graphique unique et engageante. La lecture du texte est en soi une expérience transformatrice.

Jasmine McRorie’s essay, “My Neighbourhood is Normal,” tells a story of the 120-year-old Normal School building in London, Ontario, and of the tenacious community-engaged process of preserving its heritage and the beautifully normal life its architecture supported.

As McRorie writes, “This old, abandoned building transformed into a community space because the neighbourhood never gave up on it. This is not a one-off miracle story, many communities have started to reclaim their history… After all, my community is just like any other. My neighbourhood is normal.”

Jury Comment: Well written and researched, the narrative carries the reader along with a powerful portrayal of what’s possible when a community works together.

With compelling verbal and visual analysis, Saba Mirhosseini’s essay, “Transformative Architecture,” traces the long history

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Certificats de Mérite Composé sous forme de lettre à un vieil ami, le texte de Jerry Chow, « Cher bâtiment 22, » offre une réflexion intelligente et judicieuse sur le bâtiment abritant l’école d’architecture qui a eu un impact vraiment important sur lui, malgré toutes ses imperfections, alors qu’il étudiait à l’Université Carleton.

Il écrit; « Bâtiment 22… je pense que tu as changé ma vie. Et pas seulement la mienne, mais aussi celle de nombreux autres anciens et futurs étudiants… toi aussi tu es une œuvre d’architecture imparfaite, mais c’est peut-être pour cela que tu as laissé une marque aussi indélébile dans ma vie. » Commentaire du jury: Créatif et personnel, le texte évoque poétiquement l’auto-transformation d’un étudiant en architecture ainsi que l’effet transformateur de l’architecture.

Dans son essai intitulé « Mon quartier est normal », Jasmine McRorie raconte l’histoire du bâtiment de 120 ans qui a abrité l’école normale à London, en Ontario et parle de la ténacité de la communauté qui s’est fortement impliquée pour préserver son patrimoine et la belle vie normale favorisée par son architecture.

Comme elle l’écrit : « Ce vieux bâtiment abandonné s’est transformé en un espace communautaire parce que le quartier ne l’a jamais abandonné. Ce n’est pas un miracle unique, de nombreuses communautés ont commencé à se réapproprier leur histoire ... Après tout, ma communauté est simplement comme toutes les autres.

Mon quartier est normal. » Commentaire du jury: Bien écrit et bien documenté, le texte plonge le lecteur dans un puissant portrait de ce que peut obtenir une communauté qui se mobilise dans un même objectif.

Avec une analyse verbale et visuelle convaincante, Saba Mirhosseini, dans son essai intitulé « Architecture transformatrice », trace la longue histoire de flux et de stabilité le long du « cosmos fluide » de la rue Lalehzar à Téhéran.

Elle écrit : « Le point le plus vital de la ville peut devenir le cœur battant de la ville…

Pour moi, la rue Lalehzar à Téhéran, en Iran, est exemplaire… chaque adresse de cette rue a raconté une nouvelle histoire en dialogue avec le temps. » Commentaire du jury: Texte éloquent et bien illustré! L’auteure révèle que le temps et le contexte sociopolitique sont des agents cruciaux de la transformation et célèbre la codépendance du changement et de la persistance.

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HOUSE OF CARD TEXT

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Peter Sealy Thomas Demand

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A blue blanket, white sheet, and two wrinkled pillows cover a bed in the corner of a room lit by a single, wall-mounted light. An electrical socket provides relief on the room’s mauve-coloured walls. A fundamental banality resounds from the image: this could be anywhere and that is the point.

As with many works by the German artist Thomas Demand, Refuge II (2021) hovers between seemingly opposite registers. It depicts an anonymous yet infamous space. It was in this room that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden is believed to have lived for over a month at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport following his flight from the United States in 2013.

Printed in large format, this photograph in fact depicts a model constructed in Demand’s studio, based on a press photograph. From afar, the model photograph is indistinguishable from its source. But as the viewer comes closer, the model’s materiality becomes present. The pillowcases’ creases are revealed to be crinkles in white paper.

Far from disappointment at any deception, or joy at uncovering an image’s origins, the viewer is instead greeted with a pleasant moment of suspension, in which the image hovers between a depicted reality and its materialized representation. While the historian Jesus Vassallo has celebrated a trend in recent architectural photography towards “seamless” images which merge architectural projects and their banal settings (proving the former is taking better account of the latter), it is instead the “seams” visible within Demand’s images—the moments where reality is shown to be a paper construct—which give them their power.

Refuge II is on display at Toronto’s Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) as part of House of Card, which features works by Demand alongside those of other architects and artists. These include an eccentric array of photographs, surfaces, models, and installations.

The most compelling of these are surface treatments. Demand has produced two large, wallpapered surfaces by photographing material textures: one wall features a f lattened print of crinkled tissue paper, another, undulating felt. Both are reminders of the historic engagement between architecture, photography, and wall coverings: Mies van der Rohe and Lily Reich famously patented photographic wallpapers back in the 1930s. Another gallery is spanned by Martin Boyce’s site-specific ceiling array, which deploys perforated metal finds in shades of pink, grey, and white. While the ceiling responds to a panoply of architectural references (including Oscar Neimeyer’s Headquarters for the French Communist Party), its strength lies in its ability to bring colour and proportion to MOCA’s galleries.

While the individual objects on display are remarkable, their ensemble falls into tautology. For example, a Japanese karaoke bar is shown in Demand’s model photograph on the third f loor and as a 1:1 scale re-construction by Rirkrit Tiravanija in the lobby. Each is compelling in its own right, but strangely their juxtaposition (albeit on different floors on the exhibition) detracts from their mystery.

Architectural historian Peter Sealy is an Assistant Professor at the Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto.

House of Card is on display at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Toronto, until January 9, 2023.

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WHAT YOU LEARN FROM AN RFP SITE MEETING TEXT

Jake Nicholson

ATTENDING A SITE MEETING DURING A REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS CAN BE SOMETIMES SURREAL—AND OFTEN REVEALING—ABOUT THE STATE OF THE PROFESSION. There’s a quiet tension that often comes from getting a bunch of candidates together for a site meeting during a Request for Proposals. Competing architects, project managers, technologists, proposal editors, all suddenly spend an afternoon together, wandering through an existing building, a built-up urban lot, or maybe some empty field. People arrive, form a little circle, wait for the client, sign the sign-in sheet. They wait quietly again for the start of the event. The walkthrough happens, people take their notes and pictures. The visit ends. Everybody goes home.

This quiet tension isn’t coming from unfamiliarity. People at these visits often know each other, or know of each other, but site visits still aren’t talkative events—and not just in the moments where everybody is listen-

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ing to the host. The surreality of the quiet can get downright striking, everybody wandering through the back access corridors of some academic building or museum with a bunch of people that they have absolutely everything in common with, even down to their notepads, and the fact that they’re taking pictures of an HVAC system on their smartphones.

What really drives this tension is two things, potentially three.

The first thing is the inherent social ickiness that comes from running into other competing candidates at a job interview. You’re suddenly forced into seeing the other people around you as both personal foils and professional threats, keeping a little mental tally of who exactly you’re competing against. You may well read the names on the sign-in

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SITE VISIT

sheet, noting people that you recognize from other pursuits. The second driving factor of the tension is the fact that there are real stakes involved in this process, and information is a valuable commodity here. That includes information volunteered by your competitors, or potentially by you. Asking questions or proposing design ideas may be necessary for clarification, but it might hurt your chances of winning the project.

If you share your great design notion with the whole class, it might lose you a competitive advantage. Even asking the wrong question can show your hand. So, some questions go unasked, some ideas go unexplored, and everybody just deals with it.

The potential third thing keeping things a little tense is that maybe— just maybe—some of the people there have been sent at the last minute because the site visit is mandatory, and they were the only person in the office who was available to go. Several of the attendees may have barely learned anything about the project. It’s a real possibility that a couple haven’t read the RFP. But you can’t submit a proposal if you don’t attend.

Make sure your name is on the sign-in sheet, other than that, polite and quiet listening will have to do.

From a distance, all these little awkward tensions are stunning features for an event where the spirit is to openly provide information and ensure transparency and fairness. Clients are often highly invested in running a fantastic site visit, in order to enrich the procurement process, build understanding among all potential proponents, and clearly define their expectations—all so that they get a good candidate to design their project. A lot of people on the client’s side can be pulled into these meetings, because the project represents something significant in their life and work. Think of what this experience is like for them: suddenly surrounded by a bunch of quiet design professionals who sometimes leave a beat of silence after being asked, “Any questions?” Imagine that room looking back at you through so many very deliberate eyewear choices.

On RFPs for high-profile or high-value projects, the scene can be quite different—but equally revealing. These site visits tend to draw a crowd, bringing out many firm owners and significant designers from near and far. This type of visit is typically better attended, more talkative. It puts the makeup of architectural leadership in Canada on sample-size display, including the most likely type of person to lead the design for the project at hand. You get a ballpark answer to the question: who, generally, gets to design the built environment around us?

It should surprise nobody reading this to learn the architectural leaders at those meetings—and those in Canada at large—are generally older, white, and male (obviously not because of any innate design talent, but because we live in a patriarchal society which, for centuries, has been wrongly structured to benefit this one group of people, providing them easier access to both professions and positions of leadership). According to a 2022 Stratcom Demographics Survey of more than 1,000 members of the Ontario Association of Architects—which, critically, is only about OAA membership and not firm leadership—69% of respondents identify as White / Caucasian, 56% identify as male, and 32% have childcare responsibilities. Most (62%) were over 40 years old, with 41% identifying themselves as over 51 years old. (For the sake of transparency, these

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statistics include some clarifications: “a response rate of approximately 15.5% and the margin of error for a sample of this size is +/- 2.6%, 19 times out of 20”.) It’s one thing to know about this information.

