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STATE OF THE PROFESSION

CANADIAN ARCHITECT

NOVEMBER 2023 03

04 VIEWPOINT

Celebrating Claude Cormier, 1960-2023.

06 NEWS

The organizers of Architects Against Housing Alienation on Not for Sale!

15 RAIC JOURNAL

Trevor Boddy on Raymond Moriyama’s importance; the mid-century work of John Di Castri.

24 TRIBUTE

Appreciations for the life and work of George Baird (1939-2023).

54 PRACTICE

What does legacy mean for architects? Jake Nicholson interviews Daniel Cohlmeyer, Shallyn Murray, John Patkau, and Silva Stojak.

26

60 INSITES

28 ANALYZING CANADA’S ARCHITECTURAL PRACTICES

hat is the state of the architectural profession in Canada? We delve into W selected results from the newly available Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report (2023 edition).

30 HOW IS YOUR FIRM’S FINANCIAL HEALTH?

Two key indicators for assessing how your firm is measuring up. TEXT Rick Linley

Christian Maidankine on aphantasia and architecture.

62 BOOKS

A revised Vancouver architecture guidebook; key texts by Arthur Erickson and Cornelia Oberlander.

66 BACKPAGE

Cameron Cummings reviews Canadian-expat curator Carson Chan’s inaugural exhibition at MoMA.

32 MIXED PROSPECTS

Examining the intertwined economic forecasts for architecture in Canada and the United States. TEXT Phyllis Crawford

34 ARCHITECTURE AND CAPITAL “M” MARKETING Marketing offers a toolset for aligning a firm’s brand story and business development. TEXT Russell Pollard

36 FIRM EXPECTATIONS

On managing remote work and flexibility. TEXT Russell Pollard

38 COMPETITIVE COMPENSATION

A full compensation package should look beyond salary to incentivize staff.

TEXT Vered Klein

41 WOMEN IN CANADIAN ARCHITECTURE

The profession is making progress towards gender equity, but much work remains to be done. TEXT Rhys Phillips

46 FUTURE FORWARD

Recent surveys point to the need to adapt education and practice to address sustainability challenges. TEXT Terri Peters and Ted Kesik

50 LOOKING AHEAD

COVER This month’s cover art was selected for its resonance with the issue’s key themes: the present and future of architecture, and the profound loss of several members of Canada’s architecture community over the past months. Toronto-based Miles Gertler and Madrid-based Igor Bragado are the co-directors of experimental design studio Common Accounts, and created the installation Three Ordinary Funerals for the Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism, later adapting it for The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Korea. Modelled to sit atop an urban hanok, the prototypical funeral home and disposition site proposes to reverse the distancing of death from daily life, and argues for the presence of ceremony in the domestic realm.

V.68 N.08 THE NATIONAL REVIEW OF DESIGN AND PRACTICE / THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF THE RAIC / THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF THE AIA CANADA SOCIETY

Strengthening a firm’s value with a view towards succession planning.

TEXT Elaine Pantel

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CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

04

VIEWPOINT

REMEMBERING CLAUDE CORMIER In late October, hundreds gathered by The Ring at Montreal’s Place Ville Marie’s to commemorate the life of landscape architect Claude Cormier, who died at age 63. We assembled around the hot pink casket that Claude had asked his friend Jacques Bilodeau to design: he meant his friends and colleagues to smile, even at his memorial.

I first met Claude after writing my earliest freelance article for Canadian Architect, back in 2003: a thought-piece on kitsch in Quebec design, accompanied by a photo of Claude’s Lipstick Forest in Montreal’s Palais des congrès. Shyly, I knocked at his home-turned-office in the Plateau with a copy of the printed magazine in hand. The door was immediately flung wide: “Perfect!” I recall him saying.

“We need a writer for a proposal we’re working on, you can help us!”

Claude’s positive energy uplifted so many.

His wit, joy, and ability to create places with universal appeal was evident in works like the pink (and later rainbow) balls that hung above St. Catherine Street’s Gay Village for nearly a decade, the dog fountain of Berczy Park in Toronto, or the split-in-half fountain of Dorchester Square in Montreal. He was also involved in dozens of other projects that paired architecture with landscape: from the National Holocaust Monument in Ottawa with Daniel Libeskind and Edward Burtynsky, to the multilayered streetscapes of The Well in Toronto.

In a time when design is increasingly concerned with collaboration, Claude’s way of working offers lessons for all designers.

He galvanized people around the strength and clarity of his ideas, and simultaneously created space for others to exhibit their talents. One of the last times I spoke with Claude, before knowing of his illness, was interviewing him about The Ring. I remember pressing him: a ring is such an open symbol, what was his core idea? In that firm, but kind way that he had, he told me: he’d done his job in creating the idea as a physical piece in the world. It was my job, as a writer, to articulate the idea in words.

“Yes, the work environment was intense; Claude never stopped until things were perfect,” writes landscape architect Marc Hallé, who began working with Claude as an intern in 2003 and is now a co-president at the firm founded by Claude, now rebranded as CCx A. “But for those who knew him, he radiated light with a positivity and a proactive outlook that

kept clouds far at bay. He took every measure to make sure it never rained on our picnic.

Although his sunshine came with its fair share of heat, it also motivated people to be their best.”

At the centre of that positivity was a love for the work itself, and a desire to make places that embodied his philosophy of “serious fun.”

“It was never about Claude when you spoke to him, and not about you either, but about the work and the joy it brings to others,” writes landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburg. “His designs remind me of the inherent optimism of our field, which goes hand in hand with Claude’s attitude about life.

While some insist that the members of a landscape architect’s ensemble stay in their assigned roles, Claude celebrates the anomalous and the episodic: a painted stick standing in for a blue poppy, or an exuberant 50-foot catalpa suddenly endowed with equal parts whimsy and gravitas as it is captured in a perfect, circular, tree-sized island. Claude empowers plants (and people) to do their own thing—the way that he has always done his.”

Claude’s positive energy continued to the end, when he was dying from complications of Li-Fraumeni Syndrome, a rare genetic condition that predisposes carriers to multiple cancers. “I want you all to know: Guys, I’m OK!” he wrote to friends, through a mailing list managed by a close group helping him through palliative care. “I’ve lived a life much longer than I ever expected. Since I was a teenager, I always knew I would die young. My father died at 44.

My sister died at 52. I’m 63. I never expected so many years. It was always hanging over my head. All my relatives on my father’s side, 12 of them, all died of cancer. Plus many of my cousins. So I feel very fortunate. My life has been PHENOMENAL. Je suis un homme excessivement privilégié!”

“I feel the love you’re sending me from all over the world—big time! That’s why I’m at peace. Keep sending it! It reinforces all the achievements I’ve had, but I was never really aware of, because I was too busy working to see it all clearly. So keep sending the love.

I want to give it back to you!”

The love is still coming, Claude—and the legacy of your projects, and of your way of being, will continue to give so much love back to the world, for decades to come.

EDITOR ELSA LAM, FRAIC, HON. OAA ART DIRECTOR ROY GAIOT CONTRIBUTING EDITORS ANNMARIE ADAMS, FRAIC ODILE HÉNAULT LISA LANDRUM, MAA, AIA, FRAIC DOUGLAS MACLEOD, NCARB, FRAIC ADELE WEDER, HON. MRAIC ONLINE EDITOR LUCY MAZZUCCO SUSTAINABILITY ADVISOR ANNE LISSETT, ARCHITECT AIBC, LEED BD+C VICE PRESIDENT & SENIOR PUBLISHER STEVE WILSON 416-441-2085 x3 SWILSON@CANADIANARCHITECT.COM ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER FARIA AHMED 416-919-8338 FAHMED@CANADIANARCHITECT.COM 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 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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CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

06

NEWS

PROJECTS

Canada’s first zero carbon office tower opens

James K.M. Cheng Architects and Oxford Properties Group have officially opened The Stack at 1133 Melville Street in Vancouver, BC. The Stack is the first office tower to obtain certification under the Canada Green Building Council’s Zero Carbon Building design standard, and, according to Oxford, is also the first high-rise commercial tower in North America constructed to meet zero carbon standards.

Features include low carbon building systems, a high-performance triple-pane glazing system, and a photovoltaic roof array. The twisting form features outdoor terraces throughout, and the design also includes operable windows that allow for natural ventilation. At the ground level, the building is connected to a landscaped pocket park.

“In addition to the building’s achievements in sustainability and the workplace experience, we have also received a lot of compliments from our neighbours as to how well this project is fitting into the community, and how much they appreciate the Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun sculpture and the pocket park connecting to the existing network of mid-block passages and plazas,” said architect James K.M. Cheng. www.oxfordproperties.com

OXFORD PROPERTIES

WHAT’S NEW Government of Canada criticized for selecting National Monument design winner by poll, not jury

The Government of Canada’s process of selecting the winner for a competition to design the National Monument to Canada’s Mission in Afghanistan is under scrutiny. Documents shared by Quebec architecture firm Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker and a subsequent investigation

by Quebec newspaper La Presse have revealed how the Government chose the winner of a public poll over the jury’s selected winner.

While the project designed by Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker Architecture, Luca Fortin (artist), and Louise Arbour (advisor) was selected as the winner by the competition jury, it was not awarded the project by the Government of Canada.

On June 19, 2023, the Government of Canada announced the selection of a design by Team Stimson, comprising Adrian Stimson (visual artist), MBTW Group (landscape architects), and LeuWebb Projects (public art coordinators). This followed a national design competition process launched in 2020.

However, the day after the public announcement of the winner, Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker received a letter from Veterans Affairs Canada, which read, in part: “Despite the fact that the jury designated your concept as the winning concept of the competition, after careful consideration, the Government of Canada has decided to select the concept developed by [another team] and, consequently, to award the contract to that team.”

The government has said that it based its decision on the results of a public poll surveying respondents on their reactions to five shortlisted proposals. The poll received 12,048 responses, 85 percent of which came from respondents that participated in Canada’s mission in Afghanistan, family members of those who participated, veterans, or current members of the Canadian Armed Forces. Overall, more than half of the poll’s respondents favoured the Team Stimson proposal, which was selected about 25 percent to 50 percent more often than the Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker-led proposal, depending on the question asked.

But “when it comes to judging art or architecture projects, an online survey is a ‘simulacrum of democracy’ that cannot replace either a design

CA Nov 23.indd 6

ABOVE Designed by James K.M. Cheng Architects, The Stack is the first commercial high-rise office to be awarded the CAGBC’s Zero Carbon Building - Design Standard certification.

competition or a real jury,” write Jean-Pierre Chupin, Canada Research Chair in Architecture, Competitions and Mediations of Excellence at the Université de Montréal and architect Jacques White, trainer and professional advisor for multidisciplinary and architectural competitions.

“If this case were to become a precedent for public commissions, no architect, designer or artist would agree to their proposals being fed to an online survey,” continue Chupin and White. “To judge the complexity of projects for public spaces, buildings open to the public and, in this case, public monuments, a survey will never be as reliable, fair and transparent a procedure as a well-organized competition.”

“An anonymous online survey, even if accompanied by a series of questions, is not the equivalent of the deliberations of a jury representing the interests of the public, made up of members informed of the multiple issues at stake, who debate all the proposals—themselves designed by multidisciplinary teams—for long hours, and make a well-argued consensus judgment in the name of the collective interest,” write Chupin and White.

Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker has written to the Prime Minister of Canada to protest the “undemocratic selection process,” and is gathering support for a follow-up letter asking that the government reverse its decision and award the mandate to the team selected by the jury, as stipulated in the competition rules. It is also asking that the government put in place the necessary mechanisms to ensure that this situation does not reoccur in future competitive bidding processes. Supporters of their petition include CCA founder Phyllis Lambert, KPMB founder Bruce Kuwabara, and former Senators The Honorable Serge Joyal and The Honorable Patricia Bovey.

Another petition led by the Regroupement des artistes en arts visuels RAAV has garnered over 1,500 signatures. “Although it can be explained

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by certain political considerations, this decision is in no way justifiable and is in complete contradiction with the initial commitment to respect the results of the selection process,” reads the RAAV petition. “It raises concerns about the credibility of the competition and the way the rules were selectively applied, jeopardizing artists’ confidence in this type of government initiative.” daoustlestage.com

LETTER TO THE EDITOR Not for Sale!

As c\a\n\a\d\a’s leading voice in architectural journalism, and at a time when support for architectural criticism has waned, Canadian Architect’s review of Not for Sale! by Architects Against Housing Alienation at the Venice Biennale is important. We are grateful for this interest, and we appreciate Adele Weder’s detailed engagement with our work (see CA, August 2023). Her review is helping us hone our arguments and work to improve the quality of our project and its direction.

However, we question the impression of our Not for Sale! campaign that your readership received and are writing here to share our perspective. Our project is ongoing and won’t end when the exhibition closes in late November. The exhibition is just one step in a long process of creating real change and new forms of advocacy that architects across c\a\n\a\d\a can participate in. In other words, it’s a “hot mess” for a purpose, and in the best way.

First, we wholeheartedly agree that transforming the housing system is significantly a design problem and requires images as well as words.

Second, the radically collaborative nature of the project is essential to its functioning as an inclusive campaign. It might indeed require a “dog’s breakfast” of different approaches to solve the magnitude of brokenness we face. Third, we think meaningful demands need to exceed what is currently possible in our political climate in order to change the conversation about housing.

On our first point, each of the ten demands that comprise the campaign is richly illustrated with an architectural project, designed by a number of the country’s most celebrated architects, though the review unfortunately did not describe this work. We purposely designed the pavilion–the heart-quarters of a campaign to imagine possibilities for decommodified architecture in c\a\n\a\d\a–to be a “graphic riot”. It includes over a hundred architectural drawings, perspectives, and diagrams, in order to represent the many diverse voices who have come together to make a common campaign. The review states that the “modest” design transformation has two main features: the Land Back garden and the interior mezzanine, somehow missing a third architectural transformation: the exterior hoarding that blocks the pavilion for viewers approaching and presents them not with words, but images of a tent encampment in Vancouver, illustrating the real housing conditions for the most housing-insecure Canadians.

Second, this project is unique, not only because of its subject matter, but because of its collaborative formation. This collaboration is on display in the hoarding mentioned above, whose images were made for a documentary with the tent community, and the selection of images from that documentary was done with the community’s participation.