It’s another to see this imbalance on display in front of you at a big site meeting, and to remember that the projects that result from this type of large-scale RFP process can have an outsized influence on their surrounding communities and user groups. Because it’s an activity done by people, design can be rife with unconscious bias. Even a talented designer doesn’t know to think about the biases they don’t know they have.

Consider this idea in the context of a major cultural project or a school.

Think about it in the context of a multi-purpose building with a daycare.

Of course, there are gradations to what RFP site meetings are, just as there are gradations to what projects are. If at one end of the spectrum, a site meeting might serve as a summit for architectural leadership with millions of dollars on the line, at the other, a site visit can be nothing, the very definition of “this could have been an email.” RFPs for tiny little projects can have site visits too; and then there is the prickly question of what is implied to be necessary when the client has given a date for a site visit that is described as being voluntary. The good-hearted intent to put in effort and attend a non-mandatory visit may add significant extra cost to the whole process. And most of the time, this money will be for nothing, returning only an employee with a slight theatre-of-theabsurd type experience. (As an example, in response to a non-mandatory site meeting scheduled within an RFP, I once drove for 90 minutes, then suited up in a required hard-hat, safety glasses, high-vis vest, and steel toes, only to wander around an empty building alone, while the client’s representative waited outside. He declared at the outset that the purpose of the meeting was for me to “see the building.” He would be answering no questions, and he would be providing no information beyond what was given in the RFP. This was for a smaller pursuit that was eventually lost on fee to somebody who was smart enough not to attend. The thing that was running through my unnecessarily PPE-covered head at the time was something like: “You were the one who called this meeting.”

Shortly after, I had another 90-minute drive back to the office.)

At even the best of times, RFPs have the potential to burn time and money, but within this sub-section of pursuit-related overhead, site visits can stand out as a uniquely useless way to set fire to thousands of dollars.

Depending on the expanse of the region where a firm chooses to chase work, attending a site visit can include airfare, hotels, food, time, and mileage. This is not to say that these visits cannot add anything important to the process, but that value comes from forethought, planning, and the intent of all parties involved to make the finished project better.

Mandatory or not, if a site meeting is included as part of an RFP, it should have a purpose. It should be conducted with the spirit of adding value, and it should allow for an exchange that enriches the process.

Without meeting at least one of these criteria, there is something else you can learn from attending enough of these events: sometimes it would be okay if some of them were never planned in the first place.

Jake Nicholson is a writer based in London, Ontario, with extensive experience working on proposals for architectural and engineering firms.

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A CONCERT HALL REBORN A COMPREHENSIVE REVAMP OF DAVID GEFFEN HALL IS TAILORED TO THE NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC’S SIGNATURE SOUND.

The New York Philharmonic’s orchestral home at Lincoln Center, David Geffen Hall, has been revamped with a flexible concert hall boasting impeccable acoustics.

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David Geffen Hall, Lincoln Center, New York, USA Diamond Schmitt (Concert Theatre & Masterplan); Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects (Public Spaces) TEXT Elsa Lam PHOTOS Michael Moran, unless otherwise noted PROJECT

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“Powerful. Confident.” That’s how musicians in the New York Philharmonic described their sound to a team of acousticians and architects tasked with redesigning David Geffen Hall, facing Lincoln Center’s central plaza, in New York City. “This isn’t an orchestra that’s introverted, it’s an orchestra that broadcasts and loves to share,” says architect Matthew Lella of Diamond Schmitt, who was one of the project leads, alongside colleagues Gary McCluskie and Sybil Wa, and New York architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien. Think of the epic music of Gershwin, which figures in the New York Philharmonic’s signature repertoire, he adds.

It’s the sound that the musicians wanted their orchestral home, which opened in mid-October, to contain and enhance.

It was a long-held desire, dating back over half a century. When Lincoln Center opened in the early 60s, many of its half-dozen performance spaces worked beautifully. But the orchestra’s space, designed by Max Abramovitz and then known as Philharmonic Hall, was plagued by acoustic problems from the start. New York Times critic Harold C. Schonberg commented on the hall’s “decided lack of bass” following opening night; higher frequency instruments like oboes and clarinets echoed against the smooth walls, and musicians had trouble hearing each other.

Many of the problems persisted through a 1976 gut renovation (which saw the venue renamed Avery Fisher Hall), led by architect Philip Johnson. A series of subsequent tweaks—including the addition of bongo-like sound reflectors along the sides of the stage in the 1990s—helped, but not enough. In the early 2000s, the orchestra threatened to leave Avery Fisher for its original home, Carnegie Hall.

The root of the problem, notes principal Gary McCluskie of Diamond Schmitt, is that there were always too many seats for the volume of space.

At the conception of the hall, in a bid to increase the reach of the orchestra and to match the 2,760-seat capacity of Carnegie Hall, its board made a last-minute decision to add as many seats as possible to the 2,400 planned for the venue. Abramovitz managed to squeeze in an additional 338 seats— but without consulting the acoustician. The 1976 renovation, while correcting the worst of the acoustic issues, retained the same number of seats.

This over-density of seats affected the transmission of sound, as well as the sightlines crucial for audiences to connect the sound to its source.

“When you were sitting at the back, it felt like a football field,” says Adam Crane, the New York Philharmonic’s Vice President of External Affairs.

At the front, the views were often not much better: the upper balconies faced each other head-on, rather than being turned towards the stage.

Views for VIPs in the very front boxes only took in half the stage, with the field of vision further cut off by the acoustic wall bumps.

In 2015, a $100-million donation by entertainment executive David Geffen spurred a new attempt at renovating the building. Diamond Schmitt, partnered with Thomas Heatherwick, comprised one of four teams invited to participate in a limited design competition to redesign the New York Philharmonic’s home. In response to the client’s brief, their winning scheme included relocating the main concert hall to sit on the ground f loor, as well as adding a new 1,000-seat venue atop it.

But this proposal would require extensive demolition, resulting in a three-year construction process—a year more than the orchestra was willing to be absent from their home base.

It was back to the drawing board, this time with Diamond Schmitt flying solo, and an assignment to investigate the feasibility of a redesign that retained the structure of the existing building, rebuilding the concert hall in its current placement, and adhered to a two-year construction

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Behind the concert hall’s heritage travertine marble exterior, the renewed building generously welcomes audiences into an enlarged lobby and upper-level reception areas. Fritted glass wraps the top of the building in a band of coloured light. OPPOSITE The outer walls of the theatre are clad in custom felt with a rose petal motif in blue, red, orange, and fuchsia; the petal motif is echoed in bespoke chandeliers.

ABOVE

schedule. (The expected completion, which had been set for 2024 after construction in two phases, was accelerated when the orchestra decided to fast-track the project during pandemic closures.) As the schematic design for the project was being finished and it turned into a formal commission, Manhattan-based Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects (TWBTA) was added to the team, heading up the design of the public spaces of the building and providing a local connection.

A crucial move within the performance space, Wu Tsai Theatre, was reducing the number of seats to 2,200, and configuring those seats to bring audiences closer to the musicians. The front of the stage is pulled forward by 7.6 metres; the main seats are set at a slightly steeper rake that improves sightlines. A new section of parterre-style seats is set behind the stage; this area can alternatively accommodate a full choir, or be swap­ ped out for a raised performance platform. To the sides, the box seats are replaced with terraced lines of seating, gently angled towards the stage.

The whole is set within a carved beechwood box, with softly angular balcony fronts and rippling wall panels that diffuse sonic waves, improving the distribution of sound in the room. “We wanted the room to embrace the orchestra, so that the orchestra could embrace the audience with its sound,” says Lella.

Given the goal of delivering a powerful sound, the Diamond Schmitt team debated whether the extensive use of wood was appropriate: would it make the hall appear cozily rustic rather than confidently urban? In the end, the orchestra felt that wood was fundamental to how musical sound would be supported by the space, and lead acoustician Paul Scarbrough agreed.

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Flair was imparted to the hall in other ways, including in its lighting: in a nod to the raising of the chandelier that accompanies the dimming of the lights at the Met, a cloud of pulsing firefly-like lights rise into the air before a performance at David Geffen Hall begins.

Perhaps the theatre’s boldest gesture is the bespoke upholstery on the seats. Instead of the expected solid navy or scarlet, the fabric, selected by TWBTA, is a collage of pinks and magentas on a purple backdrop, evoking scattered flower petals. The upholstery ties in with a curtain-like felt that wraps the outside of the concert hall in a cascade of falling rose petals.

The inspiration for the floral motif stemmed from Williams and Tsien’s experience of the Pentecost celebrations at the Pantheon in Rome, when flower petals are dropped through the ceiling’s oculus. “It’s a rainstorm of petals—a rainstorm of beauty,” says Tsien. The petal form is also part of the columnar chandeliers in the stacked lobbies, created from cascades of cymbal-like brass discs.

The architectural team’s strategic rethinking of the public spaces surrounding the orchestral hall aimed to increase the openness and accessibility of the building. By relocating offices from the ground floor to an upper level, they were able to clear out the ground floor to create a spacious lobby—a kind of public lounge, open to all. The space is marked by a garagedoor-style connection to the plaza, and mushroom-like structural columns, which TWBTA uncovered and restored from the original building.

The main lobby also includes a plaza-facing 15-metre-long media screen that will display bespoke video art pieces during the daytime, and simulcasts of the New York Philharmonic’s performances in the evening. In this

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age of ubiquitous live feeds, such programming may seem obvious—but the unionized members of American orchestras have typically opted to vet their work before having it broadcast in any way; this initiative is the first of its kind. One can imagine the simulcasts gaining a following, just as the orchestra draws a crowd for its summer concerts in Central Park; both initiatives lay the groundwork for a robust fanbase among younger audiences.

The architectural team also made the critical decision to relocate escalators from the corners of the building to its flanks, freeing valuable real estate for a plaza-facing box office and restaurant, both of which can remain open when the building is rented out for corporate events.

At the building’s northeast corner, TWBTA freed up ground floor space for the new Broadway-facing Sidewalk Studio, intended for small performances, rehearsals, and workshops.

Behind its screen of travertine columns, the building is largely enclosed by glass, so both the ground floor and upper levels are highly visible.

TWBTA chose an indigo-blue paint for both the walls and soffits, drawing views deep into the space. The ground-level escalators are set against creamy white stone; above, stairs to the balcony levels rise against walls clad in iridescent glass tile—with shimmering gold tones facing the street; and antique white gold on the concert hall side.

These design decisions make the activity within David Geffen Hall visible to motorists on Broadway and pedestrians in Lincoln Center’s central plaza. In turn, the lobbies gain animation from the street, and from each other: the upper concert-level tiers were enlarged by the removal of glass smoke screens, and the addition of promontory-like overlooks fosters con-

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nection between the levels, adding to the festive atmosphere of concerts.

“New York is an emotional place,” says Diamond Schmitt’s Matthew Lella. “It’s a place where people feel willing to express themselves.”

During the orchestra’s tuning week in August, the crescendo opening of Bruckner’s 7th Symphony filled the theatre with feeling, capturing something of the anguish and resilience of the city’s intense pandemic experience, when the orchestra went on a nearly two-year hiatus from conventional concerts. “It gives you goosebumps, which it’s supposed to do,” says McCluskie. “But it doesn’t matter what they’re playing in there, it’s an emotional room: it gives [the orchestra] the tools to grab people’s emotions and create all of these colours and textures.”

During opening week in October, Diamond Schmitt principal Sybil Wa, who was based in New York throughout the project, attended almost every performance, including multiple versions of the same program. “It’s clear the value of live music is unique,” she says. “Each performance had its own feeling: an artist and audience chemistry. It felt different even if the notes on the score were the same.”

“I watched the audiences as much as the artists, and it is possible that the building may very well do what all of us working on the project set out to do: enable a new connection between the artists with their established and new audiences,” says Wa. She talked to many of the New York Philharmonic’s musicians throughout the work and during that opening week. Horn player Lellanee Sterrett, she says, “told me that in the old proscenium hall, it felt like they were playing in a cupboard—in comparison to the new surround hall that she is in now.”

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ABOVE Rippling panels of beechwood help to diffuse sound waves evenly through the concert hall, while lending visual warmth to the space.

The uniqueness of David Geffen Hall’s acoustic achievement, notes McCluskie, is that every instrument’s distinct voice can be heard in the space, yet they also combine into a single musical declaration. That balance between the individual and the whole is part of the building’s acoustics, and the powerful driving idea behind the falling rose petals that adorn and encase the theatre. But perhaps its most poetic architectural expression is in a detail that may be overlooked by even the most avid concert goer.

The public lobby’s wool carpet, which extends to the plaza entrance, is embellished with a motif made from a single, continuous yellow line that wends its way through the blue field. Many Southeast Asian refugees ended up in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where the carpet was made by Scott Group Custom Carpets, explains Tsien, “and there’s one guy that personally tufted this wandering yellow line.” Adds Williams, “It’s as if he was doing a drawing, miles and miles long.”

The path to renovate the New York Philharmonic’s concert hall has similarly been a long journey, for many people. At a hardhat concert before the official opening, the seats of Wu Tsai Theatre were filled with designers, engineers, fabricators, and tradespeople—just some of the many involved with the project. Together, they’ve created a place that the New York Philharmonic’s musicians can be proud to call home.

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CLIENT LINCOLN CENTER, NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC | ARCHITECT TEAM DIAMOND SCHMITT—

GARY MCCLUSKIE (MRAIC, PRINCIPAL-IN-CHARGE), SYBIL WA (PROJECT ARCHITECT), MATTHEW LELLA (FRAIC, PROJECT ARCHITECT), DONALD SCHMITT (FRAIC, PRINCIPAL), MICHAEL TREACY (MRAIC, PRINCIPAL), NIGEL TAI (MRAIC, PRINCIPAL), GRAEME REED (MRAIC, ASSOCIATE/PROJECT MANAGER), MICHAEL LUKASIK (MRAIC, ASSOCIATE), MEHDI GHIYAEI (ASSOCIATE), STEPHANIE HUSS (ASSOCIATE), JOSE TRINIDAD (ASSOCIATE), JAVIER ZELLER (MRAIC, ASSOCIATE). DIAMOND SCHMITT DESIGN TEAM—CARLOS CALPE GARGALLO, ALEXA CARROL, SHERRI CATT, CLAUDIA COZZITORTO (MRAIC), PAUL DE VOE, KHOLISILE DHLIWAYO, MARIE DIVIVIER, NICK DUCH, HUGO FLAMMIN, EMRE GOKTAY, SIMGE GOKTAY, JIM GRAVES, BRANDON GRIFFIN, LIHENG LI, CHRISTIANO MAHLER, MAYA ORZECHOWSKA, ALBERTO SAPUTELLI, MATTHEW SCHMID (MRAIC), NIKA TEPER, BRIAN TSENG, RUSSELL WOOTEN, COCO XIONG, ALBERT YU, WEI ZHAO. TOD WILLIAMS BILLIE TSIEN—TOD WILLIAMS (FAIA, LEAD DESIGNER), BILLIE TSIEN (AIA, LEAD DESIGNER) PAUL SCHULHOF (AIA, PARTNER), AZADEH RASHIDI (PROJECT MANAGER), JOHN SKILLERN (PROJECT MANAGER), WHANGJIN SUH (PROJECT ARCHITECT), OLEN MILHOLLAND (PROJECT ARCHITECT), MANDO FYTOU (ARCHITECT), JOSH STASTNY (ARCHITECT), JESSICA SADASIVAN (ARCHITECT), ISAAC SOUTHARD (ARCHITECT), CHRIS PHILLIPS (ARCHITECT), JENEE ANZELONE (ARCHITECT), SHERRY NG (ARCHITECT), LAURA JOO (ARCHITECT) | STRUCTURAL THORNTON TOMASETTI | MECHANICAL/ELECTRICAL/PLUMBING/FIRE PROTECTION KOHLER RONAN | ACOUSTICS AKUSTIKS, LED BY PAUL SCARBROUGH | THEATRE DESIGNER FISHER DACHS ASSOCIATES, LED BY JOSHUA DACHS | INTERIORS DIAMOND SCHMITT AND TOD WILLIAMS BILLIE TSIEN FOR THEIR RESPECTIVE AREAS | CONTRACTOR TURNER CONSTRUCTION COMPANY | RESTAURANT DESIGNER MODELLUS NOVUS | LIGHTING FISHER MARANTZ STONE | LEED SOCOTEC (FORMERLY VIDARIS)| ENVELOPE FORST CONSULTING ARCHITECTS | ELEVATOR VDA | HERITAGE LI/ SALTZMAN ARCHITECTS - JUDITH SALTZMAN | AREA 20,900 M2 | BUDGET $550 M | COMPLETION OCTOBER 2022 ENERGY USE INTENSITY (PROJECTED) 311 KWH/M2/YEAR | UNRENOVATED BUILDING 460 KWH/M2/

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11"

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UNDER ONE ROOF

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GRAND SUDBURY’S NEW PLACE DES ARTS BRINGS TOGETHER SEVEN KEY FRANCOPHONE ARTS INSTITUTIONS IN A SINGLE STUNNING FACILITY. Place des Arts, Greater Sudbury, Ontario Moriyama & Teshima Architects in joint venture with Bélanger Salach Architecture TEXT Terrance Galvin PHOTOS Tom Arban PROJECT

ARCHITECTS

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Franco-Ontarian heritage spans over 400 years. When the CPR transnational railway arrived in Greater Sudbury (Grand Sudbury in French) in 1883, a large number of French speakers from Quebec moved to the area to work in agriculture, mining, and forestry. By 1911, Francophones represented 35 percent of the area’s population, and they remain 25 percent of Sudbury’s residents. The impact of la Francophonie is reflected in the city’s institutions, including the Jesuit Collège du SacréCoeur, a French-language educational institute established in 1913 that led to the creation of the University of Sudbury in 1957. Over time, generations of Francophones growing up in Sudbury ever more strongly embraced their uniquely French culture. In the 1970s, while nationalism was surging in Quebec, Grand Sudbury was the epicentre of its own Francophone ‘serene revolution,’ including the “Nouvel-Ontario” movement, a collective of young artists which fought—and succeeded—in forging a distinctive Franco-Ontarian culture and identity.

Those cultural and historical roots are still bearing fruit today, most recently made visible in the lyrical and urbane Place des Arts (Pd A), which opened at the end of April. Designed by Moriyama & Teshima

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Architects in joint venture with Bélanger Salach Architecture, the long-awaited Place des Arts addresses Elgin Street and brings together seven key Francophone arts institutions in a single stunning facility.

Place des Arts’ weathering steel planes slide past and intersect with one another, alluding to Sudbury’s industrial heritage, while its interior reflects Francophone history, rigorously displayed through historical artefacts placed in-situ. The building’s long horizontal stone plinth echoes the Canadian Shield and large areas of glazing are strategically placed to amplify urban activity or frame vistas. The client-artists challenged the design team to forge an architectural framework equal to the artistic vision of the Francophone community of Grand Sudbury—now translated into an architecture that feels both contemporary and comfortable, with a familiarity as if it had always been there.

At its source, the movement known as le Nouvel-Ontario embodied a cultural explosion in literature and the arts in northern Ontario that was centred in Sudbury; a movement whose effect was as dynamic as the meteor impact that created Grand Sudbury millennia ago.

This “artistic explosion” remained a powerful metaphor for Place des Arts’

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SECTIONAL PERSPECTIVE

Place des Arts’ weathering steel cladding alludes to Grand Sudbury’s industrial history—a past that intersects with the region’s strong Francophone presence. OPPOSITE The facility addresses Elgin Street with a corner entrance, flanked by a French-language bookshop and boutique, and an already-popular bistro. TOP The building’s glazed west façade contrasts with a more solid north elevation, composed with intersecting weathering steel planes.