Not for Sale! was initiated by six people who bring different skill sets to the project; although we all teach, some of us are designers, some historians, and half of us are registered architects. Indeed, the project is “overcrowded” (which seems fitting for a project about housing).

Though the review lists some contributing architects, it omits Urban Arts Architecture’s Ouri Scott, Grounded Architecture, SOLO Architecture, and the work of David T. Fortin Architect—all Indigenous

CA Nov 23.indd 7

practitioners whose contributions are crucial for understanding both housing alienation and an architecture of connection–as well as SvN, whose senior partner John van Nostrand is the most experienced affordable housing architect in this campaign.

We collaborated initially with thirty organizations, which form ten teams, each including an architect, an activist and a housing advocate— though the campaign has grown to over forty organizations and over a hundred contributors. The ten demands, which are the centrepiece of the campaign, emerged in a collaborative and bottom-up process.

Hardly “compiled by academics,” the ten multi-disciplinary teams wrote and designed them, and they evolved over regular meetings with all participants. This campaign is a radical experiment in uniting architects, activists and advocates in what we hope is a new form of architectural activism, collaboratively created with direct ‘on-the-ground’ experience from across the country. What is perhaps most important is that the campaign has built a national conversation about architecture that includes people with other expertise who share similar and overlapping goals around housing justice in c\a\n\a\d\a. While the review doubts our ability to “enforce such demands,” its contributors are already doing the work—applying for grants, building coalitions of allied organizations, lobbying politicians and organizations, hosting events, and boosting the profiles of each campaign through diverse print and digital media. The project builds on this momentum and will continue to raise awareness and advocate for change.

Finally, we want to underline that we strongly believe the project’s proposals, while ambitious, are realistic and realizable. The review is unconvinced by the Land Back team’s demand and also doubts the demand for a gentrification tax. Taxes very much like the one the Gentrification Tax team proposes were implemented in Vermont, New

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NEWS

Zealand, Ontario, and Washington in the 1970s; the main distinction of this proposal is that it is earmarked so that the profits from housing sales fund housing affordability. There is nothing unrealizable about this proposition; it simply needs to channel an already existing political will. Nor is the Land Back demand of co-ownership of crown land unrealistic. It is an invitation to imagine a different future, one where First Nations leaders work with Canadian governments to reimagine how housing provision is addressed/redressed. The provocation of the team here is, in fact, designed to unsettle the settler imagination, and, in this, it seems to be working.

Our campaign makes ten demands that link c\a\n\a\d\a’s legacy of colonialism and the theft of Indigenous land to the deep inequality that characterizes c\a\n\a\d\a’s current housing system. We do this because today’s unsustainable ideas about the speculative value of property were formed through the process of land dispossession and because it is Indigenous practices that have so much to teach us about how to dis-alienate our homes. Government policies only change for the better because citizens make strong arguments that exceed the limitations of the current legislative and political system. Each team, the students working in the pavilion, and other members of AAHA, are all taking concrete actions toward their realization. As the review rightly points out, we are more concerned with this ongoing campaign than the exhibition itself, and we appreciate the words of encouragement for its success. We agree that our students will have much to teach us along the way—they will in fact be subject to the conditions for housing for longer than we will.

We’re just not sure that they will settle for “realistic” adjustments that preserve the status quo.

-Adrian Blackwell, David Fortin, Matthew Soules, Sara Stevens, Patrick Stewart, Tijana Vujosevic (Organizing Committee, Architects Against Housing Alienation)

I reiterate my appreciation of the great challenge and complexity of addressing the housing crisis, and respect that the Not For Sale! team holds a difference of opinion on how to address that crisis.

However, I must point out two inaccuracies in their letter of concern.

First: I agree that the Indigenous perspective is significant, which is why I deemed it important to include curator Simoogit Saa Bax Patrick Stewart’s specific comments. But just as that doesn’t negate the three non-quoted curators, there was no “omission” of any of the other team member names supplied to us. Each of them—including Ouri Scott and David Fortin—are named in the credits. In fact, this complaint affirms my own critique of the project: the pavilion had so many contributors that it was impossible to highlight them all.

Whatever insights they could offer—Indigenous and otherwise—tended to be lost in the crowd.

Second: Nowhere in my review do I suggest that co-ownership of crown land with Indigenous peoples is “unrealistic.” On the contrary, here is what I wrote: “If and when that land and its income-generating resources revert to Indigenous stewardship, the Canadian political economy will transform in a major way. Even if the transformation involves co-ownership, the governments’ power and financial strength will almost certainly diminish. You can support that consequence wholeheartedly as historic justice—a fair and necessary transition—but you cannot then assume that our governments will have the wherewithal to bankroll the manifesto’s funding demands for housing, urban revitalization, and reparation payments.”

We do agree that architecture is political and that architects should have a far greater role in the political life of our cities and our country.

For that to happen, we need to encourage more—not less—healthy and robust debate and disagreement, and we need to interpret and reflect each other’s views with accuracy.

-Adele Weder

CA Nov 23.indd 8

— WILL LEW

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

08

IN MEMORIAM Claude Cormier, 1960-2023

Landscape architect Claude Cormier, the creative force behind of some of Canada’s most beloved, joyous, and critically acclaimed public spaces, has died at his Montreal, Quebec, home on September 15th. He was 63. The cause of death was complications from Li-Fraumeni Syndrome, a rare genetic condition that predisposes carriers to multiple cancers.

Cormier’s joyful and subversive designs blended conceptual clarity with a studied instinct for making enduring places. His ability to design public spaces with broad public appeal stemmed from multiple qualities: audacity, sincerity, discipline, leadership, business acumen, a talent for creative problem solving, and an ability to bring light and laughter to everyone—and every situation—he encountered.

Along with being a gifted designer, Cormier was a deft strategist and salesman who knew how to win over even the most status-quo-minded municipal bureaucracies. For Toronto’s Berczy Park (2017), he proposed a prominent water fountain featuring life-sized bronze dogs (and a single cat); officials told him that “dogs were not art.” In response, Cormier’s team put together a 50-page presentation on the role of dogs in art over the last 500 years. This paved the way for one of Toronto’s most beloved parks for humans and dogs alike.

Cormier’s love of fashion often translated into project pitches where his team would dress up to embody a project. They appeared in full camouf lage for early design workshops on Camouf lage Park (concept, 2003) in Toronto. For a public presentation on the revitalization of Place d’Armes in Montreal (concept, 2007), the square in front of the towering spires of the iconic Basilica Notre-Dame, they donned hardhats embellished with an antler-like rack of crosses. More recently, Cormier memorably wore Rick Owens platform boots to spark humour and surprise— as well as to “boost his stature”—at the announcement of his $500,000 donation to establish the Claude Cormier Award in Landscape Architecture at his alma mater, the Daniels Faculty at the University of Toronto.

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DAVID BOYER

NEWS

CCXA

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At Toronto’s Love Park, a mature catalpa tree is enthroned on a circular island within a heart-shaped pool. ABOVE RIGHT The Ring caps the raised plaza of Montreal’s renovated Place Ville Marie, framing views to McGill University and Mont-Royal beyond.

ABOVE LEFT

Cormier came from modest, hard-working rural roots, growing up on a farm and sugarbush near the small town of Princeville, Quebec. He was the eldest of two boys and third of four children.

Cormier’s father, Laurent, was a farmer; his mother, Solange, was a teacher. Cormier embarked on an education in agronomy and plant genetics at Laval University in Quebec, with the intent of taking over the family farm. After his father died, in 1976, when Claude was 17, he re-directed his education—first to finish his undergraduate degree in Agronomy at the University of Guelph in 1982, and then to study at the University of Toronto, where he graduated in with a Bachelor of Landscape Architecture in 1986. Cormier then sought out Phyllis Lambert as a benefactor: Lambert agreed to finance a year at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design in 1994 for Cormier to obtain a Master’s degree in the History and Theory of Design, in exchange for Cormier’s commitment to consult on the landscape stewardship of Lambert’s recently built Canadian Centre for Architecture.

Cormier set up practice in Montreal in 1994, and with his early installation works, established a reputation for projects that incorporated incorporated abstraction, storytelling, conceptual art, and the bold use of colour. Ideas from this period became through-lines in Cormier’s work, and were captured in a 2008 manifesto, with maxims including: “A Garden is About Experience, Not Plants,” “Colour is not a Decoration,” “Artificial but not Fake,” and 32 others; ten more were added later.

Cormier’s work quickly scaled up to include public spaces in Montreal and his second adopted city, Toronto. His design approach favoured singular design ideas imbued with humour and grounded in a deep understanding of human social behaviour—including the theatrical way people use public space to see and to be seen.

In Montreal, Cormier’s signature projects revelled in the tension between history and contemporary design. His first competition-winning project in the city he made his home was Place d’Youville (Phase 1, 2002; Phase 2, 2008), a tree-filled linear plaza in the Old Port, crisscrossed by paths connecting the doorways of adjoining buildings.

His vision for rejuvenating Dorchester Square (Phase 1, 2010; Phase 3, 2019) incorporates mannered riffs on Victorian elements, including an ornate multi-tiered fountain sliced in half vertically (the f lat end truncated to make way for a bus route). His best-known contribution

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to Montreal’s historic waterfront is Clock Tower Beach (2012) with its distinctive blue umbrellas.

Toronto’s waterfront is home to three international competitionwinning Cormier landscapes. Completed in 2007, HTO, designed in association with Janet Rosenberg Associates, was the first in what would become a series of urban beaches designed by Cormier. Sugar Beach (2010) riffed on the beach theme, but this time with giant candy-striped rocks and “Jackie O”-pink umbrellas. His design for Leslie Lookout Park, currently finishing construction in Toronto’s Port Lands, creates a new connection to a shipping channel with a beach, forested dunes and a lookout tower. Cormier’s ability to think threedimensionally and at large scale made him an invaluable contributor to projects such as The Well in Toronto, expected to open this November, where the high-quality granite materials of the multi-level ground plane and serene linear gardens set the tone for a retail, office and residential development that covers nearly an entire downtown block.

Several projects showcase Cormier’s role as a design ambassador for queer issues. In these projects, Cormier’s characteristic blend of avantgarde techniques and accessible fun create places that emotionally resonate with—and beyond—LGBTQ2S+ clients and communities.

Whether conveyed through the pink columns of Lipstick Forest (2002), Sugar Beach’s signature pink umbrellas near the base of Toronto’s Gay Village, or the rainbow balls of Cormier’s brilliant Pink Balls (20112016) and 18 Shades of Gay (2017-2019) installations that hung over Montreal’s Sainte-Catherine Street East every summer for nearly a decade, the expression of queer joy was an important dimension of Cormier’s design identity.

Cormier’s last major works are love letters to his two chosen cities, Montreal and Toronto. The Ring in Montreal (2022) is a monumental 30-metre-diameter steel hoop, suspended between the modernist towers of Henry Cobb’s 1950s Place Ville Marie. As a piece of visual poetry, the installation marries the beloved mountain and the revitalized public space of the downtown office complex. Love Park in Toronto (2023), a heart-shaped pond enclosed by a 170-metre-long red mosaic “love seat,” transforms a former freeway offramp into a town square for a growing community on the city’s downtown waterfront. The late part of his career also saw the publication of a major retrospective called

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

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NEWS

Serious Fun: The Landscapes of Claude Cormier by Marc Treib and Susan Herrington (ORO Editions, 2021), and the rebranding of his 15-person office as CCxA , marking the passing of the torch to long-time collaborators Sophie Beaudoin, Marc Hallé, Guillaume Paradis and Yannick Roberge.

The quality of the work by Cormier and his team has garnered the highest honours of the landscape profession, including more than 100 awards. These include recognition from publications such as Fast Company, Azure and Canadian Architect, and organizations including the Canadian and American Societies of Landscape Architects, Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, and American Institute of Architects. Cormier is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada and Knight of the Ordre National du Québec. He has received individual and lifetime awards from the Association des architectes paysagistes du Québec and Architectural League of New York.

-Excerpted from a text by Beth Kapusta Gair Williamson, 1951-2023

Vancouver architect Gair Williamson, founder and principal of Gair Williamson Architects, passed away on September 9, 2023.

Gair lived the most unimaginable and fulfilling life. Those of us who knew him well have had the pleasure to hear him recalling his memories in the most articulate and perfect detail. This sensibility was revealed in his work as an architect, with the belief that buildings are a repository of our collective cultural memory. With that idea, his buildings were designed to relate to context, with materials that endure and age well over time. Their apparent simplicity invites careful investigation and multiple viewings to uncover the details and gestures that make them unique.

He leaves behind numerous realized projects, many of them in disregarded and forgotten places in the City of Vancouver’s Gastown, Chinatown and Downtown Eastside. This reflected his belief in an architect’s role and responsibility in rebuilding and giving back to the city. His efforts and contributions were celebrated by his peers in Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia Awards in Architecture for The Keefer, The Stables and his Case Study 547.

Gair was a consistent advocate of ideas regarding heritage and adaptive reuse of existing buildings in the architectural discourse in Vancouver. This interest was inherited from his work, early in his career, with the architect Barton Myers. His heritage work did not get completely unnoticed as several of his projects were awarded Vancouver and BC Heritage Awards.

A large part of Gair’s work was mentoring and inspiring young architects. At his office he instilled a culture of trust and freedom and provided the inspiration and generosity to nurture the growth of interns and architects at the early stage of their careers. We will benefit from a cohort of legacy firms that will carry forward the enduring spirit and ideas Gair generously offered.

He also shared his knowledge as an educator, teaching at the University of Waterloo School of Architecture, the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto, and Toronto Metropolitan University’s Department of Architectural Science. www.gwarchitects.ca

Taymoore Raouf Balbaa, 1977-2023

Architect Taymoore Raouf Balbaa has passed away on September 29, 2023, at the age of 46. Balbaa, who was born in Burlington, Ontario, co-founded AXIA Design Associates in 2010, where his portfolio included cultural centres, educational facilities, places of worship, infill housing, and social housing projects. He also led the design

of The Diwan, a jewel-like pavilion that completed the world’s northernmost Islamic-inspired garden, just outside of Edmonton, Alberta.

Balbaa completed his Master of Architecture degree at the University of Waterloo, and earned the 2004 RAIC Medal for his graduate thesis.