OPENING PAGE

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The building’s bistro adjoins a flexible salon area, marked by a curved wall for temporary exhibitions. OPPOSITE A 299-seat theatre, named La Grand Salle, hosts events by the seven Franco-Ontarian arts organizations that came together to found Place des Arts.

ABOVE

founding president, Stéphane Gauthier, who penned a historical manifesto to guide the Pd A project. “Through the Coopérative des artistes du Nouvel-Ontario (CANO), [artists] achieved an unprecedented and momentous extension of their sphere of resonance,” he writes. “They founded institutions that provided new means for ongoing cultural expansion,” he continues, adding a list of Franco-Ontarian ‘firsts’ created by the group. “First professional theatre company. First publishing house. First province-wide popular music festival. First art gallery.”

These groups redefined Francophone music, visual arts, publishing, theatre, storytelling, poetry, and literature in northern Ontario.

The dream of a singular cultural hub started 15 years ago, when the Regroupement des organismes culturels de Sudbury (ROCS) brought together seven of them: Carrefour francophone, Centre franco-ontarien de folklore, Théâtre de Nouvel-Ontario, Concerts La Nuit sur l’étang, Éditions Prise de Parole, Galerie du Nouvel-Ontario, and Salon du livre du Grand Sudbury.

A second metaphor for the project, ‘Under one roof,’ is elegantly express­ed in the Place des Arts’ logo, designed by Christian Pelletier of Studio123.

Instead of continuing to compete for grants or pay for separate real estate scattered throughout Sudbury, these seven cultural groups agreed to join resources, adding an eighth partner in the Place des Arts itself.

At ground level, Place des Arts’ plan is organized around three public rooms dedicated to the creation and performance of contemporary art: the main theatre, a black box theatre and a white box gallery. But much of the place is open to all with no admission fee. Greeted by an external welcome bench and canopy, one enters past a librairie-boutique that will sell books, crafts and other local merchandise. En route is a reception desk for tickets and information, followed by a long triangular space named the salon, which invokes the idea of a living room. The salon is defined by a curved exhibition wall, currently displaying names of key donors and black-and-white photos of Francophone artists from the 1970s;

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the temporary exhibition faces the café’s dining area. One immediately experiences the vibrancy of Le Bistro, facing Elgin Street, as a gathering place for flâneurs as well as a spot for fostering potential collaborative synergy among the Pd A’s multi-disciplinary artists.

Juxtaposing old and new was a driving force for the project, beginning with the reuse of part of the foundations from the 1905 King Edward Hotel that once occupied the site, as well as using over 800 of its bricks in the interior. Throughout, the building imaginatively reveals a series of collected artefacts within its walls. The pressed-tin ceiling from Sudbury’s 1914 École St. Louis-de-Gonzague is tucked under a plane of Corten in the bookstore-boutique, pointing to a site of Francophone resistance against cultural assimilation in the 1920s.

Bread pans from Sudbury’s Canada Bread create a patinated wall near the bistro, recalling a company founded on cooperation prevailing over competition amongst major bakeries. Salvaged white pine beams from Chicago are repurposed as benches, a clin d’oeil to the northern Ontario forests used in rebuilding Chicago after its great fire of 1871.

Through the language of bricolage and adaptive reuse, each artefact offers a window into history that resonates with the Francophone community’s focus on cultural heritage as storytelling.

Behind the curving wall of the salon lies La Grand Salle, a 299-seat theatre whose deep stage and proscenium are shrouded by a serene, wood-lined interior, providing excellent acoustics and intimate sightlines.

Bélanger Salach principal Amber Salach recalls the technical gymnastics, including neoprene gaskets and structural separation, required to achieve a quiet performance hall across from CP ’s downtown railyards.

Adjacent is Le Studio Desjardins, a black-box theatre designed as a flexible space for both rehearsal and a variety of performances. Third in the sequence is the Galerie du Nouvel Ontario. With its Palladian-scaled white cubic interior and large partition doors, the art gallery is both a beautiful room and a flexible exhibition space. One windowed wall

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LEVEL 1

MAIN ENTRY BAR/CAFE BISTRO DINING SALON KITCHEN CONTROL ROOM THEATRE SEATING STAGE LOADING / EQUIPMENT AREA DRESSING MPR EQUIPMENT AREA MULTIPURPOSE ROOM GNO (ART GALLERY) BOUTIQUE

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LEFT Bread pans from Sudbury’s shuttered Canada Bread facility create a feature wall near the bistro, recalling a company founded on cooperation prevailing over competition amongst major bakeries. RIGHT In the boutique, a pressed-tin ceiling recovered from Sudbury’s 1914 École St. Louisde-Gonzague points to a site of Francophone resistance against cultural assimilation in the 1920s.

with large shutters faces Larch Street, connecting the gallery to the urban streetscape, while the opposite gallery wall opens onto the public salon, with views across to the bistro bar.

On the second level, a daycare with a large protected exterior terrace offers views overlooking the railyards; the f loor also includes a multifunctional youth zone, art workshop, and theatre support rooms.

The third level of the building includes Pd A administration, comprised of offices, collaboration spaces, archives, library, and a meeting room shared between the organizations. Throughout the Pd A, the graphic signage for wayfinding in multiple languages is punchy and crisp, adding another layer of artistic narrative.

Brian Rudy, partner at Moriyama & Teshima Architects, muses over the duality of the clients wanting a “signature building” for the arts community at the same time as wanting “a welcoming house” grounded in Francophone culture. The inclusion of the bistro and the daycare are programs that PdA believed would help create an intergenerational building open to the wider Francophone community. For Louis Bélanger, a Franco-Ontarian architect who had often done work for the individual arts groups in the past, the experience was deeply personal; he remains extremely proud of the scale, materiality, and cultural meaning achieved in the overall design.

The Place des Arts’ tagline is: “A centre of artistic and cultural excellence and a gathering place for Francophones and for the whole community.” A few short months after opening, it is handsomely fulfilling this mandate, thanks in no small part to a building that embodies the organization’s mission. The design gains its strength from a delicate

balance: the architects have crafted a building whose scale is intimate and image is welcoming while, at the same time, creating a timeless signature piece for downtown Sudbury. The result is reminiscent of the wonderfully ambiguous spaces designed by Dutch modernist Aldo van Eyck in the 1960s. The Pd A remains both a cultural institution and an urban “living room,” with the Grande Salle’s performance space at its heart. It is here, in this convivial place, that le Nouvel Ontario will continue to give birth to successive generations of talented artists.

Terrance Galvin, FRAIC, is Founding Director and Professor at the McEwen School of Architecture in Grand Sudbury, Ontario. This article is dedicated to the memory of Paulette Gagnon, North Star of the Place des Arts.

CLIENT LA PLACE DES ARTS DU GRAND SUDBURY | ARCHITECT TEAM MORIYAMA & TESHIMA

ARCHITECTS—BRIAN RUDY (FRAIC ), CATHY MCMAHON (MRAIC), EMMANUEL AWUAH, JASON PHILLIPE, LOUIS LORTIE (MRAIC), MARIA PAVLOU, NICK GONSALVES, SEAN ROBBINS, XIAOYI NI, JASON CORBIN. BÉLANGER SALACH ARCHITECTURE— LOUIS BÉLANGER, AMBER SALACH, DENIS COMTOIS, LAURA TEDDY, ROBERT ANDRE, YVON LAMOUREUX, TRACY ROCHON, TONY DI NIRO. | STRUCTURAL A2S (STEVE CAIRNS, AARON DENT) | MECHANICAL SNC LAVALIN (JEFF HUNTER, FILIPPO BIOBDI) | ELECTRICAL SNC LAVALIN (STEPHANE CHIASSON, GREG PETRYNA, LAURIER LALONDE) | LANDSCAPE PMA LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTS (TERRENCE LEE) | INTERIORS MORIYAMA & TESHIMA ARCHITECTS AND BÉLANGER SALACH ARCHITECTURE | CONTRACTOR HEIN | PROJECT MANAGER COLLIERS | ACOUSTICS THORNTON THOMASETTI | THEATRE EQUIPMENT/AV DESIGN NOVITA TECHNE LTD. | COST CONSULTANT MARSHALL & MURRAY | FOOD SERVICES DESIGN KAIZEN FOODSERVICE | AREA 3,716 M2 | BUDGET $24.3 M | COMPLETION APRIL 2022 THE BUILDING IS PROJECTED TO HAVE A 6.3% ENERGY USE REDUCTION OVER THE ASHRAE 90.12013 ECB AS MODIFIED BY SB-10 2017.

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ACING IT

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A TORONTO HOTEL BY SHIM-SUTCLIFFE BRINGS HIGH DESIGN INTO THE PUBLIC SPOTLIGHT. Ace Hotel, Toronto, Ontario Shim-Sutcliffe Architects TEXT Bill Curran PHOTOS Scott Norsworthy, unless otherwise noted PROJECT

DOUBLESPACE PHOTOGRAPHY

ARCHITECT

ABOVE

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A dramatic series of curvilinear concrete arches sweeps through the lobby of Toronto’s Ace Hotel, extending a welcome out to the street.

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DOUBLESPACE PHOTOGRAPHY

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The board-formed concrete arches marking the main floors are race-striped with a grey-painted steel corner relief detail. ABOVE The hotel faces St. Andrew’s Park; its west façade is marked by deep, purple-red brick piers that frame vertical slots of windows. The deep set bays give the building a powerful presence and sense of solidity.

OPPOSITE

Hotels matter because, as architect Robert Stern once put it, they “constitute a permanent, habitable dreamworld, which we can escape into and depart at will—a dreamworld we can share with others.” Toronto’s latest addition to the typology—the Ace Hotel, by Shim-Sutcliffe Architects— is the kind of dreamy place that architects love to create and spend time in.

Facing St. Andrew’s Park, an island of green in a growing sea of downtown offices and condos, it’s also a real-life manifesto that, in Brigitte Shim’s words, is “a statement of resistance against the thin and glassy.” It is a magnificent piece of architecture in its own right, but also a contextual fabric building that respects its neighbourhood’s scale and material history. It raises the bar for private development in its immediate context and throughout downtown Toronto.

The duo of Brigitte Shim and Howard Sutcliffe and their team are about the best among us at creating architecture founded in a sincere reverence for craft and material research. Their deep, thoughtful design consideration often seems freed from the frets of normal time and budget constraints, and they relish it. They produce consistently remarkable works of architecture that make us hold our breath. This is not the giddy exhilaration of bold, sculptural form, but quiet, deliberate, restrained modernism.

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The Ace is Shim-Sutcliffe’s first tall building, one of few in a nonlandscaped urban setting, and one of an even smaller number that are easily accessible to the public. Set on a tiny 21-by-27-metre lot, it is a world apart from the bucolic rural and backcountry sites of their most recent Governor General’s Award-winning private residences. It’s also a departure for the Ace, whose worldwide hotels, to this point, have mostly been in renovated heritage buildings.

But there is a remarkable coherence between Shim-Sutcliffe’s exquisite design sensibilities and the Ace’s goal of creating classic, refined places. Shim-Sutcliffe and Atelier Ace (the hotel’s in-house, full-service creative agency, and a collaborator on the interiors) began the design process by visiting all of the Ace’s properties, getting a sense of the overall brand. The Ace Toronto feels quiet, restrained, taut. It’s suave and debonair, not brash or hippy. It achieves the “timeless” feel that we all seek. It is produced with superb attention to design detail and craft, with a fantastic, utterly authentic layer of rich quality. As the day ends, when golden sunlight streams in horizontally down the canyon of Adelaide Street and across from the facing park, the Ace is an ethereal, otherworldly place.

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OPPOSITE The lobby bar is suspended above the lower ground floor restaurant, hovering in the space just above street level. ABOVE A drawing shows the intended design of the main façade. The perceived scale of the building is reduced by the inclusion of metal belt courses on every second storey.

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A modest monumentality The monumentality of the building is apparent from a glance at the 14-storey brick building, which takes on a dead simple rectangular form, made spectacular by an intense attention to detail. To the west, deep, robust brick piers frame wide vertical slots of window, whose recesses throw deep shadows and rise full height, with tall bays reminiscent of Louis Kahn’s First Unitarian Church. A subtle recess of the bays above the second floor gives away valuable floor area, but produces a powerful presence for the building’s main façade when seen from the long view down Adelaide. The piers have no syncopation or pattern: I wish they were raw buttress forms ragged against the sky, like a Sant’Elia fantasy, instead of comfortably pulled together with a horizontal cap.

The Endicott brick boasts a lush purple-red colour, and a glossy texture that adds to the classic feel of the building. There were some budget constraints, though: the brick is panelled, rather than hand laid. In response, the architects provided a thoughtful celebration of the panel joints as a design feature, while embracing the panels’ liberation from gravity with unusual vertical coursing and interspersed panels of soldier courses.

The simplicity of the west wall and its regular, powerful patterning is paired with a much different north wall, facing the quieter Camden

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1 GL-1 VISION UNIT, TYP. 2 D. FIR PLYWOOD FRAMING FOR DAYBED BEYOND 3 3 MM BRAKE FORMED MT-1 SILL FLASHING 4 CONT. MT-1 ‘C’ C102X50X6MM 5 3 MM BRAKE-FORMED MT-1 PLATE FLASHING 6 CONT. 2-HR FIRESTOP AT SLAB EDGE, TYP. 7 6MM MT-1 CLADDING 8 BRICK-FACED PRECAST PANEL BEYOND 9 ALUMINUM C.WALL SYSTEM WITH 6MM MT-1 PLATE FASTENED TO CAPS, COUNTERSUNK, TYP. 10 S TEEL HANGER ROD BEYOND 11 100X50MM GREY-PRIMED STEEL BENT PLATE, ROLLED TO SUIT CURVATURE, ON EXPOSED CONCRETE ARCH BEYOND 12 T&G WOOD CLADDING BEYOND 13 STEEL H.S.S. 14 HEATING UNIT 15 ALUMINUM C. WALL 16 CONCRETE BOULEVARD 17 10MM STEEL PL. RETAINER 18 CAST-IN-PLACE CUSTOM LIGHT 19 BANQUETTE

GL-1 VISION UNIT, TYP. D. FIR PLYWOOD FRAMING FOR DAYBED BEYOND 3mm BRAKE FORMED MT-1 SILL FLASHING CONT. MT-1 'C' C102x50x6mm 3mm BRAKE FORMED MT-1 PLATE FLASHING CONT. 2HR FIRESTOP AT SLAB EDGE, TYP. 6mm MT-1 CLADDING BRICK FACED PRECAST PANEL BEYOND ALUMINUM C.WALL SYSTEM WITH 6mm MT-1 PLATE FASTENED TO CAPS, COUNTERSUNK, TYP.

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OPPOSITE A feature stair descends alongside the Brant Street façade, allowing natural light and views of St. Andrew’s Park to grace the lower floor restaurant and lobby bar suspended above it.

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Street. Here, a rich, f latter surface results from a delightful, sophisticated and informal pattern of varied windows, with wood privacy screens to the condo across the narrow street. At ground level, the main entrance is the magical focus—a flourish of bold canopy with a wavy, layered wood-and-steel soffit over wood revolving doors, all composed with subtlety and restraint.

The entrance canopy is supported by a structural concrete arch— the first in a series that carries through the sublime two-storey lobby at tight 4.5-metre intervals. The heroic, splayed concrete columns yield a highly unusual space, reminiscent of Alvar Aalto’s Sanomat Newspaper building and of dirigible hangars.

Each of the asymmetrical columns is carefully sculpted to the room.

On the east, oversized steel knuckle connectors attach to counter-height bases, framing the lobby bar. On the west, the columns descend down past the park-facing windows into the lower-level restaurant, where they jackknife and splay back into the room. The columns have a raw formboard finish on the outside faces, contrasting with polished inside faces, and are race-striped with a grey-painted steel angle corner relief detail. Light grey plaster ceilings miss setting off the concrete frames as wood, copper or Corten would have, but it is a space refreshingly not defined by drywall, ACT or orthogonality.

Suspended by rods and cantilevered from the columns, the lobby bar sits on a floorplate that floats a few steps up from the entrance. It’s a particularly fine civic room, modest yet exhilarating, with a compact size that leads it to be often busy and buzzy.

A grand stair slices down the west side of the main f loor, bringing guests to the restaurant—a generous, open, unencumbered space. The decision to raise the lobby bar a metre above the street allows for more light to pour in from large clerestory windows along the west wall. To the south, an atrium—where the restaurant and lobby bar floors interconnect—feels high and welcome, although one wishes the tiny site allowed it to be larger.

The floating lobby is not so apparent to view, except where seen from below to the south from the restaurant atrium. Otherwise, it can only be glimpsed from the entrance through a narrow slot below the lobby floor, and few would notice this. The suspension system is concealed in the solid guard, so the floating effect is lost. Perhaps a more open guard or greater expression of the suspension elements would have made the raised effect more appreciable. One craves more rich details like those that adorn the south feature stair, where an arrhythmic series of suspension rods, serving as braces, bisect round reveals in the steel guardrails.

The backdrop to both the lobby bar and restaurant is a stunningly crafted plywood collage, made by A. Howard Sutcliffe at Shim and Sutcliffe’s cottage and gifted to the project. Inspired by light dancing on a northern lake, its visual richness comes from the varied patina of the sun- and wind-aged segments, and an intended repair detail for warping edges that now seems perfectly needed in its randomness.

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Urban cabins Travelling upstairs, the floorplans are super-efficient, with a pinwheeled array of rooms on each floor. The best rooms face the park to the west, with second-best rooms to the north and south, and exit stairs abutting the east party wall. Shim-Sutcliffe describes the rooms as “urban cabins.” In that spirit, their main design element to each room is a pair of staggered, varied window boxes of raw-edged double plywood— one a lovely window seat with leather pad and reading light, the other a desk/object stand.

A pleasant touch is the room accent colour, repeated in the bathroom grout—Frank Lloyd Wright’s Cherokee Red paint, an almost steel primer tone that matches the exterior brick and steel lobby stairs, and a recurring Shim-Sutcliffe motif. It’s a warm, soft choice that fits well with the urban cabin idea. But I found much of the room design rather fey and

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Horizon Line, a three-storey artwork crafted from weather-worn plywood by A. Howard Sutcliffe, sits just beyond a secondary stair detailed with a weathering steel guardrail and slender vertical bracing rods. ABOVE The cabin-like hotel rooms are accented by bespoke plywood built-ins, including a deep-set window bench and desk.

OPPOSITE

boring. White solid surface counters, white tile, Fat Albert lights—yawn.

Another disappointment was the prominent, yet unadorned TV screen— a surprising omission of design attention. Shim-Sutcliffe’s artistry is at its highest when they design a project as a gesamtkunstwerk, down to bespoke door handles and lights; these shortcomings are telling for where private development funds fall short of the budgets available on private projects.

Towards a better city To build in Toronto, Ace partnered with Zinc Developments and Alterra, local entities whose previous work focused on luxe condos of more conventional design. Ace Toronto marks a whole new level: it sets a benchmark for hotels in Canada for the design quality possible even with the constraints of the real estate market. Other developers are certainly taking notice.

As with any project, important design elements get jettisoned along the way: on the exterior, I regret the loss of expressed metal belt courses every second floor, now only on the third floor line. On the top floor, there is a fabulous rooftop bar room, bookended with a pair of fireplaces framed by lovingly crafted steel mantles and highly textural, integrated concrete art panels by Montreal artist David Umemoto.