He was the recipient of the the Canada Council for the Arts’ Prix de Rome for Emerging Practitioners and the RAIC’s Young Architect Award.

Before founding AXIA Design Associates, Balbaa gained experience at architectural firms including Menis Arquitectos in Tenerife, Spain, KPMB Architects in Toronto, Massimiliano Fuksas in Rome, Italy, and HLW International in New York, NY. He contributed to the Parthenon Restoration Project in Athens, Greece, in 1998.

He also shared his knowledge as an educator, teaching at the University of Waterloo School of Architecture, the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto, and Toronto Metropolitan University’s Department of Architectural Science.

MEMORANDA Venice Biennale of Architecture

Canada Council for the Arts is currently accepting exhibition proposals for Canada’s official representation at the 19th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venizia 2025. The chosen team will be responsible for the complete execution of the exhibition in the Canada Pavilion, from design to production. Proposals are due November 15, 2023. www.canadacouncil.ca

Governor General’s Medals in Architecture

The Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC) and the Canada Council for the Arts are inviting architects to submit projects for the 2024 Governor General’s Medals in Architecture. The key metrics of Energy Use Intensity (EUI) and Thermal Energy Demand Intensity (TEDI) are mandatory starting with the 2024 submission cycle, and submission fees are now tiered according to construction cost. The deadline to enter is December 7, 2023. www.raic.org

National Urban Design Awards

The Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC), the Canadian Institute of Planners (CIP), and the Canadian Society of Landscape Architects (CSLA) are currently accepting entries for the 2024 National Urban Design Awards. Up to 12 winners will be selected from six categories: Urban Architecture, Urban Design Plans, Civic Design Projects, Urban Fragments, Community Initiatives, and Student Projects.

The deadline to enter is January 11, 2024. www.raic.org

RAIC Annual Awards

The RAIC is accepting submissions for its annual awards, including the Architectural Practice Award, Emerging Architectural Practice Award, Advocate for Architecture Award, Architectural Journalism & Media Award, and Architectural Research & Innovation Award.

The deadline for submissions is January 11, 2024. raic.org

For the latest news, visit www.canadianarchitect.com/news and sign up for our weekly e-newsletter at www.canadianarchitect.com/subscribe

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THE CANADIAN ARCHITECTURAL PRACTICES BENCHMARK REPORT (2023 EDITION) IS NOW AVAILABLE! Published in partnership by the The Royal Architectural Institute of Canada and Canadian Architect, the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report (2023 edition) provides comprehensive data on the current standards for compensation, billings, and other key indicators among Canadian architectural practices.

Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report 2023 edition

This 160+ page report provides vital business knowledge for the Canadian context with high quality data that enables practices to compare themselves across a broad spectrum of criteria, providing possibilities to identify areas of strength, challenge, and opportunity.

An update from a previous 2011 benchmark report, the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report (2023 edition) covers 16 key areas, including new sections related to Indigenous themes and reconciliation, climate action, and equity, justice, diversity, and inclusion.

GET YOUR COPY TODAY AT https://bit.ly/benchmarkreport23 Publication List Price: $350 • RAIC Member Price: $250

We are grateful to all the contributors to this publication, including the hundreds of survey participants (individuals and firms), Bramm Research Inc, and the RAIC committees and volunteer groups that provided input, including the Committee on Regenerative Environments, Indigenous Task Force, Truth and Reconciliation Task Force, Promoting Equity and Justice Committee, and Practice Support Committee.

Questions? Please contact benchmark@raic.org

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A Renewal for the New Year! The RAIC helps architects at all stages of their careers, from building a solid foundation as a student to leaving a lasting impact as a Fellow. As a member, you access valuable resources and mentorship, and expand your global network. Renew by January 18th. raic.org Un renouvellement pour la nouvelle année! L’IRAC aide les architectes à toutes les étapes de leur carrière, tant pour bâtir de solides fondations comme étudiant que pour laisser un impact durable comme fellow. Les membres ont accès à des ressources précieuses et à du mentorat et ont l’occasion d’élargir leur réseau global. Renouvelez votre adhésion avant le 18 janvier. raic.org/fr The RAIC 2024 Conference on Architecture in Vancouver, BC, from May 14-18, welcomes attendees at all career levels for insights, inspiration, and practical ideas, offering professional and educational benefits, along with interactive learning opportunities. raic.org/2024-raic-conference-architecture La Conférence sur l’architecture 2024 de l’IRAC qui aura lieu à Vancouver (C.-B.) du 14 au 18 mai, accueille des participants qui y trouveront de l’inspiration, des points de vue nouveaux et des idées pour des applications pratiques, à quelque étape de leur carrière qu’ils en soient, en plus d’en tirer des avantages professionnels et éducatifs grâce aux occasions d’apprentissage interactif. raic. org/fr/raic/conference-sur-larchitecture-delirac-2024-0 Call for Submissions. Submit your work for two prestigious awards: 1) National Urban Design Awards, recognizing contributions to urban design, deadline Jan. 11, 2024 and 2) Governor General’s Medals in Architecture, celebrating design excellence by Canadian architects, deadline Dec 7, 2023. www.raic.org Appel de candidatures. Présentez votre candidature pour deux prix prestigieux : 1) les Prix nationaux de design urbain, qui récompensent des contributions au design urbain, date limite : 11 janvier 2024 et 2) les Médailles du Gouverneur général en architecture, qui célèbrent l’excellence en design d’architectes canadiens, date limite : 7 décembre 2023. raic.org/fr/

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

RAIC Journal Journal de l’IRAC Architect Raymond Moriyama passed away on September 1, 2023, at the age of 93.

L’architecte Raymond Moriyama est décédé le 1er septembre 2023, à l’âge de 93 ans.

Moriyama Teshima Architects

Briefs En bref

Benchmarking Success Analyse comparative de la réussite Giovanna Boniface Chief Implementation Officer Cheffe de la mise en œuvre

This month’s issue of Canadian Architect is the result of a long-term collaboration. It highlights key findings from the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report (2023 edition), published in partnership by the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada and Canadian Architect.

The full Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report, which is now available for purchase, provides comprehensive data on the current standards for compensation, billings, and other key indicators among Canadian architectural practices. Based on an extensive industry survey from earlier this year, it contains vital business knowledge for the Canadian context, including high quality data that will enable practices to compare themselves across a broad spectrum of criteria, providing possibilities to identify areas of strength, challenge and opportunity.

The Benchmark Report is an update from a previous 2011 edition, but we’ve heard from our members that they would like to see such reports with greater frequency—so we’re already planning for the next one. In the meanwhile, you can purchase the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report (2023 edition) at raic.org.

Le présent numéro de Canadian Architect est le fruit d’une collaboration à long terme. Il souligne les principales conclusions de l’Étude comparative sur les bureaux d’architectes du Canada (l’Étude), édition de 2023, publiée en partenariat par l’Institut royal d’architecture du Canada et Canadian Architect.

La version intégrale de l’Étude, maintenant disponible à l’achat, fournit des données exhaustives sur les normes actuelles en matière de rémunération, de facturation et d’autres indicateurs clés dans les bureaux d’architectes du Canada. Basée sur une vaste enquête effectuée auprès des intervenants du secteur un peu plus tôt cette année, elle comprend des renseignements cruciaux pour les entreprises œuvrant en contexte canadien, notamment des données de grande qualité qui permettront aux bureaux de se comparer sur un large éventail de critères, leur donnant ainsi la possibilité de cerner leurs forces, leurs défis et leurs opportunités.

L’Étude comparative est une mise à jour de l’édition antérieure de 2011. Nos membres nous ont toutefois indiqué qu’ils aimeraient que ce type d’étude soit réalisé plus fréquemment; c’est pourquoi nous préparons déjà la prochaine édition. Entre-temps, vous pouvez acheter l’Étude comparative sur les bureaux d’architectes du Canada (édition de 2023) à raic.org/fr.

RAIC Journal

Journal de l’IRAC

Why Raymond Moriyama Matters L’importance de Raymond Moriyama

Moriyama Teshima Architects

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Trevor Boddy Architecture critic and historian Critique et historien de l’architecture

While disguised by his innate humility, Raymond Moriyama, who died at age 93 in September, is proving to be one of the most influential architects Canada has ever seen. Certainly, no peer can come close to the string of almost-new building types he pioneered in the first decades of his practice. Moriyama rose to national prominence with his Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre of 1963. In the decades prior to its completion, Canada had built plenty of nostalgic half-timbered English social halls, tile-roofed Chinese clan hubs and dark wooden-walled German cultural enclaves. Until Moriyama’s breakthrough design, however, there had never been a contemporary synthesis of leading architecture from the nation of memory with the new realities of life in Canada. The Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre set the datum for buildings that probe the profound depths of the immigrant experience, rather than suffice with surface effects.

I first came to appreciate Raymond Moriyama’s quiet wisdom during my around-the-world architecture student year out in 1977, which started with a term at London’s Architectural Association, and ended in Japan. Just before my departure, my history and criticism professor Michael McMordie had brought his Universi-

ty of Toronto classmate to Calgary for a talk. At the reception after, I told Moriyama about my travel plans, including my enthusiasm for the works of Kenzo Tange. (From the windows of my Edmonton high school English classroom, I had watched Peter Hemingway’s 1970 cablesupported Coronation Swimming Pool rise, his design a riff on Tange’s 1964 Tokyo Olympics installations.) Ray smiled and responded graciously, in that quiet but firm voice of his: “Tange is a very good architect, but while you are there, why not take a look at some of the works of Kunio Maekawa?”

I followed his advice and was deeply moved by the Tokyo Bunka Kaikan and other Maekawa designs that marked his maturation, after early works under the shadow of Le Corbusier. The wisdom of Moriyama’s advice came clear when I finally visited his Japanese Cultural Centre after my return to Canada. Moriyama had borrowed expertly from Maekawa, but also fused it with his own emerging aesthetic. Only then did I realize why dozens of Ontario’s Japanese community members had mortgaged their own homes to build it, in those days before multicultural policies and funding. With this single work, Moriyama set the standard for the best cultural centres, mosques and prayer halls that have followed in Canada ever since.

The same is true of the indoor/outdoor, public space-oriented suburban civic centre, effectively invented with Moriyama’s Scarborough Civic Cen-

tre of 1973. There would be no Mississauga City Hall without its pioneering, and even Bing Thom acknowledged Scarborough as a key precedent for his Surrey Central City. Then there is the downtown main library branch, another Moriyama breakthrough. The confident brick walls and bright interior of Moriyama and Teshima’s 1977 Toronto Reference Library sparked main downtown library buildings as diverse as Moshe Safdie and Downs Archambault’s Library Square in Vancouver, Schmidt Hammer Lassen with Fowler Bauld & Mitchell’s Halifax Central Library, and Patkau Architects + Menkès Shooner Dagenais Le Tourneux Architectes + Croft Pelletier’s Grande Bibliothèque in Montreal. Moriyama’s conception was that rare combination—modest and profoundly civic, yet also monumental—with a sinuous skylit public room wrapped within a hive of effortlessly functional book and study spaces. His friend Bruce Kuwabara describes the design as “architecture using big brushes and a roller,” and its influence carried on through the decades that followed, inspiring both those notable Canadian libraries listed above and a wave of American constructions, including prominent downtown libraries for Chicago, Salt Lake City, Phoenix and many more.

Moriyama did not seek or receive credit for starting this parade, but perhaps a new generation of critics and historians with an eye to programmatic invention—not just form-making and fetishistic detail—will set this right. Not to belabour this axis of interpretation of Moriyama’s brilliance, but his originality is similarly evident for the contemporary science museum, first brought into full blossom with the Ontario Science Centre. Focused on hands-on interactive activities, the Toronto-based Science Centre was followed by Science North in Sudbury, and inspired dozens of buildings that learned its generous lessons all around the world. To lose or bowdlerize both the former building for the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre, standing for now at 123 Wynford Drive and the Ontario Science Centre at 770 Don Mills Road, would be a dreadful declaration of Toronto’s ignorance of its own real place in global architectural culture.

In their 70s, Raymond and his wife, Sachi, bought a condo unit in one of Georgia Street’s finest towers (designed by Bing Thom), the couple having plans—hers more than his—to have a western base for a complete retirement that never came. When in town, we would meet regularly for a meal at our place or a Japanese restaurant, with a long ritual of ordering. One time, after lunch, Raymond asked to be driven along Powell Street—“Japantown” being one of the more polite names it was called while it thrived prior to WWII—to look for the location of the former Moriyama family hardware store. The social transformation of this area, now the

Opened in 1977, the Toronto Reference LIbrary was designed with a large central atrium inspired by the fabled Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

Inaugurée en 1977, la Toronto Reference Library a été conçue avec un grand atrium central inspiré des légendaires jardins suspendus de Babylone.

RAIC Journal

James Brittain

In 1964, the 28-year-old Raymond Moriyama was chosen by his community to design Toronto’s first Japanese Cultural Community Centre.

L’architecte Raymond Moriyama est décédé en septembre à l’âge de 93 ans. Aussi humble qu’il fût, il est l’un des architectes les plus influents que le Canada ait jamais connus.

Dans les premières décennies de sa pratique, il a réalisé nombre de projets innovants par rapport à d’autres bâtiments de mêmes types, comme certainement aucun de ses pairs ne l’a fait. Moriyama s’est distingué sur la scène nationale avec son Centre culturel japonaiscanadien de 1963. Dans les décennies qui ont précédé l’achèvement de ce centre, le Canada avait construit de nombreuses salles nostalgiques à vocation sociale avec colombages à l’anglaise, des centres chinois claniques munis de toitures en tuile et des enclaves culturelles allemandes aux murs de bois sombre. Avant la conception révolutionnaire de Moriyama, jamais un bâtiment n’avait présenté une synthèse contemporaine d’une architecture de pointe exprimant à la fois la nation de la mémoire et les nouvelles réalités de la vie au Canada. Le Centre culturel japonais-canadien a servi de référence pour les bâtiments qui scrutent l’expérience profonde de l’immigrant plutôt que de se limiter aux effets de surface.

C’est lors de mon année d’études en architecture autour du monde en 1977 que j’ai pu apprécier la sagesse et le calme de Raymond Moriyama. J’ai entrepris cette année-là par une session à la London’s Architectural Association et je l’ai terminée au Japon. Peu avant mon départ, mon professeur d’histoire et de critique, Michael McMordie, avait invité à Calgary son camarade de classe à l’Université de Toronto, pour une conférence. Pendant la réception qui a suivi, j’ai parlé à Moriyama de mes projets de voyage et je lui ai fait part de mon enthousiasme pour les travaux de Kenzo Tange (depuis les fenêtres de ma classe d’anglais au secondaire, j’avais regardé s’élever la piscine Coronation soutenue par des câbles conçue par Peter Hemingway en 1970 en s’inspirant des installations de Tange pour les Jeux olympiques de Tokyo en 1964). Ray a souri et m’a répondu gen-

timent de sa voix calme, mais ferme : « Tange est un très bon architecte, mais pendant votre séjour, pourquoi ne pas jeter un œil sur certaines réalisations de Kunio Maekawa? »

En 1964, Raymond Moriyama, âgé de 28 ans, a été choisi par sa communauté pour concevoir le premier centre communautaire culturel japonais de Toronto.

Journal de l’IRAC

Le Tourneux Archi-tectes + Croft Pelletier, à Montréal. La conception de Moriyama était cette rare combinaison – modeste et profondément civique, tout en étant monumentale. Le bâtiment comprenait une salle publique sinueuse et éclairée par un puits de lumière, enveloppée dans une ruche d’espaces d’étude et de lecture naturellement fonctionnels. Son ami Bruce Kuwabara décrit le design comme étant « une architecture qui utilise de grands pinceaux et un rouleau » et son influence s’est poursuivie tout au long des décennies qui ont suivi, inspirant à la fois les bibliothèques canadiennes remarquables mentionnées ci-dessus et une vague de constructions américaines, y compris des bibliothèques de centres-villes de haut niveau à Chicago, Salt Lake City, Phoenix et dans bien d’autres villes.

J’ai suivi son conseil et j’ai été profondément ému par le Bunka Kaikan de Tokyo et d’autres designs de Maekawa qui témoignaient de sa maturité après ses premières œuvres réalisées à l’ombre de Le Corbusier. La sagesse du conseil de Moriyama m’est apparue clairement lorsque j’ai finalement visité son Centre culturel après mon retour au Canada. Moriyama avait emprunté habilement à Maekawa, mais il avait aussi ajouté sa propre esthétique émergente.

Ce n’est qu’à ce moment-là que j’ai compris pourquoi des dizaines de membres de la communauté japonaise de l’Ontario avaient hypothéqué leur maison pour construire ce centre, en cette époque où les politiques et les subventions multiculturelles n’existaient pas encore. Avec ce seul projet, Moriyama a établi la norme pour les meilleurs centres culturels, mosquées et salles de prières qui ont été réalisés depuis lors.

Moriyama n’a pas cherché ni obtenu la reconnaissance pour avoir lancé ce mouvement, mais peut-être qu’une nouvelle génération de critiques et d’historiens qui s’intéressent à l’invention programmatique – et pas seulement à la création de formes et de détails fétichistes – rétablira les faits. Sans vouloir trop insister sur cet angle d’interprétation de la virtuosité de Moriyama, son originalité est tout aussi évidente pour le musée scientifique contemporain qui a éclos avec le Centre des sciences de l’Ontario.

Centré sur les activités interactives, le Centre des sciences situé à Toronto a été suivi par Science Nord, à Sudbury, et a inspiré des dizaines de bâtiments qui ont retenu ses généreuses leçons dans le monde entier. La perte ou la dénaturation de l’ancien bâtiment du Centre culturel japonais-canadien, situé actuellement au 123 Wynford Drive et du Centre des sciences de l’Ontario, au 770 Don Mills Road, serait une lamentable déclaration de l’ignorance de Toronto quant à sa place réelle dans la culture architecturale mondiale.

Il en va de même pour le centre civique intérieur et extérieur de banlieue axé sur les espaces publics, inventé par Moriyama pour le Centre civique de Scarborough en 1973. Il n’y aurait pas d’hôtel de ville à Mississauga si ce n’était de ce projet pionnier, et même Bing Thom a reconnu que Scarborough était un précédent important pour sa ville centrale de Surrey. Mentionnons aussi la bibliothèque principale du centre-ville de Toronto, un autre projet innovant de Moriyama. Les murs de briques et l’intérieur lumineux de la Toronto Reference Library, conçue par Moriyama and Teshima en 1977, ont inspiré de nombreuses bibliothèques principales de centres-villes, des projets aussi diversifiés que la Library Square de Moshe Safdie et Downs Archambault, à Vancouver; la Central Library de Schmidt Hammer Lassen avec Fowler Bauld & Mitchell, à Halifax; et la Grande bibliothèque de Patkau Architects + Menkès Shooner Dagenais

Dans les années 70, Raymond et son épouse Sachi ont acheté un logement en copropriété dans l’une des plus belles tours de la rue Georgia (conçue par Bing Thom), le couple ayant l’intention – elle plus que lui – d’avoir une base occidentale pour une retraite qui n’est finalement jamais venue. Lorsqu’ils étaient en ville, nous nous retrouvions régulièrement pour un repas chez moi ou dans un restaurant japonais dans lequel la commande des plats suivait un long rituel. Une fois, après le repas, Raymond m’a demandé de l’amener sur la rue Powell – le « quartier japonais » étant l’un des noms les plus polis que l’on donnait à ce quartier qui prospérait avant la Seconde Guerre mondiale – pour voir l’emplace-ment de l’ancienne quincaillerie de la famille Moriyama.

La transformation sociale de ce quartier, maintenant au cœur de Downtown Eastside, n’était pas une surprise, mais elle a tout de même profondément troublé Raymond. « Cet endroit est devenu

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RAIC Journal

Journal de l’IRAC

Moriyama Teshima Architects’ Canadian Embassy in Tokyo, Japan aimed to create a symbol of Canada that would be meaningful to the people of Japan by embodying Canada’s spaciousness and diversity.

Images: Moriyama Teshima Architects

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heart of the Downtown Eastside, was not unexpected, but nonetheless deeply troubled Ray: “This place has become a complete slum!” he exclaimed, aghast. As we drove on, he spoke about the brief time between when his father was imprisoned—for speaking out publicly against Internment—and when he and his family were shipped to a camp near Slocan, spending the war without him. His mother busy with his siblings, as the 12-year-old eldest son, Raymond was put in charge of the hardware store. “Prices were not marked, so I had to guess what things were worth,” he explained. “The word soon spread around the neighbourhood that I was offering some really good deals—I think I sold a brand-new refrigerator for $5.00!”, he said, his anger transforming to laughter.

The human possibility of discovering joy in the midst of suffering is what powered the architecture of Raymond Moriyama. Emotionality is a quality seldom discussed in contemporary architecture, but scratch the surfaces of forms and details, and it is there, because buildings are just as much a product of inner lives as novels or

symphonies. This is evident in the Canadian Embassy in Tokyo, a mixed-use structure built on some of the most expensive land in the history of cities. Planning is necessarily tight and elegant, but an unexpected generosity appears in the explosion of space and vista at its top floor decks. A small rock garden and bonsai plantings are there, but the real revelation is the panorama of Tokyo, its impact amplified by the long brow of the roof projecting above. Tokyo residents relish an invitation there, nominally because it affords a rare glimpse into the Imperial Palace’s protected compound below. More than that, Tokyo citizens are curious about the Canadian nisei who has designed so splendid a sky realm, one that speaks of both his architectural cultures. Trust an ex-internee to craft this sterling example of cultural diplomacy.

Moriyama’s late masterpiece, the Canadian War Museum—designed in consort with sons Ajon and Jason, fellow MTA associates, and joint venture partners Griffiths Rankin Cook— packs a similar emotional wallop, and not just for those of us with war veterans in the family.

L’ambassade du Canada à Tokyo, au Japon, de Moriyama Teshima Architects, visait à créer un symbole du Canada qui soit significatif pour le peuple japonais en incarnant la diversité et l’immensité du pays.

In my view, it has come to eclipse the higherprofile Safdie and Cardinal museums as a symbol of nationhood.

Ray told me how impressed he was with the book Douglas Cardinal and I compiled in 1989, saying it was the rare architecture book that talked in depth about both design and racial conflict. He looked for a chance for me to review one of his major buildings, and found it with his Saudi National Museum in Riyadh. Moriyama arranged an invitation from King Fahd’s court for me to attend its 1998 opening, a date marking the centenary of the state. (See CA, April 1999.) From the moment we arrived, Ray spoke of the importance of driving west with his two sons and me before dawn into the dunes of the Arabian desert, to watch the sun rise: “You won’t understand the building without it,” he told us.

We sat shivering while waiting for the first burst of rays, me fully expecting the architect to explain sand dunes as the inspiration for the tapered and curving walls of his museum, or some words from him about the qualities of desert light. No. Ray spoke solely of his experience in the Slocan internment camp, the good times of building his famous tree house, the bad periods of shame and isolation. The next day, at sunset, I first saw shadows of some of Riyadh’s oldest masonry buildings slide across the long curving elevation, making the museum a screen, a ghost village, a marker of time, and yes, a desert dune—the inverse of its backlit presence at dawn. Moriyama was right, once again: this expedition had been needed to understand the museum and his other designs, and the ever-human animating architectural force behind them.

Architecture critic and historian Trevor Boddy’s review of Moriyama’s Saudi National Museum in Riyadh is part of a collection of Boddy’s texts on work by dozens of architects entitled The Constructed Landscape: Writings on Canadian Architecture Since Expo 67, forthcoming next year from Dalhousie Architectural Press.

un véritable bidonville! », s’est-il exclamé, complètement sidéré. Pendant que nous roulions, il a parlé de la brève période qui s’est écoulée entre le moment où son père a été emprisonné – pour avoir parlé publiquement contre l’internement – et celui où lui et sa famille ont été envoyés dans un camp près de Slocan, passant la guerre sans lui. Sa mère s’occupant de ses frères et sœurs, Raymond, qui était le fils aîné alors âgé de 12 ans, a été mis en charge de la quincaillerie. « Les prix n’étaient pas indiqués, alors je devais deviner la valeur des articles », m’a-t-il expliqué. « La

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Ajon Moriyama

The National Museum of Saudi Arabia was the winning entry in an international design competition. It opened in 1999 to celebrate the centenary of Saudi unification.

rumeur s’est vite répandue dans le quartier que j’offrais de très bons prix – je pense que j’ai vendu un réfrigérateur tout neuf pour cinq dollars! », m’a-t-il raconté, la colère laissant place au rire.

La capacité des humains à découvrir la joie au milieu de la souffrance a été le moteur de l’architecture de Raymond Moriyama.

L’émotivité est une qualité sur laquelle on se penche rarement dans l’architecture contemporaine, mais si on gratte les surfaces des formes et des détails, on la trouve, parce que les bâtiments sont tout autant un produit des vies intérieures que les romans ou les symphonies, comme en fait foi l’ambassade du Canada à Tokyo. Ce bâtiment à usage mixte a été construit sur l’un des terrains les plus chers de l’histoire des villes. La planification comportait des contraintes, mais le résultat est élégant et fait apparaître une générosité inattendue dans l’explosion de l’espace et de la vue sur les terrasses du dernier étage. On y trouve un petit jardin de rocailles et de bonsaïs, mais la vraie révélation est le panorama de Tokyo, dont l’impact est amplifié par le long front de toiture en surplomb. Les résidents de Tokyo sont ravis d’y être invités, notamment parce qu’ils ont ainsi une rare occasion d’entrevoir l’enceinte protégée du palais royal en contrebas, mais aussi parce qu’ils sont curieux de connaître le nisei canadien qui a conçu un espace aussi splendide, qui témoigne de ses deux cultures

architecturales. Faites confiance à un ancien interné pour créer ce remarquable exemple de diplomatie culturelle.

Le dernier chef-d’œuvre de Moriyama, le Musée canadien de la guerre – conçu en collaboration avec ses fils Ajon et Jason, associés de MTA, et en partenariat avec Griffiths Rankin Cook – dégage une force émotionnelle similaire, et pas seulement pour ceux d’entre nous qui comptent des vétérans dans leur famille. À mon avis, ce musée en est venu à éclipser les musées de Safdie et de Cardinal, qui jouissent d’une plus grande visibilité, comme symbole d’identité nationale.

Ray m’a dit à quel point il avait été impressionné par le livre que Douglas Cardinal et moi avons compilé en 1989, qu’il considérait comme un rare ouvrage d’architecture à traiter en profondeur de la conception et du conflit racial. Il se demandait duquel de ses principaux bâtiments je pourrais traiter et il a déterminé que ce serait le Musée national d’Arabie saoudite, à Riyad. Il a pris les mesures pour que je sois invité par la cour du roi Fahd à l’inauguration du musée en 1998, date qui marquait le centenaire de l’État.

Anticipant ma première occasion d’analyser un bâtiment de Moriyama (voir CA, avril 1999) dès notre arrivée, Ray a parlé de l’importance pour ses deux fils architectes et moi-même de l’accompagner en direction de l’Ouest, avant l’aube, dans les dunes du désert d’Arabie, pour

assister au lever du soleil. « Vous ne comprendrez pas le bâtiment sans cela », nous a-t-il dit.

Nous nous sommes assis, tout grelottants, en attente de l’apparition des premiers rayons de soleil. Je m’attendais à ce que l’architecte explique en quoi les dunes de sable avaient inspiré les murs effilés et incurvés de son musée, ou qu’il nous parle des qualités de la lumière du désert. Il n’en fut rien. Ray n’a parlé que de son expérience dans le camp d’internement de Slocan, du bon temps passé à bâtir sa fameuse cabane dans un arbre, des mauvaises périodes de honte et d’isolement. Le lendemain, au coucher du soleil, j’ai d’abord vu les ombres de certains des plus anciens bâtiments en maçonnerie de Ryad glisser sur la longue élévation incurvée, faisant du musée un écran, un village fantôme, un marqueur du temps et, oui, une dune du désert – l’inverse de sa présence rétroéclairée à l’aube.

Moriyama avait raison, encore une fois : cette expédition était nécessaire pour comprendre le musée et ses autres projets, et pour comprendre la force architecturale motrice toujours humaine qui les sous-tend.

Critique et historien de l’architecture, Trevor Boddy publiera dans le courant de l’année prochaine un recueil de textes intitulé The Constructed Landscape: Writings on Canadian Architecture Since Expo 67 sur des travaux réalisés par des dizaines d’architectes.