(An absolutely fabulous aspect of the hotel is its extensive and diverse art and decor elements, mostly sourced or commissioned from thoughtful local artists and designers selected by Atelier Ace.) The washrooms on this top floor are also wonderful, with wall sconces made from sectioned clay chimney flues. But these dramatic washroom design elements

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did not make it into the washrooms serving the lobby (which are bland), and the outdoor bar terrace is much simplified from its original design, losing a long loggia along the west wall that would have provided a sense of shelter and scale. The architects, always diplomatic, demure to criticize such losses. But this is also a lesson for clients: stay the course, see the vision through.

The Ace Hotel offers the city not only a new exemplar of hotel design, but a valuable approach to quality infill. Its presence is gently enlivening a quiet, post-industrial area of the city. It is both a showpiece and, simultaneously, an excellent fabric building. It blessedly avoids fakery, nostalgia and vulgarity while projecting design depth and robustness. Ace Toronto demonstrates the transformative potential of quality architecture, and we need more of its like. But in the meanwhile, it’s a dreamworld I’m glad to enjoy.

Bill Curran is a principal of Hamilton-based CGS / Curran Gacesa Slote Architects.

OWNERS ALTERRA, B-RIGHT, FINER SPACE CORPORATION, PROWINKO AND ZINC DEVELOPMENTS |

MANAGEMENT COMPANY ACE HOTEL GROUP | ARCHITECT TEAM BRIGITTE SHIM, HOWARD SUTCLIFFE, NARSI NAGHIKHANI, BLAINE LEPP | PROJECT TEAM ZACK GLENNON AND DESIGN WORKSHOP ARCHITECTS | STRUCTURAL REED JONES CHRISTOFFERSEN LTD. | MECHANICAL/ELECTRICAL MCW CONSULTANTS LTD. | CIVIL COLE ENGINEERING | CODE DAVID HINE ENGINEERING | LANDSCAPE NAK DESIGN STRATEGIES | TRANSPORTATION BA CONSULTING GROUP | PLANNING BOUSFIELDS INC. PLANNING AND STIKEMAN ELLIOTT LLP | KITCHEN CINI LITTLE INTERNATIONAL | LIGHTING VBK LIGHTING | HOTEL PROCUREMENT BENJAMIN WEST | SPRINKLER SYSTEM HYDRAULICS ANC | INTERIORS SHIM-SUTCLIFFE ARCHITECTS AND ATELIER ACE | CONTRACTOR ALTERRA | AREA 7,089 M2 | BUDGET WITHHELD | COMPLETION JULY 2022

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STRATEGIC INTERVENTIONS

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THE CENTURY-AND-A-HALF-OLD UNIVERSITY COLLEGE IS REVITALIZED WITH A SERIES OF THOUGHTFULLY CONCEIVED AND PRECISELY EXECUTED MOVES.

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A new elevator shaft is clad with overlapping copper tiles reminiscent of dragon scales. ABOVE LEFT In the library, a swooping white staircase is detailed with picket-like reveals that allow for views through the guardrail. ABOVE RIGHT The library’s upper mezzanine revives a spatial arrangement found in the original 1850s library, which was destroyed by fire. OPPOSITE Mirrored strips on the main-level stacks help to lighten the visual weight of the mezzanine above.

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University College Revitalization, Toronto, Ontario Kohn Shnier and ERA Architects in Association TEXT Pamela Young PHOTOS Doublespace Photography PROJECT

ARCHITECTS

A good cover song generates renewed appreciation for the original while establishing the validity of the reinterpretation. The main building of University College, the University of Toronto’s founding college, was designed by Cumberland and Storm and completed in 1859. After an 1890 fire gutted most of the interior, the college was grandly rebuilt. More recently this magnificent repository of gargoyles, stained glass and ornamental stonework was a golden oldie ripe for a remix: in addition to falling far short of 21st-century accessibility standards, “ UC ” needed a radical space usage rethink and extensive systems upgrades.

Kohn Shnier Architects and heritage specialists ERA Architects aptly characterize their UC revitalization as “strategic and surgical.”

It encompasses comprehensive accessibility upgrades, the transformation of Canada’s first purpose-built chemistry lab into a conference centre’s main space, the renovation of the West Hall reading room and various classrooms and offices, a new café, and the return of UC ’s library to its pre-fire home in the East Hall.

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When John Shnier and ERA’s Graeme Stewart conducted a July 2022 Toronto Society of Architects tour, they stressed that although UC may look to 21st-century eyes like quaint Victorian medievalizing, it was radical in its day. Stewart describes it as Canada’s first example of “progressive eclecticism”: a mash-up combining historic Norman, Gothic, and Italianate elements with contemporary inf luences such as the Second Empire style. To Shnier, it was important for new revitalization elements to avoid the heritage renovation “trope” of minimalist steel-and-glass neutrality: “We were trying to solve oxymorons—to create interventions that are clearly of this moment, but at the same time look as though they’ve always been there.”

The University College Revitalization is a series of Big Moments, linked by changes that, without calling attention to themselves, do much of the heavy lifting required for modernization. The integration of accessibility ramps exemplifies the latter. Shnier recalls sneaking off after the RFP-stage mandatory site visit to do some measuring. Initially the university had thought mini-lifts would be needed to address UC ’s frequent partial-f light level changes. Kohn Shnier and ERA argued, in their proposal, that a carefully conceived ramps system would be a viable and more gracious alternative. Mission accomplished: the revitalization’s chevron-patterned grey stone ramps, accented with landingdelineating black-and-white borders, mesh beautifully with the heritage

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1 PAUL M. CADARIO CONFERENCE CENTRE AND CROFT CHAPTER HOUSE 2 BARRIER-FREE ENTRANCE TO CROFT LOBBY 3 SENIOR COMMON LOUNGE 4 BARRIER-FREE WASHROOM 5 ACCESSIBILTY IMPROVEMENTS 6 LECTURE THEATRE 7 INTERACTIVE LEARNING CLASSROOM 8 ELEVATOR 9 CLARK READING ROOM 10 SERVERY 11 LIBRARY 12 SUCCESS CENTRE 13 CAFÉ 14 LIBRARY MEZZANINE LEVEL

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interior palette. Similarly, automatic door openers, fire and life safety hardware and other mechanical and electrical control panels were consolidated into freestanding blackened steel consoles that made it possible to integrate a lot of new tech without having to run conduits up the walls.

The Big Moments, for their part, are woven into the heritage fabric with equal thoughtfulness. West of the elevated 19th-century main entrance, a new accessible entrance leads into the Paul M . Cadario Conference Centre. Circular in plan, the centre’s Croft Chapter House was originally UC ’s chemistry lab. Pulled away from the rest of the building to contain explosions, the domed chapter house was one of few UC interiors not destroyed in the 1890 fire. This striking but long-underused room has been transformed into versatile, technologyenabled space. Its massive new ‘chandelier’, fabricated by Eventscape, improves acoustics and provides adjustable lighting, without closing off views to the dome. A perimeter bar rail tucked into the wainscoting—made of stained oak pickets infilled with fabric-wrapped acoustic material—supports the conversion of space that hosts presentations by day into an after-hours venue for drinks and socializing.

On the second floor, the soaring West and East Halls flanking UC ’s main stairwell originally housed a museum and library respectively, but both were repurposed as examination rooms/study hall space after the 1890 fire. In the West Hall, now called the Clark Reading Room, new

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10M

cylindrical pendants provide even, ambient light that shows off the freshly restored wall and ceiling woodwork, while downlights in the same fixtures provide illumination levels suitable for reading a book or newspaper. (Shnier notes that the university originally envisioned traditional chandelier-style lighting for this space. To demonstrate that the functionally superior but more contemporary-looking pendants would complement the interior, the design team gathered images of Oxford University’s Christ Church dining hall, which has pendant fixtures when it’s used as a Hogwarts set in the Harry Potter movies.)

The most complex of the UC Revitalization’s Big Moments is the return of the library to the East Hall. A mezzanine framed the original 1850s library, creating study nooks on two levels around the open centre. The new library reinstates this type of spatial arrangement. Shnier likens the new mezzanine to an oversized “piece of furniture” that houses an array of infrastructure and provides access for future systems modifications, while meeting heritage requirements for OPPOSITE TOP The domed Croft Chapter House was restored with a multipurpose ceiling fixture that improves acoustics and provides adjustable lighting. OPPOSITE BOTTOM A series of ramps weaves accessibility into the building, avoiding the lifts that the University had initially thought necessary to upgrade the space.

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A fire hose cabinet is surrounded by a glowing halo, giving it a ghostly presence in resonance with its 19th-century surroundings. ABOVE In several areas, ramps become the main circulation routes through the building, collapsing the distinction between accessible and regular paths of travel.

ABOVE

minimal contact with the 19th-century walls. Its construction was no easy feat: steel supports had to be embedded in the ground and threaded through first-f loor classrooms. To reduce the mezzanine’s bulk, the main-f loor stacks taper inward as they rise. Adding to the effort to dematerialize the volume, mirrored stringcourses were inset up the full height of the main-level stacks. (These mirror strips also let students approaching a study alcove know whether it’s occupied and give those sitting in these nooks a head’s-up when someone approaches.) But these mitigation measures are not enough to counteract the impression of a lot of “furniture” squeezed into a smallish box—and the mirroring adds a dollop of cruise-ship glitz to an otherwise urbane heritage renewal.

There is, however, a lot to like in the library. The new stairway that swirls between the main and mezzanine levels is confident, modern, and purposefully playful: the ‘spikes’ incised through its white-painted steel balustrade enable even shorter students to take in the axial view enroute between levels. Seeing the restored stained glass and ornamental carvings at eye height adds to the pleasure of exploring the mezzanine. Here again, accessibility-improving interventions enliven everyone’s experience of moving through this building. At the mezzanine’s west end, the f loor ramps up slightly around enclosed volumes containing study rooms and administrative space to provide access to an attic-level café and the new elevator.