Sa critique du Musée national d’Arabie saoudite de Ryad, conçu par Moriyama, en fera partie.

Le Musée national de l’Arabie saoudite était le projet gagnant d’un concours d’architecture international.

Il a ouvert ses portes en 1999 pour célébrer le centenaire de l’unification du royaume saoudien.

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John Di Castri, Architect: A Retrospective John Di Castri, architecte : Une rétrospective Di Castri’s design for the University of Victoria’s Cornett Building linked four blocks around a central cloistered quad.

It opened in 1967.

L’édifice Cornett de l’Université de Victoria reliait quatre blocs autour d’un quadrilatère central fermé. Ce projet de Di Castri a été inauguré en 1967.

arts specialist Allan Collier and Wentworth curator Ben Clinton-Baker. Photographs, drawings, paintings and architectural models covered over 50 years of Di Castri’s highly creative practice.

The exhibit featured dozens of his local commissions, from residences, churches, and schools to commercial buildings and shopping malls.

Images: Universtiy of Victoria Archives

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Even among the group of young architects who were transforming Victoria’s postwar urban landscape in the 1950s and 60s with their ambitious Modernist designs, John Di Castri was an outlier.

Chris Gower, MRAIC and / et Martin Segger, Hon. MRAIC

This summer, the career of mid-century Modernist architect John Di Castri (1924-2005) was featured in an exhibition at Wentworth Villa Architectural Heritage Museum in Victoria. The exhibit was sponsored by the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, and co-curated by local architect Chris Gower, MRAIC, and architectural historian Martin Segger, Hon. MRAIC, working with design

Born in Victoria, Di Castri was raised in an Italian immigrant family. His father was a band master and voice coach. But Di Castri’s own early ambitions for a career as a concert pianist gave way to the reality of family finances.

On graduation from Victoria High School, Di Castri joined the Provincial Government Public Works Department as a trainee draughtsman.

By 1949, Di Castri was a senior technician in the practice of Birley Wade and Stockdill, but decided to take time off for studies at the University of Oklahoma to work under Bruce Goff (19041982), a noted leading disciple of American architectural icon Frank Lloyd Wright (18671959). Goff immersed his students in a radical brand of highly innovative expressionist design,

pushing Wright’s “organic design” legacy to new limits. Di Castri’s graduation thesis—a proposed community arts centre for Oklahoma City— amalgamated notions of sci-fi futurism and an idealized creative community, along with asfound urban planning.

Di Castri returned to Victoria after a cross-continental tour of Wright’s major commissions (including meeting the great man himself at his architecture school, Taliesin West, in Arizona), and established his own practice in 1951.

At that time, Victoria was poised at the edge of a multi-decade building boom as the province expanded its economic ambitions and the “boomer generation” itself came of age. Aspirations were unbounded. Set against the rationalist strains of the prevalent local Modernism, which mainly referenced the work of Europeans and particularly the spare clean lines of British and Scandinavian architects featured in the literature of the day, Di Castri’s designs were creative, even flamboyant. His work celebrated the rugged treed landscapes of the region and the rich palette of local building materials.

While a noted pioneer of what we now call “West Coast Modern,” Di Castri was unconstrained by the minimalism of his contemporaries. Often. Di Castri would establish a theme

RAIC Journal

Même parmi le groupe de jeunes architectes qui transformaient le paysage urbain d’aprèsguerre de Victoria dans les années 1950 et 1960 avec leurs designs modernistes ambitieux, John Di Castri faisait figure d’exception. Né à Victoria, Di Castri a grandi dans une famille d’immigrants italiens. Son père était un directeur d’harmonie et un professeur de diction. Les ambitions précoces de John qui rêvait d’une carrière de pianiste de concert ont fait place à la réalité financière de la famille. À la fin de ses études secondaires, il s’est joint au ministère des Travaux publics du gouvernement provincial en tant que dessinateur stagiaire.

En 1949, Di Castri était un technicien senior au sein de la firme Birley Wade and Stockdill, mais il a décidé de poursuivre des études à l’Université

d’Oklahoma dans le but de travailler auprès de Bruce Goff (1904-1982), un disciple réputé de l’icône de l’architecture américaine Frank Lloyd Wright (1967-1959). Goff a plongé ses étudiants dans une forme radicale de design expres-sionniste très innovant, poussant l’héritage de « design organique » de Wright vers de nouvelles limites. Le projet final de Di Castri – un centre d’arts communautaire pour la ville d’Oklahoma – fusionnait des notions de futurisme de sciencefiction et de communauté créative idéalisée dans un contexte urbain existant.

Di Castri est retourné à Victoria après avoir visité les principaux projets de Wright dans le continent. Il a même rencontré le grand homme à son école d’architecture, Taliesin West, en Arizona. Il a créé sa propre firme en 1951. À cette époque, Victoria était sur le point de connaître un boom de construction qui s’étendrait sur plusieurs décennies alors que les ambitions économiques de la province étaient de plus en plus élevées et que la génération du « baby-boom » arrivait à maturité. Les aspirations n’avaient aucune limite. Face aux tensions rationalistes du modernisme local prévalent, qui se référait principalement au travail des Européens, et en particulier aux lignes épurées des architectes britanniques et scandinaves présentés dans la littérature de l’époque, les projets de John étaient créatifs, et même flamboyants. Ils célébraient les paysages boisés et sauvages de la région et la riche palette des matériaux de construction locaux.

Bien qu’il fût un pionnier de ce que nous appelons aujourd’hui le « style moderne de la côte ouest »,

Di Castri n’était pas freiné par le minimalisme de ses contemporains. Souvent, il déterminait un thème inspiré par la nature, comme les courbes qui s’entrecoupent (maison Smith, 1952) ou la forme d’un coquillage (résidence riveraine Dunsmuir, 1953).

La commande de la maison Trend, l’une des dix maisons de démonstration commandées par le B.C. Coast Woods Extension Bureau a marqué une avancée majeure dans sa carrière. Le design de Di Castri, qui repoussait les limites de l’utilisation des matériaux et des technologies, a été immédiatement reconnu comme le plus innovant du groupe. Un plan polygonal soutenant un système de fermes de toit en forme de diamant semble s’inspirer de la technologie des cellules en bois. Une cheminée massive en maçonnerie traverse le corps de la maison en diagonale comme pour donner des ailes aux formes complexes de la toiture en vol. Les revêtements extérieurs en bois et en maçonnerie se retrouvent à l’intérieur. Tous ces éléments deviendront les marques de design de Di Castri.

Les dessins de Di Castri, tant les plans que les élévations, révèlent souvent des structures mathématiques complexes qui sous-tendent une discipline – et qui, en fait, l’imposent – à bien des projets : grilles octogonales, triangles équilatéraux superposés et, en particulier, une référence commune, l’angle de 15 degrés. Les entrepreneurs ont souvent dit en privé que les projets de Di Castri étaient « difficiles à construire »! Élevé dans la religion catholique, Di Castri s’est fait connaître par ses nombreux projets d’églises.

La dernière qu’il a réalisée, à l’Université de Vic-

British Columbia Lumber Manufacturers Association (BCLMA)

Cet été, le Wentworth Villa Architectural Heritage Museum de Victoria a présenté une exposition sur la carrière de John Di Castri (19242005), un architecte moderniste du milieu du siècle dernier. L’exposition était parrainée par l’Institut royal d’architecture du Canada et organisée conjointement par l’architecte local Chris Gower, MRAIC, et l’historien de l’architecture Martin Segger, Hon. MRAIC, en collaboration avec le spécialiste des arts du design, Allan Collier, et le conservateur des expositions à Wentworth, Ben Clinton-Baker.

Les photographies, les dessins, les peintures et les maquettes d’architecture exposés ont couvert plus de 50 ans de la pratique très créative de Di Castri. L’exposition a présenté de dizaines de projets locaux allant de résidences, d’églises et d’écoles à des bâtiments commerciaux et des centres commerciaux.

Journal de l’IRAC

Built in Saanich, BC, as part of a program to showcase the versitility of the province’s softwood lumber, the Trend House features diamond form roof trusses, a polygonal floor plan, and large plate glass windows.

Bâtie à Saanich (C.-B.) dans le cadre d’un programme de démonstration de la versatilité du bois d’œuvre résineux de la province, la maison Trend se caractérise par des fermes de toit en forme de diamant, un plan d’étage polygonal et de grandes baies vitrées.

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Victoria,” Times Colonist, August 20, 2023 https:// www.timescolonist.com/islander/why-you-knowjohn-di-castri-iconoclastic-architect-who-reshapedvictoria-7430904 The Wentworth Villa Architectural Heritage Museum is the brainchild of two Victoria philanthropists and heritage advocates, Magda and Stefan Opalski. Recent retirees from Ottawa, they were enamoured with Victoria’s rich architectural history. The couple completely

Di Castri’s 1955 Charles Watts residence was located on Surrey Road in Victoria’s Uplands district.

The Alexander Smith House at 446 Goldstream Avenue was completed in 1954.

restored an 1860s landmark residence to house the museum and a small chamber music concert hall. The permanent exhibit galleries feature a series of architectural models depicting major Victoria historic houses and the personalities that designed, built and lived in them. wentworthvilla.com

Images: Hubert Norbury, University of Victoria Archives

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drawing from nature, such as intersecting curves (Smith House, 1952) or the form of a seashell (waterfront Dunsmuir residence, 1953).

A major breakthrough came with the commissioning of the Trend House, one of ten demonstration houses commissioned by the B.C. Coast Woods Extension Bureau. Di Castri’s design was immediately celebrated as the most innovative of the group, pushing materials and technology to the limit. A polygon plan supports a diamondform roof-truss system which seems inspired by wooden airframe technology. A massive masonry chimney slices diagonally through the body of house as if to pinion the complex roof forms in flight. Exterior wood and masonry finishes are carried through to the interior. All these elements would become Di Castri design hallmarks.

Di Castri’s drawings, both in plan and elevation, often reveal complex mathematic structures which underpin—indeed discipline—many of the designs: octagonal grids, layered equilateral triangles, and in particular a common reference, the 15 degree angle. Contractors often noted privately that Di Castri commissions could be “difficult builds”!

Raised a Roman Catholic, Di Castri was noted for his many church commissions. His last commission, for the University of Victoria, was a multifaith chapel. Set within gardens nestled in a woodland forest site, the congregation space shelters beneath the generous spread of a dominant hipped roof. The structure references a traditional Victoria house-form, the colonial bungalow, and beyond that nods to the symbolism of the ancient Bronze Age “sacred hut.” Many of Di Castri’s commissions also reveal a profound meditative quality—a sense of the sacred which informs the iterative manipulation of spaces, forms and textures.

toria, était une chapelle multiconfessionnelle.

Situé dans des jardins nichés dans un boisé, le lieu de rassemblement s’abrite sous un généreux toit en croupe qui domine l’espace. Le bâtiment rappelle une forme de maison traditionnelle de Victoria, le bungalow colonial et, au-delà, le symbolisme de l’ancienne « hutte sacrée » de l’âge du bronze. De nombreux projets de Di Castri témoignent également d’une qualité méditative profonde – d’un sens du sacré qui sous-tend les manipulations itératives des espaces, des formes et des textures.

Dans un texte rédigé pour une exposition de ses travaux de son vivant, Di Castri a écrit : « Les gens désirent des bâtiments qui incarnent les normes intemporelles de beauté, de qualité, d’harmonie et d’intégrité. Nous ne devons pas nous contenter de désirer ces normes. Nous devons les exiger de tous les responsables de l’environnement bâti, y compris de l’ensemble des instances politiques qui autorisent la réalisation du type de collectivités que nous avons aujourd’hui. » Pour en savoir plus sur John Di Castri, lire l’article : « Why you know John Di Castri, iconoclastic architect who reshaped Victoria, » publié dans le Times Colonist, le 20 août 2023 https://www.timescolonist.com/islander/why-you-know-john-di-castri-iconoclastic-architectwho-reshaped-victoria-7430904 La création du Wentworth Villa Architectural Heritage

In a statement prepared for an exhibition of his work during his lifetime, Di Castri wrote: “People yearn for buildings which are based on the timeless standards of beauty, quality, harmony and integrity. We must not only desire these standards, but demand them of all those responsible for the built environment, including the whole political structure which permits the type of communities we now have.”

Museum est l’idée originale de deux philanthropes et défenseurs du patrimoine de Victoria, Magda et Stefan Opalski. Récemment retraités d’Ottawa, ils ont été séduits par la riche histoire architecturale de Victoria.

Le couple a entièrement restauré une résidence emblématique des années 1860 pour abriter le musée et une petite salle de musique de chambre. Les galeries d’exposition permanente présentent une série de maquettes architecturales qui présentent les principales maisons historiques de Victoria et les personnal-

For a more on John Di Castri see: “Why you know

ités qui les ont conçues, construites et habitées. went-

John Di Castri, iconoclastic architect who reshaped

worthvilla.com

La résidence Charles Watts, conçue en 1955 par Di Castri, était située sur le chemin Surrey, dans le quartier Uplands de Victoria.

La résidence Alexander Smith du 446 avenue Goldstream a été achevée en 1954.

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TRIBUTE

GEORGE BAIRD 1939-2023 Architect, theorist, and educator George Baird died at his Toronto home on October 17, 2023, at the age of 84.

A member of the Order of Canada (OC), Baird was the former Dean (2004-2009) of the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto, and founded the Toronto-based architecture and urban design firm Baird Sampson Neuert Architects.

Prior to becoming Dean at the Daniels Faculty, Baird was the G. Ware Travelstead Professor of Architecture at the Graduate School of Design, Harvard University.

He was co-editor, with Charles Jencks, of Meaning in Architecture (1969), and, with Mark Lewis, of Queues, Rendezvous, Riots (1995).

He is author of Alvar Aalto (1969), The Space of Appearance (1995), and Writings on Architecture and the City (2015). A book of essays about his work and influence, The Architect and the Public: On George Baird’s Contribution to Architecture, appeared in 2019.

Baird’s consulting firm, Baird Sampson Neuert, is the winner of numerous design awards, including two Governor General’s Awards. Baird was a Fellow of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada and received the Ontario Association of Architects’ Da Vinci Medal (2000).

To honour Baird’s life, we have gathered tributes from the architecture community in appreciation of his legacy.

Phyllis Lambert Founder, Canadian Centre for Architecture Of the outstanding international generation that changed architecture, initially through immersion in theory and history, George Baird holds a special place. With the radiance of his persona, George brought the discipline of mind he had honed to the critique of the city, a process of understanding which is now ever more important. I am grateful to George for his approach and analysis as I am for his continued support of my own study of the city, and for the warmth of his friendship.

Mirko Zardini Architect, Author and Curator It was the summer of 2019. Touring Toronto with George Baird as a personal guide—driving from the Sharon Temple, in Gwillimbury, to the University of Toronto Campus, in Scarborough, both in the outskirts, and into the city’s downtown—while talking about the problems of the city he loved and studied so deeply, and for which he did so much in every possible way, was a delightful, rare privilege. I will never forget it.

And it was very rare because, in fact, George belonged to that generation of architects born in the 1920s and 1930s—with the likes of Frampton, Gregotti, Ungers, Rossi, Eisenman, De Carlo, Colquhoun, Jencks, Grassi, and Moneo—that, by embodying multiple roles, profoundly shaped the architectural and urban discourse, from the postwar years until today. George Baird was, simultaneously and inseparably, an architect, an urban designer, a historian, a critic, a theorist and, probably above all, a teacher and mentor for many.

After working on Meaning in Architecture in 1969 with Charles Jencks, George kept looking at the city, architecture, and public space from exceptional perspectives. He was also responsible for bringing the works of Hannah Arendt, Jurgen Habermas, and Ivan Illich into architectural discourse.

George Baird dedicated his life to architecture, becoming a crucial protagonist in shaping the architectural, urban, and academic worlds in Canada, and elsewhere. The breadth of George’s legacy is yet to be

CA Nov 23.indd 24

ANDRE BENETEAU, COURTESY DANIELS FACULTY OF ARCHITECTURE, LANDSCAPE, AND DESIGN

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

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fully understood. In the meantime, the best way to honor his life is by keeping his teachings and extraordinary commitment alive.

Kenneth Frampton Emeritus Professor, Columbia University George Baird’s death on October 17 leaves us in a state of shock and loss—not only in relation to the Daniels Faculty at the University of Toronto, of which he was for so many years its dedicated and exceptionally creative Dean, but also for Canadian and even for world architecture as a whole. This is due to his prolific output as a brilliant writer and engaged critic—not to mention his activities as an inspired teacher in both Canada and the United States. Baird also played a fundamental role in introducing landscape urbanism into the architecture school curriculum of U of T, aided, inspired, and partially led by Charles Waldheim, whom he met during his period as Visiting Professor at Harvard University. From the seminal semiotic anthology that he edited with Charles Jencks, Meaning in Architecture, George and I shared a mutual conviction as to the pertinence for architecture of Hannah Arendt’s magnum opus The Human Condition (1958). Although we were rival interpreters as to the significance of her political philosophy for architectural culture, throughout my time in academia l admired Georges’s perspicacity as a studio critic plus his innate capacity for articulate public speaking and debate! In general, George was a brilliant and prolific writer who wrote with exceptional sensitivity about the work of Alvar Aalto, as is evident from the concise but perceptive monograph he produced on the work of the Finnish master early in his career. Above all, George’s work acumen and life-long passion for architecture will be sorely missed—not only on the North American scene, but also on the global scene as a whole.

Bruce Kuwabara Founding Partner, KPMB Architects George Baird was a brilliant intellectual who combined teaching and practice, design and building, research and writing, and public lectures and criticism.

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

I’ve known George since I was 18, when I began my first year at the University of Toronto’s Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design. George was my thesis advisor, and upon graduating in 1972, I worked for him for three years, along with my contemporaries John Van Nostrand, Joost Bakker, and Barry Sampson. It was an ongoing education. George was a very cool intellectual. He knew everybody. He organized the lecture series at Daniels, and everyone who lectured came to the office, including Rem Koolhaas and Oswald Mathias Ungers, all of them. You have to imagine what it’s like when you’re 23 or 24, and you’re connecting to the architects who were really significant at that time.

George was 30 years old when he edited Meaning and Architecture with Charles Jencks. He put forward the idea that architecture developed around a system of significance, with a langue [language] and parole [dialect]. The langue was about the rules of the language, and the parole was the way individual architects would use and manipulate that language. I wondered how it seemed so simple: the reason George was a genius to me, is that often the genius is able to tell you what you already intuit.

George felt The Space of Appearance was his most important book, and he was very committed to the ideas of Hannah Arendt. There’s a lot of debate over what that phrase means: the simplest reduction would be the public realm. But for George, there were all sorts of philosophical aspects to existence and the ability of individuals to act out their political lives in space.

At George’s office, we went between doing projects and major pieces of public policy on the city. His knowledge and provocations expanded and enriched our understanding of architecture at the urban level, as propositions about the city, society, growth, and change. George viewed architecture as a gesture in a social, physical, and cultural context.

Possessing astonishing curiosity, George evolved his prolific and enduring practice as a scholar, writer, teacher, practitioner, and mentor with an exceptional kindness and generosity for generations of students and practitioners. George played at the level of what was happening in the context, whether it was a review, a symposium, or just lunch.

It was very f luctuating. It didn’t always stay at one level.

One of the things that I most respect about George is that he was often the smartest person in the room. His knowledge base was so wide, and his curiosity covered everything: film, fashion, cars, food, cities, art, politics, provincial, municipal issues. He was all over it.

What I will cherish most is George’s generosity and kindness. I will miss his presence, especially at the amazing dinners that he and Elizabeth hosted where great food and wine, and lively conversations brought people of different generations together in friendship. You choose your friends, and friendship is maybe one of the most important parts of your life. It’s not networks—it’s friendships, real friendships.

And that’s the lesson I got from George.

Jon Neuert Partner, Baird Sampson Neuert Architects Like many, I first fell under George’s inf luence as a student in his Architectural Theory course at University of Toronto’s then-School of Architecture. This occurred during his brief reign as Acting Chair of Architecture (1983-1985) and the tumultuous years following the

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demise of the ‘New Program.’ At this time, George had left behind his ground-breaking work in semiotics (Meaning in Architecture), and his Theory course intensively focused on interpreting the philosophical ideas of Hannah Arendt’s The Human Condition into a critical understanding of the role of public space as a generative place for speech and action, plurality and history. His course work served as the foundation for his seminal book, The Space of Appearance, and to his work as a teacher, architect and urbanist.

George’s commitment to this idealized concept of public space—Arendt’s polis—existed alongside a belief and understanding that the creation of this space exists only when actualized through the performance of deeds.

While different than George’s outlook, I believe this was a critical motivator drawing George outside the academic sphere and into the “real world” of architecture.

In his capacity as architect, George led many projects which advanced the seminal ideals of urbanism as inclusive places of speech and action.

Notable examples include the Edmonton City Hall competition (1981), which was collaboratively developed by a cadre of young designers who would later become leaders in Canadian architecture and beyond.

This project preserved and celebrated the original City Hall, f lanking it with new extensions. The result was a framed civic space where new and historical layers co-existed, and where the council chambers were prominently featured as the central architectural actor. Although disqualified for disregarding the requirement to destroy the original building, this project’s body politic has lived on in other forms, including Mississauga’s City Hall (1982), for which George served as competition advisor, and KPMB’s Kitchener City Hall (1989), where Detlef Mertins (who was also a member of the original Baird design team for the Edmonton project) served as competition advisor.

Another pivotal project was the 1994 Seaton New Town competition.

George provided a central leadership role on the winning entry, which was developed with many of these same collaborators and other urbanists. The project proposed a new and integrated model of a densely populated, walkable city designed to sustain public transit and respond to the ecological and bioclimatic features of the landscape. These principles have become standard planning guidelines, even if their full implementation remains elusive.

After graduating in 1990, I was invited by George and Barry Sampson to join their studio, working to implement the Cloud Gardens Park competition (1989) which the firm had been just awarded. This project explored the historical layering and reconstruction of the city through time, realizing an inclusive placemaking strategy which advanced both a phenomenological and narrative experience. It earned the firm its first Governor General’s Award in Architecture. The Monument to Construction Workers, conceived as a framing edge to the park, was designed

by Margaret Priest and executed in collaboration with Toronto’s skilled trades and apprentices. Though George never explicitly labelled it as such, this creation both celebrates and embodies Arendt’s Homo Faber, rendering labor, work, and action visible.

The products of George’s innate curiosity and worldliness have left an indelible mark on generations of students, architects and scholars.

I consider it my greatest gift to count myself amongst them. One of George’s greatest regrets concerning Cloud Gardens was the City’s

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recent decision to turn off its four-season waterfall during the winter.

Providing a soothing acoustic mask for the park’s active urban context, the waterfall is designed to be heated using waste heat and condensate from the nearby Cloud Forest Conservatory’s steam heating system, enabling year-round operation. When George and I last spoke, he was actively seeking support to build an endowment to maintain the waterfall’s year-round operation. I sincerely hope his last quest serves as a call to action to its realization, and becomes a tangible civic reminder and tribute to George’s voice in the City.

George Kapelos Professor, Toronto Metropolitan University George Baird and I met in 1976 in Quebec City at a meeting of the Society for the Study of Architecture in Canada. I was immediately drawn to his intellect and appreciation of Canadian architecture, past and present. As the planner at the Ontario Heritage Foundation, I engaged his firm to examine urban issues and heritage conservation, particularly the vitality of Ontario’s rural communities. We quickly became friends and along with his wife, Elizabeth, we have enjoyed a lifelong friendship, travelling together to Greece and other parts of Europe as well as many Canadian provinces, working together on research projects, seeking his advice on my own life plans, and spending holiday meals together. George was my mentor, colleague, and good friend.

George was a complex person and a brilliant intellect. His 1976 study of Ontario’s Main Streets, undertaken with Barry Sampson, celebrated the significance of small-town urbanism, underscoring the hidden beauty found in little-known towns and villages. Our 1983 architecture exhibition, OKanada, at the Berlin Akademie der Künste, showcased Canada’s robust contribution to global modernity. At home, together with his food-savvy and gracious wife Elizabeth, he welcomed all—family, friends, students, colleagues, and newcomers to Toronto—to share an evening of conversation, critical debate, political analysis, gossip, and jocular storytelling around a table where good food complemented the lively spirit of the moment. Death has silenced his voice, but through his teachings, writings, and architectural works, his legacy endures. A good life, well and vigorously lived. May his memory be a blessing.

Brigitte Shim Co-founder, Shim-Sutcliffe Architects For five decades, George Baird has been at the centre of activity for architectural culture in Canada, and its spokesperson internationally in countless publications, exhibits and symposia. Baird’s power as a mentor is also a monument to his career: he inspired generations of students and architects now practising and teaching throughout North America.

I became aware of George through his writing long before I ever met him in person. In 1978, George Baird and Barton Myers joined forces to co-edit issue 108 of Design Quarterly, which they titled Vacant Lottery and curated to ask tough questions about the future of the North American metropolis. In those pages, George generously shared the research and design work of his University of Toronto architecture students, who were examining the North Jarvis neighbourhood of Toronto under his direction. As an educator, George was engaged in the exploration of innovative ideas straddling the scales of architecture and

urbanism. These innovative design experiments projected an optimistic future for the metropolis.

It was a revelation for me to see student research and student design work published and engaged in a conversation about the future of urbanism. George Baird demonstrated that the research and design investigations that take place in architecture schools are not just isolated academic exercises—but that each design studio has the capacity to be the generator of intellectual capital and creative equity shaping the future of global cities.

In the early 1980s, George brought critical voices from around the world to participate in the lecture series at the Daniels Faculty. As a student, I remember squeezing into a packed lecture hall to listen to debates and discussions about architecture curated by George. He became famous for his complex compound sentences—which seemed to run on endlessly—when introducing the who’s who of architecture. Distinguished international speakers have been known to ask George for a copy of his introductory notes, while others have asked him to contribute to their own monographs because his remarks were so insightful, revealing, and poignant.

After I graduated from architecture school, my first job was in the office of Baird/Sampson Architects. My time as an intern architect was split between working on projects in the design studio and working as a research assistant for George’s book The Space of Appearance. In the office, both George and Barry Sampson taught me that the first act of city building was to conserve buildings, rather than demolish them. I learned to value small-scale architecture and its contribution to an incremental approach to urbanism. George made me aware of the work of Alvar Aalto, Hannes Meyer, Wells Coate and others, shaping my understanding of—and respect for—the “other” Modern Movement.

In the Baird/Sampson studio, we often worked on small house renovations requiring surgical additions and insertions. The designs, however modest, emerged out of intense conversations about the inter-relationship between modernism and the vernacular. As a teaching assistant for George’s History and Theory of Architecture course, I saw him lead a series of seminars on the philosophical evolution of certain modern ideas, and witnessed the lively intergenerational debates that ensured. George introduced me to the interwoven relationship between politics and architecture through the writings of Hannah Arendt, Jurgen Habermas, and Ivan Illich. At the same time as they were practicing architects, both George and Barry were engaged educators setting a new pedagogical agenda at the Daniels School, and much of the animated discussion about course content took place in the Baird/Sampson offices on Britain Street.

Toronto is the city that George chose to live in and work on for decades. George Baird’s gift to Toronto is that he has made us startlingly aware of the rich urban form in our own city. His intimate and passionate understanding of Toronto’s urban fabric, and his dissemination of that knowledge through his teaching and writing, has had a profound effect on the shape and urban form of Toronto today. Generations of students have absorbed George’s inherent understanding of the social, the collective and the communal dimensions of architecture, landscape architecture and urban design—and are using the lessons he taught them to rethink and redefine the future of architecture and urbanism.

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THE STATE OF CANADIAN ARCHITECTURAL PRACTICE In early 2023, the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC) and Canadian Architect partnered to refresh and update the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report, with the goal of providing comprehensive, anonymized data on the current standards for compensation, billings, equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI), and other key indicators among Canadian architectural practices.

This survey and report were last completed in 2011, and prior to that, in 2009. For the 2023 report, we refreshed the 2011 survey, and added new sections related to Indigenous themes and reconciliation, climate action, and EDI. To complete this work, we partnered with Bramm Research Inc., a consultancy which has supported previous editions.

The full report is now available for purchase from the RAIC. Here at Canadian Architect, we’ve delved deep into select findings.