Normally, an elevator addition barely rates a mention in a project review, but this one is a Big Moment. Unable to find a suitable interior location for an elevator shaft, the design team repurposed the quadrangle-facing ground-floor purser’s office and designed a new tower above it. Clad in overlapping copper tiles that are several decades away from acquiring an old-timey patina, the new elevator shaft nonetheless evokes heraldic associations, ranging from armour to dragon scales.

It is of its own time—especially at night, when a soft red LED glow seeps out between the tiles—but also true to the spirit of University College’s historically allusive architecture. It belongs. And it’s arguably the signature riff in a revitalization that compellingly reinterprets University College for the 21st century.

Pamela Young is a Toronto-based writer and communications manager.

CLIENT UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO | ARCHITECT TEAM KOHN SHNIER—JOHN SHNIER, MAGGIE BEN-

NEDSEN, AMIN EBRAHIM, TRISTAN VAN LEUR, ROXANA LILOVA, KIANA MOZAYYAN ESFAHANI. ERA—GRAEME STEWART, MAX BERG, LEAG GIBLING | STRUCTURAL BLACKWELL ENGINEERING | MECHANICAL/ELECTRICAL HIDI | CONTRACTOR MJ DIXON | CROFT CHAPTER HOUSE ACOUSTIC CANOPY FABRICATOR/CONTRACTOR EVENTSCAPE | LIGHTING ALULA LIGHTING | AREA 2,230 M2 | BUDGET WITHHELD | COMPLETION 2021 | OFFICIAL OPENING OCTOBER 2022

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BOOKS

TORONTO STAR PHOTOGRAPHIC ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES: COLIN MCCONNELL

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RECONSIDERING RON THOM A NEW BOOK BY ADELE WEDER CHRONICLES THE ODYSSEY OF THOM’S LIFE AND TIMES. Odile Hénault

COURTESY OF THE THOM FAMILY ARCHIVE; TONY ARCHER.

REVIEW

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“Something akin to a miracle….” This is how John Fraser, Master Emeritus of Massey College describes his former institution, designed by Ron Thom in the early 1960s. His words might equally have served as the title for Adele Weder’s recently released book, Ron Thom, Architect: The Life of a Creative Modernist. The new publication is a thorough and compassionate portrait of one of Canada’s most creative—and tormented—architects. It stands out as an intimate look at Ron Thom’s life and career, but also as a remarkable foray into the complex political, economic, and professional forces at play in any large-scale architecture project.

The book’s 21 chapters are grouped under two headings: West and East. West refers to Vancouver, where Thom grew up and started his career in architecture. East alludes to Toronto, where he settled until his passing in 1986. In the first chapters, we learn about Thom’s family and about the influence his music-loving mother had over him in his early years, as she relentlessly steered him towards a career as a concert pianist. These ambitions came to an abrupt end as the young Thom discovered the joys of drawing in high school. His true call, however came in 1941, when he enrolled at the Vancouver School of Art. There, he was taught by such luminaries as artists Jack Shadbolt and Bert (B.C.) Binning—both of whom embraced art and architecture as closely allied fields.

B.C. Binning, in particular, exercised considerable authority amongst his colleagues and students in the early 40s. After spending a year in Europe and some time in New York, Binning returned to his

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CANADIAN ARCHITECTURAL ARCHIVES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY, RON THOM

hometown, determined to build a house which would serve as a salon for Vancouver’s arts circle. Beyond being impactful in its time, the resulting home is also one origin point for the current book on Ron Thom. The Binning House was the topic of Adele Weder’s Master’s thesis at UBC; her research eventually led her to co-author a book on Binning, and brought greater awareness to the artist’s inf luence on the developing scene of West Coast Modernist architects, including Ron Thom. Weder’s growing interest in Thom later led her to curate the exhibition and accompanying catalogue Ron Thom and the Allied Arts, on display at the West Vancouver Museum in 2014 and later at Toronto’s Gardiner Museum. The present book is the final outcome of a relentless fascination and in-depth research into the life of a highly unusual architectural figure.

As Thom started his career, the power scene in Vancouver was well established. “The region’s politicians, lumber barons, mining magnates, and other corporate titans convened [at the Vancouver Club] regularly to eat, drink, smoke, gossip, and conjure up the region’s future,” writes Weder. “Architects invested in its high-priced memberships, which paid off handsomely in relationships and design commissions.”

Thom began his apprenticeship in 1949 at Sharp & Thompson, Berwick, Pratt—one of Vancouver’s most well-connected and wellestablished firms. Thom was taken under the wing of Ned Pratt who, according to Weder, “recognized […] that even when people wanted

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PETER VARLEY

STEVEN EVANS

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Thom in the mezzanine studio of his self-designed house on Meadowcliffe Drive, Scarborough. OPPOSITE BOTTOM The young Ron Thom’s family, including, clockwise from left, Heather, Ron, Mavis, Elena, and James Thom. TOP Ron Thom’s southeast elevation for round two of the Massey College competition. ABOVE LEFT The dining hall at Massey College ­was conceived as a total work of art; Thom designed the architecture, lighting, and furniture. ABOVE RIGHT Inspired by the Oxford Colleges, Massey College groups residence rooms and common areas around a generous shared courtyard.

OPPOSITE TOP

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BOOKS

COURTESY OF STEVEN EVANS

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COURTESY OF STEVEN EVANS

ABOVE Thom masterplanned and designed Champlain College, the anchor building for Trent University, as a village-like grouping of modern, textured concrete buildings. LEFT The ceiling of the Champlain College dining hall exemplifies Thom’s artistry in combining modern materials and techniques with an attention to craft and detail.

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efficiency, they still wanted beauty.” Thom’s talent as an illustrator got him in the door, but his role soon expanded. Beyond being a workplace, TBP, as it was known, was a small society in itself, with passionate young men often staying after hours to explore new ways of building houses. Among them were Thom, Arthur Erickson, and Erickson’s future business partner Geoff Massey. Their “2 a.m. specials” resulted in striking projects, in tune with the lush Pacific vegetation and Vancouver’s amazing coastal views.

1949 was also the year the Government of Canada launched its Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters, and Sciences, headed by Vincent Massey, who was to have a major inf luence on the future of the arts in Canada. Serving as Governor General from 1952 to 1959, Massey also happened to be at the head of a wealthy family that would be instrumental in Ron Thom’s eventual move to Toronto.

The 50s were marked by TBP obtaining the commission to design and build the B.C. Electric Building. Weder provides helpful background on the social and political context that surrounded this new job, for which Ron Thom was designated as lead designer. The project, which involved artist B.C. Binning, was highly praised as an original, modern, and elegant take on the highrise office tower. But, reports

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Weder, it also fed the “rift between Ned [Pratt] and Ron, which had been widening as Ron’s fame grew.”

“In February of 1960,” writes Weder, “Ron received a letter that would change his life forever.” Vincent Massey, who had just retired from his official duties, was inviting him to participate in an architectural competition, along with Arthur Erickson, John C. Parkin and Carmen Corneil. The project was for a graduate student residence on the grounds of the University of Toronto. The memorandum accompanying the invitation stipulated that the building “should possess certain qualities: dignity, grace, beauty and warmth.” Thom, in charge of TBP ’s proposal, won the competition and went on to build Massey College, “destined to be a kind of grand plot twist in the story of modern Canadian architecture,” according to Weder. Indeed, in the context of the early 60s, the carefully crafted, intimate interiors proposed by Thom were perceived by some of his contemporaries as contrary to the prevailing trend towards slick glass-and-steel modernism.

Weder describes the painstaking design process, which was totally under Thom’s control, as one that was professionally rewarding, but personally taxing. Adding to the complexity, Thom still lived in Vancouver and was juggling other commissions at TBP, all while going through unsettling divorce negotiations. Playwright, novelist, and inaugural Master of Massey College Robertson Davies described Thom in his personal diary as “a man of genius, without self-knowledge or self-protection, naked, bruised, and wandering.”

Thom’s mounting personal hurdles were to be somewhat tempered when he finally moved to Toronto in 1963. He was deeply in love with Molly Golby, whom he had met a year before while working on Massey College. He would soon be married to her. Another positive turn of events was a chance encounter on the construction site of Massey College with Tom Symons, the founding president of Trent University—a post-secondary institution in its early planning stages in Peterborough, Ontario.

This meeting eventually turned into a commission to lead the design of the new university’s masterplan and first buildings—a commission, writes Weder, that “marked a quantum leap in scale and complexity

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from anything Ron had attempted in his career. He knew how to design stand-alone houses and buildings, but he had no idea of how to go about master-planning a university campus from scratch.”

Thom struggled with the difficult task at hand and relied on TBP’s expertise to back him up. He surrounded himself with a few talented, trusted colleagues, among them, architect Paul Merrick. Like Massey College, the design of Champlain College—the new university’s f lagship building—became a kind of living laboratory for exploring new ideas. Fortunately, Thomas Symons turned out to be an indefectible champion and supporter of Thom’s creative vision. As Symons confided to Weder during an interview, “[Thom] would draw, and with just a few strokes of a pen, he would precisely conceptualize something I couldn’t even imagine. It was breathtaking.”

The resulting building, mostly designed by Ron Thom, was highly praised for its aesthetics—but the budget ran much higher than expected, alarming Trent’s cost consultants. As pressure mounted on the architectural team, Weder writes, “Ron’s architects struggled to get their projects back on schedule while producing thousands of meticulously rendered hand-drawings and details.”

Accustomed to digital tools, today’s young architects would probably be astonished at the amount of work needed to document a project or produce seductive perspective renderings. Unfortunately for Thom, even by the time Champlain College was underway, his more traditional work methods were starting to be displaced by digital drafting in the powerful corporate world, and among the most aggressive architectural firms. Weder sheds light on the anxiety the shift created among architects such as Thom, who still firmly believed in the value of intricate, time-consuming hand drawings.