How has the profession been doing in the past decade? To start with, the average firm size has grown. In 2010, Canadian firms responding to the survey had a median of five employees and an average (mean) of 17.7 employees. Now, those numbers are eight and 19.3, respectively. Gross billings for firms in 2010 clocked in at a median of $500,000 and an average of $1,507,000; in the present survey, the median was $900,000 and the average was $2,736,000. The growth has been more pronounced as firms increase in size. While one-to-two-person firms went from an average of $140,000 in gross billings in 2010 to just $150,000 in 2022, firms of three to ten people went from an average of $550,000 to $886,000 in those years. Firms of 11 to 25 employees went from gross billings of $2,160,000 in 2010 to $3,039,000 in 2022, and firms of over 26 employees billed, on average, $7,200,000 in 2010, compared to $10,069,000 in 2022.

While categories of staff have changed over the past decade, as a general indicator, associates in the 2011 report made an average range of $81,400 to $98,300; while in 2023, they made an average range of $92,713 to $120,376— $120,376 —a notable increase, although one that falls somewhat short of matching the average rate of inflation of 2.39% annually over that period.

A significant change in the past decade has been in the area of proposals. In 2010, firms responded to an average of 62 RFPs and a median of 10 RFPs in the preceding three years. In 2022, those numbers are 79 and 25, respectively. The increase is particularly evident in small and midsized firms, where responses to RFPs doubled: one-to-two-person firms responded to a median of four RFPs from 2007 to 2010 and a median of 10 from 2019 to 2022; 11-to-25-person firms responded to a median of 27 RFPs from 2007 to 2010 and a median of 50 RFPs from 2019 to 2022.

While the responses from individual staff (as opposed to firm owners and principals) will be included in a future publication rather than in the report currently available from the RAIC, the data provides some noteworthy insights. Some of these concern remote work. According to the

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surveys completed by those representing firms as well as by individual staff members, the vast majority of firms— firms—around 83 percent of them— them— currently accommodate remote working. While there is an expectation that, on average, employees work at the office 2.7 days a week, staff reported actually being at the office an average of 3.2 days per week.

Slightly over half (51 percent) of staff respondents worked in the office four or five days a week. While 39 percent of firms report that remote work has resulted in productivity decreasing somewhat or significantly, with only 12 percent reporting an increase in productivity, the inverse is true for staff respondents: almost half (47 percent) feel that productivity has increased somewhat or significantly with remote work, while 17 percent report decreased productivity, and 36 percent feel that there has been no change in productivity with remote work.

In terms of work hours, only a third of staff respondents (35 percent) work a regular 35 to 40 hours per week, while another third (37 percent) work between 40 to 45 hours, and 23 percent work over 45 hours per week. 43 percent of respondents report that firms offer time off in exchange for additional hours worked, although 38 percent report no additional compensation.

In a series of questions on the future of the profession, just under a third of respondents (31 percent) rated their outlook on the profession over the next five to ten years as eight or higher, on a scale of one to ten, with ten as the most positive score. More respondents— respondents— 47 percent— percent— ranked their outlook as neutral or somewhat positive, with scores of five to seven.

Job satisfaction ratings also cluster towards the mid-range. About two of five staff respondents (41 percent) are satisfied or very satisfied with their job, rating this as eight or higher or a scale of one to ten. Another 44 percent ranked their job satisfaction as five to seven on the same scale.

Half (50 percent) of staff respondents state they have a good to excellent work-life balance, rating this as a seven to ten on a scale of zero to ten.

For both firms and staff, the greatest challenges to the profession in the next five years will be in the area of economic factors and market challenges (48 percent of staff respondents and 50 percent of firm respondents), followed closely by workplace and human resources (48 percent of staff respondents and 34 percent of firm respondents).

Climate change and sustainability was also identified as a key concern by 15 percent of staff respondents and 29 percent of firm respondents, along with technological advancements and AI— AI— a concern for 18 percent of staff and 20 percent of firms. Firms also identified public perception and awareness, along with regulatory and industry challenges, as key concerns (18 percent and 17 percent, respectively), although these were less of a concern for staff respondents, who identified these factors 5 percent and 12 percent of the time, respectively.

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Ultimately, many of these factors are intertwined. “Fees are getting lower and costs (staffing, IT) are getting higher,” writes one firm leader.

“It is not sustainable. Contracts put undue risk on architecture firms.

In competitions and RFPs, there is no ability to negotiate contract terms, and other architects don’t review or understand what they sign.”

This sentiment is echoed by other firm leaders, who point to the need for greater advocacy, including work towards establishing an architecture policy for Canada. “There is an ever-increasing pressure to lower fees and poor public understanding of the value of design and architectural services,” writes one respondent. “Government and institutional procurement practices are among the worst, often placing the highest weight on price before quality or comprehensiveness in design. Getting a commitment from all levels of government to adopt higher sustainability standards, policies and laws [is important to] force a new baseline for development of the built environment—much like most Scandinavian countries have done over the past three decades.” Other architects reiterate the need for advocacy, at all levels: “Architects need to start pushing back on what scopes of work we are engaged in, and stress that back to clients,” writes one.

The intersecting issues of public perception and the increasing complexity of architectural work were foregrounded in several responses. “[A key challenge is] maintaining the value proposition that our services are worth what we cost,” says one respondent, who also points to “the overwhelming complexity of practice from changes in building code regulations, climate/energy performance requirements, social justice and equity considerations, accessibility, and so on.” They write: “It is becoming practically impossible to execute projects in anything resembling a timely fashion, or without employing [large] teams of specialty consultants. It is enough to have me considering leaving the profession.”

“The erosion of fees during economic downturns is rarely recovered,” notes one respondent. “It is disheartening to know real estate agents in hot condo markets are paid four percent fixed fees on sales, while architects are lucky to get one to three percent of construction value.

Until architects are respected by the client groups and, more importantly, by themselves, the challenges of commissions (fees) and procurement will not change, and likely will continue to erode.” They add: “I have witnessed the decline for well over 40 years.”

Young professionals are especially challenged in the current marketplace. “[There is a] lack of innovation and few opportunities for emerging practitioners to access work that is larger in scale than single-family housing or small commercial projects,” reads one response. Younger architects embedded in firms are also feeling discouraged, says another respondent, who points to the “retirement of those 50 and over leaving little legacy within the profession” and “reduced expectations of success among the younger generation.” At the present moment, they continue, “the pandemic has exhausted the usually energetic architects who led or who were likely to lead.” Parallel challenges are present throughout the industry, leading to a reduced quality of construction, say several respondents, one of whom notes the “shrinking pool of good GCs and trades” as a factor in “increasing architects’ scope and liability.” On a hopeful note, they add: “This could be an opportunity if addressed correctly.”

Both firm and staff respondents pointed to the need for procurement reform. “[The] biggest challenge is how to open up the commissioning and procurement process to a wider range of practices, moving beyond current habits of minimizing risk and awarding projects to a handful of established baby boomer firms, [and] moving the criteria for project award beyond the ‘How many of these have you done before?’ approach,” writes one respondent.

Several respondents were comprehensive in their analysis of the need for better procurement reform.

“Public RFP processes ask for more and more work in completing a proposal, most of which is not necessary for evaluation,” writes one

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respondent. “Public RFPs are asking for three to five completed projects of the same type and scale in five years. Only large firms/multinationals will continue to be able to provide this, and it will reduce the ability for smaller and newer firms to be competitive.”

“Public sector contracts put undue risk on the architecture firms,” they add. “Project managers in the public sector are poor quality. Their lack of competence increases project time required and lengthens the project timeline (with no ability for further compensation on a fixed fee project). The skills shortage in construction trades means longer project construction timelines and more work for the architect, which put strain on the architect’s fee in a fixed-fee contract.”

Some of the reforms needed are in the way RFPs are structured.

“The commodification of procuring architectural services by local and provincial governments as if we are simply any other service or good is continuing apace, and will be a significant challenge,” writes one respondent. “Purchasing departments are already implementing complicated, text-entry-only submissions to online platforms that disallow creative writing, sharing of images, and other elements that allow architects to fully share and sell our experience and services. This is done under the guise of fairness, but results in fee-based awards. Architecture is a creative service that cannot be purchased fairly without the ability to share that creativity at the RFP stage.”

Another respondent writes: “Public tenders should be evaluated on quality, and not only on price. [There is a need for clients to] choose the right delivery method for the right projects. The involvement of contractors/builders is not justifiable for all modes, and this affects the quality of the architect’s work. Clients are not sensitive enough to the responsibilities of architects versus builders, and they only prioritize cost reduction. They therefore choose implementation methods that do not take into account the real issues of the project. On the other hand, customers should be more aware of the analysis of the lifecycle of the project, and thus avoid making decisions only on the economy of construction costs. By reasoning this way, they ignore the long-term financial impacts of these decisions. Clients should consider the recommendations of professionals, who take into account the quality, durability and cost reduction of the building over its lifecycle.”

Lifecycle costs are linked to sustainability, which is also at the forefront of concerns for many respondents. Some are hopeful that architects will be able to better serve society through centering sustainability in their practices. One respondent notes the challenge of “dealing effectively, creatively, and positively with climate change,” including “building more with less because of dwindling resources, as well as material and labour costs [and] designing buildings for post-disaster situations.”

Another notes that “with the question of degrowth, the direct impact of climate change and the increase in the use of artificial intelligence, the role of the architect will be called upon to change and it is to be expected that our profession will undergo a major transformation in the type of support that we will offer to our private and public clients.”

What is the path forward? In the pages ahead, we take a deep dive into several aspects of the report, and the way they describe both the challenges confronting architects in Canada and the opportunities available to move in positive directions. You’ll hear from experts who have used the Benchmark Report to assess the financial health of firms in Canada, the relative state of architecture markets in the United States compared to Canada, and the new norms for hybrid and remote work. We also include analysis on the effectiveness of marketing and branding work among Canadian firms, advice on compensation strategies needed to attract and retain talented staff, and guidance for succession planning—one of the key challenges identified by survey respondents. Finally, you’ll find in-depth coverage on the state of gender equity and sustainability expertise among Canadian architects.

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HOW IS YOUR FIRM’S FINANCIAL HEALTH? TEXT

Rick Linley

At your annual checkup, your doctor uses shortcut ratios like body mass index and blood pressure to quickly understand your physical health.

For design firms, there are also shortcut ratios—two in fact—that can provide valuable insights into your practice’s fiscal health.

These two ratios are Net Fee per Full Time Equivalent (NF/FTE) and Operating Profit Margin (OPM). The recent Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Survey provides component data for these two shortcut benchmarks. Let’s take a look at each part individually.

Net Fee (NF) represents all the money generated by a firm, after excluding subconsultants and reimbursable expenses. Net Fee can go by various names on a profit and loss statement, such as Net Service Revenue, Net Operating Revenue, or Net Billings, but all are synonymous with Net Fee. Full Time Equivalent staff (FTEs) accounts for the total number of full-time and part-time individuals employed by the firm, including principals, professionals, technical experts, contract labour, and administrative staff. This number is not found on your profit and loss statement, so a manual count of FTEs for any given year is necessary.

Net Fee divided by the number of Full Time Equivalent staff (NF/ FTE) provides a sense of how well the firm is leveraging its payroll and operating expenses to complete client work.

Operating Profit (OP) is the funds available after deducting payroll and operating expenses from net fees. It’s important to understand that Operat-

ing Profit is not the money that goes into the owner’s pockets. It includes funds for capital expenditures, corporate taxes, debt reduction, staff profit sharing, bonuses, funds for growth, a rainy-day fund, and—after all those commitments have been met—distributions to the firm’s owners.

Operating Profit divided by Net Fee yields Operating Profit Margin (OPM). This provides a valuable gauge of the firm’s overall operational efficiency, allowing for accurate comparisons within the industry, as well as an indicator to track changes from year to year within the firm itself.

The recent Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report provides both financial and non-financial data focussed exclusively on Canadian practices. Organizations like Deltek, PSMJ and the AIA offer highly detailed industry surveys for design firms primarily in the US. The table below captures a composite of the NF/FTE and OPM of small/midsized firms in recent surveys by these organizations.

The Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report indicates that the median NF/FTE for all firms in Canada is $132,000.

The survey does not provide an actual median for profit margins, but it does indicate that firm leaders in Canada aspire to achieve 20% profit margins. However, an admittedly non-scientific median for actual operating profit margin of small/midsized firms in Canada—based on the relation between NF/FTE and OPM in broader surveys of North American firms—is likely around 14%.

NET FEE PER FULL TIME EQUIVALENT STAFF, AND OPERATING PROFIT MARGINS FROM INDUSTRY SURVEYS

RAIC/CA (2022 data)

Deltek (2022 data)

PSMJ (2022 data)

AIA (2021 data)

Median (all firms)

Median (1-50 Emp.)

Median (1-20 Emp.)

Median (10-50 Emp.)

NF/FTE

$132,000

$160,992

$160,703

$151,000

OPM

(20% aspirational)

17.6%

22.4%

14.6%

For more precise data, go to raic.org, Deltek.com, PSMJ.com, AIA.org. These surveys offer detailed information broken out by discipline, project type, firm size, geography, annual billings, etc.

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KEY INDICATORS OF A FIRM’S FISCAL HEALTH

Firm Type

NF

FTE

NF/FTE

OP

OPM

Super

$2,000,000

10.0

$200,000

$750,000

35%

Strong

$1,600,000

10.0

$160,000

$400,000

25%

Struggling

$1,000,000

10.0

$100,000

$50,000

5%

Organizations like Alphabet, Meta, and Apple all consistently generate over $1,000,000 NF/FTE and over 30% OP margin.

These benchmarks will be close enough when conducting a high-level comparison between your firm and the overall industry. More importantly, you can use these benchmarks to compare your firm’s past performance to its present performance, and as a handy tool to set targets for the future.

Let’s employ these two shortcut ratios to compare three hypothetical firms with very different fiscal-health profiles—each with 10 FTEs, including two principals. Refer to the table above for a quick comparison of these three examples and their associated ratios.

Struggling Firm:

T his 10 FTE firm has averaged $1.0M in net fees ($100,000 NF/ FTE) at 5% OPM over the past three years. The financial perfor­ mance of this firm is in dire need of improvement if it is to survive.