Nonetheless, by the time work was completed at Trent, Thom’s reputation had grown. So had his workload and his staff. He brought in new talent, including Peter Berton and Stephen Quigley, but “floundered at the overwhelming task of running the firm,” writes Weder. Towards the end of the book, the chapter ‘Art versus the Corporate Wave’ summarizes the challenges Thom had to face as he tried to respond to this new reality. She also explores his mounting dependency on alcohol, which was to eventually destroy his second marriage and many of his relationships. Weder handles this nexus of issues that led to Thom’s untimely death in 1986 with restraint and great delicacy.

A lot more could be said about this book, which reads like a novel: tragic at times, but exhilarating in so many ways. It is particularly thrilling for those of us who believe, as did Thom, that “The architect’s role as artist must none the less continue to be the most important raison d’être for his existence—and for the existence of his profession— as it has been throughout history.”

Kudos to Weder who spent years on the research, interviews, and writing for this book. Thanks also are due to the architect’s family and his long-time colleagues and friends, who allowed Weder to access photographs and intimate documents that enrich this publication. In a country where architecture publishing can be an incredible ordeal, gratitude is also merited by Greystone Books, as they fully endorsed this publication.

The author’s hope was that anyone interested in understanding, in John Fraser’s words, “the difference between a humdrum shelter and something akin to a miracle,” would enjoy reading Ron Thom, Architect: The Life of a Creative Modernist. I believe she has achieved her goal.

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Odile Hénault is a contributing editor to Canadian Architect. She studied at TUNS (now Dalhousie University’s School of Architecture), founded by Jack Shadbolt in 1961. Her first internship led her to work at TBP, where she became acquainted with a number of Ron Thom’s long-time colleagues. She later crossed paths with Ron Thom in Toronto, while she was at the helm of section a, the architectural journal she created in 1983. She published Ron Thom’s National Gallery competition entry in section a in August 1984.

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BOOKS

The Site Magazine: Deviant Devices and The Edit REVIEW

Christian Maidankine

Since taking over On Site Review in 2015, the designers, academics, practitioners, and journalists that make up The Site Collective’s core team have been experimenting with different ways that print media can serve as a forum for architectural ideas. Their first half-dozen editions of The Site Magazine continued the thematic, call-based format of On Site Review.

But more recently, readers have been treated to some new formats.

The four slim volumes in the series Deviant Devices are held together by a rubber band notched into their covers. Each volume follows a theme—Perceive, Collect, Translate, and Disperse—exploring how it is practised through physical apparatuses. Together, they inquire: how do designers use tools to understand, collate, and spread their work— and how do these processes become just as important as the information they treat?

Perceive follows those who use their work to look at the world. Some later analyze this data, while others, such as artist Dan Tapper, value the raw observations. Tapper’s bespoke Machines to Listen to the Sky track electromagnetic sounds in the world’s ionosphere. Collect describes different projects of information recording, including Elaine Ayers’ piece on colour coding in botany— a work that expresses the complications that arise from the deterioration of material samples and information over time. The projects

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in Translate relay information, including Project Gnomo, a solar clock created by University of Waterloo assistant professor Jonathan Enns that keeps time in digital script, tying together the physical and virtual. The final journal, Disperse, identifies projects involved in the spread of information. It includes the work of Jon Beck, whose surreptitious 3D scans of museum artifacts aim to freely share cultural artefacts with global audiences.

Deviant Devices is a compact yet direct series—highlighting people who have a compelling view of their surroundings, want to gain a further understanding of it, and finally, are moved to share that information with others.

The Collective’s most recent publication, The Edit, returns to an exploration of the book-a-zine format. It centres the voices of the marginalized, including immigrants, victims of racialized crime, Indigenous groups, and aging populations. The publication explores what “edits”—changes to the built world enacted by conf licting powers— have affected the experiences of these communities. How can those with little agency in the built environment begin, in turn, to “edit” their boundaries, creating a sense of place and greater autonomy for themselves?

The texts in this issue highlight the importance of building relationships and processes, rather than developing pre-determined solutions—in effect, providing the opportunity for future edits. Amina Lalor’s interview with four editors from the University of Manitoba publication Voices of the Land: Indigenous Design and Planning from the Prairies is particularly

powerful. All five individuals note that institutional spaces didn’t acknowledge their Indigenous identities. Founding the Indigenous Design and Planning Student Association and releasing this publication created a space for their presence in the discipline, and has helped make new room for Indigenous youth interested in design.

The Edit explores new ways of communicating, encouraging the reader to fill out worksheets, remove pages, and post material into their own spaces. As a whole, the issue showcases the need to acknowledge earlier, painful drafts of society—and allows readers to become editors of a more compassionate future.

Christian Maidankine is a Master’s candidate in the Department of Architectural Science at Toronto Metropolitan University.

Unplanned Visitors: Queering the Ethics and Aesthetics of Domestic Space

By Olivier Vallerand (McGill – Queens University Press, 2020) REVIEW Maya Orzechowska

“Gender and sexuality’s inf luence on the design and use of a space are not essentializing characteristics,” writes Olivier Vallerand, “but two of the multiple lenses through which individuals might understand and navigate the world.” In Unplanned Visitors, Vallerand— a design educator, researcher and writer— challenges the way that gender stereotypes

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inf luence design, especially in the assumptions behind domestic space. His open-ended and inspiring case studies provide alternative paths for future architecture.

Vallerand weaves together a history of queer critiques, an exploration of their close and foundational relationship with feminist perspectives, and contemporary examples from art, spatial interventions, and architecture.

The rich mix includes projects and ideas by Mark Robbins, John Paul Ricco, Joel Sanders, J Mayer H, Elmgreen & Dragset, Andrés Jaque, QSPACE, and MYCKET. The projects range from timely themes of home and identification, to the integration of work and home, to a model for networks of care in collective housing designed to benefit a more active, engaged, supported and dignified aging process. While architects may assume that the home is an intensely private domain, the examples make it evident that architecture is always political, and shaping more integrated domestic spaces is a political act.

Queer perspectives—and with these, racialized, less affluent, elderly, female, and trans voices, among others—are often silenced in the architectural canon, education and practice. Yet the book exposes how greater consideration as to these voices and users, along with space that is hospitable to a more diverse range of inhabitants, provides opportunities to better ref lect societal diversity.

The engaging, aspirational examples also reveal how, beyond the home, inclusive design approaches can become catalysts for meaningful changes to the binary conventions of public and private in spatial design. Strategies for changing the status quo include blurring, layering, and rethinking separations between public and private.

As Vallerand explains, “Using these [outdated constructs of public and private as] oppositions to understand spaces prevents transformation of design paradigms that could improve the well-being of many people who do not—or cannot—correspond to the typical user targeted by normative designs.” He writes, “The research project at the heart of this book thus seeks to assert the potential of a queer perspective on architectural design history, theory and education: a politically responsible approach that can create more inclusive, more integrated, and safer buildings and neighbourhoods for everyone.”

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Maya Orzechowska is a Toronto-based architectural designer and an instructor at Toronto Metropolitan University. Her research work on homes gives centrality to issues of vulnerability, emotional health, empathy and resource sharing.

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BACKPAGE

CREATIVE TURN TEXT AND IMAGES

Sami Kazemi

AI TECHNOLOGIES MAY DISRUPT THE PROFESSION IN MORE PROFOUND WAYS THAN WE ARE PREPARED FOR.

To say that I created the above images may not be entirely accurate. Perhaps it’s more appropriate to say that I commissioned and oversaw their production. These images were created with the help of DALL-E, an Artificial Intelligence (AI) system that can create entirely unique, well-composed images based on nothing more than text prompts. The text prompts can be conceptual and vague, giving the AI creative liberties, or literal and precise, if more intentionality is desired. This leaves the human in the role of the curator or art director, able to enhance and refine the images through iterations and further text prompts.

It is easy to see how this tool can disrupt the professions of illustration, graphic design, digital art, and art direction. Not because AI tools are speeding productivity to a degree that doesn’t require as many humans to do the production work, but rather because AI tools are now able to enhance the creative ideation process to a degree that doesn’t require as many humans (if any) to come up with the creative idea.

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But what about our profession? Throughout my architectural career, I’ve noticed a pattern related to our perception of new technologies, whether it was CAD, 3D visualizations, BIM, or parametric design. There was always the initial brief concern of how new technology was going to disrupt the profession, and how it was going to displace or reduce the need for human creativity. This was followed by the realization that new technology merely added a tool to our tool belt. It helped us develop, visualize, or document our vision more efficiently, while leaving the creative process entirely in the realm of the human designer.

Because of this past collective experience, I think we will be biased to think that the new emerging AI tools are merely productivity aids that follow in the footsteps of previous technology. As these AI tools continue to mature, however, a fundamental difference is starting to emerge. These tools are not related to the production aspects, but rather, to the creative ideation process needed to transform a brief into a design.

ABOVE Two renderings created with the help of DALL-E, an Artificial Intelligence (AI) system that generates images based on text prompts.

Given the speed at which AI is being implemented in the real world, it seems likely that there will be a significant impact on the architectural profession in the coming years. This means that the profession needs to start thinking now about how it will respond to these changes, rather than waiting until it is forced to do so.

I stated at the beginning that I did not entirely create the images above. I should now acknowledge that I did not entirely write this article, either! The previous paragraph was entirely written by a text-completion-AI, as a response to a text prompt that I gave it, asking it: What should architects do to prepare for the emergence of AI technologies? While it’s meta to ask AI what we should do about AI, I think it’s in our best interest to keep an open mind and listen.

After all, it may be smarter than us.* *This last sentence was also an addition by the AI. Sami Kazemi is a Toronto-based Principal at BDP Quadrangle.

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