The firm generates $50K (5% of NF) in operating profits. At that level of profitability, this firm is likely facing challenges with cash flow, growth potential, return on risk to principals and so on.

Total payroll is 65% of net fee ($650K: 2 Principals averaging $93K , 8 staff averaging $58K). The firm is not able to offer market salaries for principals and staff. This may lead to high turnover and many other payroll-related challenges.

With limited resources for operating expenses, the value of the firm is likely marginal at best.

Strong Firm:

This 10 FTE firm has averaged $1.6M in net fees ($160,000 NF/ FTE) at 25% OPM over the past three years. This firm is a solid performer in comparison to the industry.

T he firm generates $400 K (25% of NF) in operating profits.

As a result, the firm can invest in areas like technology, marketing, and growth while also providing a healthy return on risk and investment to principals.

This firm allocates 50% of net fees to payroll ($800K: 2 Principals averaging $120K , 8 staff averaging $70K). At this level of payroll, the firm can offer salaries to principals and staff that make it competitive in attracting and retaining top talent.

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ith sufficient resources for operating expenses, the value of the pracW tice is built over time, providing a healthy exit option for principals.

Super Firm:

This 10 FTE firm has averaged $2.0M in net fees ($200,000 NF/ FTE) at 35% OPM over the past three years. This firm has established itself as a high performer in the industry.

The firm generates $700K (35% of NF) in annual operating profits.

This is most likely the result of the firm’s focused position in the marketplace and effective project execution.

Payroll is 44% of net fees ($880K : 2 Principals averaging $140K , 8 staff averaging $75K). This super firm is able to provide salaries to principals and staff that are above market rates, making it a formidable competitor in attracting and retaining top talent. In addition, the firm can offer generous bonuses and/or profit sharing.

A healthy budget for operating expenses allows the firm to create a virtuous cycle that helps to ensure it is attractive for an internal or external sale when the principals are ready to exit the firm.

As you can see from the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark data and other surveys, there are many firms out there that are Super, and many more that have achieved the status of Strong Practice. These firms come in all shapes and sizes—but they all use proven strategies to move up the continuum from struggling, to strong, and beyond.

Your doctor uses body mass index and blood pressure to gauge your physical health. Net Fee per Full Time Equivalent and Operating Profit Margin offer potent shortcuts to understand and improve the overall fiscal health of your practice. Is it time to give your firm a check-up?

Rick Linley is the former COO of a 200 FTE, multi-disciplinary, multi-office architecture and engineering firm. He is principal of Strong Practice Strategies, a niche consultancy helping leaders of emerging and evolving design firms to strengthen their practices. Rick is also the author of Scoreboard Your Practice: 7 Numbers to

Understand Your Design Firm’s Financials (FriesenPress Editions, 2022).

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MIXED PROSPECTS

TEXT

Phyllis Crawford

In a rapidly changing and complex world, architecture has increasingly become a difficult business. We are facing pressure from clients to do more and charge less. We are faced with increased construction costs and unpredictability in schedules. What’s more, an emerging labour force values a more balanced lifestyle and requires a higher compensation package to offset the economic strains placed on them. Balancing these combined demands and needs with the ambition and imperative to create healthy, vibrant, and beautiful spaces is challenging.

Furthermore, the new realities created by the Covid-19 pandemic over the last few years have created additional stressors. We find ourselves in unstable economic times faced with higher interest rates, inflation, and tight labour markets. What does this mean for architecture firms as we look ahead?

Looking forward, both reports anticipated that future billings are expected to remain roughly the same. The August 2023 Architectural Billing Index, a leading economic indicator in non-residential construction, reported billings in the US were relatively flat for an eleventh consecutive month, while in Canada, firms agreed that this was the expectation going into 2023. This is consistent with the shift in economic policy to curb inflation, resulting in slower economic growth.

With billings and growth slowing, we need to review the sources of revenue for architectural firms. Looking at revenue by market sector

Statistics Canada Architectural Revenue

2019

2021

Change

What does the data tell us?

In October 2022, the AIA published its annual Firm Survey Report, which provides insights on trends in firm billings and construction sectors that are impacting firms. In March of this year, the RAIC conducted the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark study highlighting current standards for compensation, billings, EDI, and other key indicators among Canadian architectural practices. As expected, there are commonalities.

Historically, the issues impacting our US counterparts similarly impact Canadian firms to a greater or lesser degree; however, the trends remain consistent. At this moment, both the Canadian and US economies are slowing.

Both the RAIC and AIA report that billings per employee remain strong with an average of C$149K per RAIC, and US$127K per AIA, while profit margins increased in the US from <10% to +16% in the last 10 years. I don’t think this data surprises anyone; we have all benefited from a strong economy and low interest rates.

Revenue from nonResidential

57%

49%

-8%

Residential

18%

22%

4%

Institutional

51%

43%

-8%

Commercial / Industrial

25%

21%

-4%

Residential

18%

28%

10%

CA Nov 23.indd 32

ARCHITECTURAL REVENUE BY SECTOR

AIA Architectural Revenue

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

MICHAEL MURAZ, COURTESY OF KPMB ARCHITECTS

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

33

for 2019 and 2021, it’s notable that residential revenue has continued to increase over this period.

We know there is a pent-up demand and a dire need for housing and that has created consistent revenues for architecture firms over the past several years. This market sector is inf luenced heavily by economic conditions, making it a challenge to deliver new housing amid higher interest rates and increasing construction costs. Both Canada and the US are facing these headwinds. Owners and developers are moving forward, sometimes cautiously, sometimes with revised scope, and sometimes on a slower schedule.

In Canada, the demand for housing remains strong, fuelled by population growth, and we can expect that architecture firms will continue to see this market sector as a material source of revenue into the foreseeable future. The recent announcements of increasing the GST rebate from 36% to 100% for residential rental, as well as the $20B increase in the mortgage bond cap, will help developers balance their proformas and encourage future development. This is a positive sign for firms in the multi-unit residential market.

Looking ahead As these new opportunities emerge, we need to focus on short-term measures and long-term growth strategies to navigate these turbulent times and set ourselves up for future growth. What does that road map look like?

Short-term measures Cash Management: As the economy shudders over interest rate increases, the response from owners and developers is to stretch cash.

Firms need to manage their receivables efficiently and effectively to maintain continuity of financial resources. Managing cash f low is not only a good habit, it will be key to successfully navigating these challenging times. Getting invoices in the hands of clients quickly and

CA Nov 23.indd 33

collecting these accounts in a timely manner will support firms during this period.

Scope Control: A clearly defined scope that aligns with the fee proposed is important for managing projects and protecting against scope creep. It further has the benefit of aligning client expectations with the architects’ deliverables. If we are clear on services delivered and that aligns with the client expectations, this creates the foundation for a successful relationship. Investing in meaningful client management and developing a post-occupancy process is critical.

Long-term measures Relationship Management: According to the AIA benchmark study, over half of all US-driven revenue is through repeat clients, either in a competitive or non-competitive bid process. This underlies the importance of building and maintaining relationships for long-term success.

Diversification or Specialization: Larger firms typically can navigate interruptions in a particular market by leveraging the diversification of their portfolio and shifting focus to other growing sectors.

Smaller firms tend to focus on a specific sector, so the ability to differentiate through specialization can help a smaller firm be more competitive. This is the time to really look at your firm and clearly define and communicate the key differentiators.

While we continue to see enquiries for new projects, it’s clear we need to adopt a nimbleness that allows us to respond and pivot to economic conditions, implement strategies that minimize impact on teams and quality of work, and create opportunities that allow us to build and sustain our competitive edge.

Phyllis Crawford (CPA, CGA) is Managing Partner at KPMB Architects.

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

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ARCHITECTURE AND CAPITAL “M” MARKETING TEXT

Russell Pollard

Every architectural firm is founded for a reason. Industry peers or spouses decide to partner in business. An entrepreneurial architect decides to venture on their own. A won competition starts an unexpected journey.

In each start-up scenario, vision, values, and mission are present, forming the initial attributes of a business’s brand or reputation. Over time, each firm will move through various stages of growth, experiencing both successes and challenges.

This is where marketing can play an integral role. Marketing can help carve out a position for a firm and secure opportunities, ensuring its value proposition is relevant, known, and purchased by clients.

Marketing gains knowledge about clients, sectors, opportunities, and broader happenings that impact a business’s current work and outlook.

This, called market research, supports firms’ approaches to serving market and client needs. Done well, marketing builds trust, reduces risk, and informs business strategy.

While terms like “vision,” “values,” and “mission” may come off as aspirational jargon, they are invaluable to aligning leadership and staff.

For many architectural firms, these contribute to how people within the firm provide services, manage client relationships, and support business development.

The 2023 Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report provides insight into how Canadian firms are currently approaching marketing. While uniform interpretation of terms across respondents cannot be guaranteed, the report offers a helpful basis for comparison and reflection on your firm’s goals and activities.

According to the survey results, more than three quarters of firms engage in-person networking. Often the objectives of this are to initiate and build client relationships, generate leads, and maintain a presence within client communities. For this activity to yield results, firms should be clear about the purpose of the in-person engagement: is it to be active in the industry, to engage in learning, or a more intentional approach to business or client development?

Architectural firms are also engaged in promotional activities.

Though the aim varies greatly between activities and channels, these often relate to initiating and maintaining brand awareness or generating leads. The survey data shows that the most adopted practice is social

CA Nov 23.indd 34

media, followed by proposals, digital advertising, publications, print advertising, and public relations. On average, architectural firms are engaged in three of these activities.

While not many of the surveyed firms have this in place, a useful additional tool can be maintaining a customer relationship database.

When established as part of a firm’s marketing infrastructure, this can support the nurturing of leads, capturing of information, and client relationship management.

Proposals are another way firms pursue work. For certain sectors and client organizations, these are labour intensive. Of firms with over five employees, more than four out of five have responded to Requests for Proposals (RFPs) in the last three years. On average, each proposal required 51 hours to produce and contributions from two to three staff.

The range of this indicator varies greatly, with many firms noting as high as 70 or even 100 hours per proposal. The average win-rate (successful bids over total submissions) for proposals among the respondents was 27 percent. This means that firms will have spent, on average, over two hundred hours on proposals for every successful bid. A go/no-go decision matrix can support earlier decisions on which pursuits firms should invest in.

Many respondents shared that RFP requirements and other procurement practices are prohibitive for them, and some firm leaders noted that RFPs do not always reflect a comprehensive understanding of architectural services. Clients’ omnipresent prioritization of low fees— particularly in the RFP process—is noted as a core challenge of the profession. This contributes to a broader concern of the commoditization and devaluation of architectural services. For certain types of RFPs, an approach that prioritizes quality-based selection was suggested.

While seeking work is often spearheaded by leaders of architectural firms, as firms develop, they are eventually faced with the prospect of sharing or delegating marketing and business development responsibilities. When making these decisions, cost is often top of mind.

The data offers that the average salary for junior marketing professionals is about $55,000. For more senior marketing professionals, salaries can be two or three times this amount. This may appear onerous for firms, especially if marketing is viewed as a cost.

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

Architecture firms would do well, however, to view marketing as an investment. When deployed judiciously, marketing can build and sustain business and brand value, and support firms in maintaining relevancy with, and connection to, their clients and sectors. When one considers the amount of revenue lost from billable employees spending their time on marketing or proposals, a lack of marketing capabilities or personnel can become quite costly. Marketing personnel can optimize—rather than replace—architects’ input into proposals and other marketing activities.

One might assume that marketing and communications personnel are for only the largest firms, but about one quarter of firms with between five and ten employees and more than half of firms with between ten and 100 employees have them.

Growth and success are not uniformly defined, or pursued, between architectural firms. While some firms may favour projects, recognition, or craft, others may favour revenue, staff count, and profit.

A firm may grow in employee count, but see reductions in profit.

Or a firm may increase how many sectors it works in, but lose its competitive advantage.

However success is defined, and whether a firm is comprised of one person or thousands of employees, there are opportunities for marketing to be a partner in achieving a firm’s goals. Good business practice is to have a marketing strategy and plan, brand and positioning statement, and resourced marketing and business development activities. For any

firm, it is valuable to define a vision, values, and mission, and to understand how these align with client and project opportunities.

Discussion of marketing architecture in Canada would be incomplete without acknowledging historic restrictions imposed by regulatory bodies in Canada and other countries as to whether and how architects could advertise and promote their services (B. Campbell, 2022). This may have resulted in the discipline of marketing being underdeveloped in the profession.

But in the present day, marketing can serve as a powerful partner in addressing many of the challenges currently faced by architects.

It can ensure business systems are in place to measure, communicate, and negotiate fees based on true cost and value. Taking a broader view, marketing has the potential to increase client and public knowledge of the depth of architects’ expertise, skills, and potential to impact their organizations and lives. It can make the profession known and attractive to people considering a career start or change.

From start-up to succession, and at every stage of business between, marketing can serve as an invaluable asset. In its truest form of identifying and serving market needs, marketing is not only good for business—it is also an integral partner in service of public interest. Done well, marketing can unlock opportunities for people and business, and for architecture itself.

Russell Pollard (he/him), MBA, is the founder and principal of business consultancy

Framework Leadership. russell@frameworkleads.com 23_007771_Canadian_Architect_NOV_CN Mod: September 25, 2023 3:57 PM Print: 09/28/23 12:08:04 PM page 1 v7

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FIRM EXPECTATIONS: MANAGING REMOTE WORK AND FLEXIBILITY Russell Pollard

The hyper adoption of remote work remains one of the most significant impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns. Often expressed as daysper-week employees are expected to be in the office, policies for remote work are prominent in discussions ranging from project management and firm productivity, to staff learning and recruitment.

The 2023 Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report reveals how remote work has been adopted by firms and experiences of remote work in relation to productivity.

84 per cent of firms accommodate remote work, with most firms expecting their staff to be in the office a majority of the week. Firms with fewer employees tend to have higher days-in-office expectations than do larger firms. Most firms perceive that productivity has not changed or has somewhat decreased. Almost half of responding employees, however, perceive that remote work has increased their productivity. Differences in these perspectives may be attributable to employers looking at productivity across the business with organizational-level data and employees defining productivity based on their individual work or teams.

Staff retention and recruitment are key considerations for remote work policies and approaches. 46 per cent of firms expect to take on additional employees in the coming year while 48 per cent expect to remain at current staffing levels. If these expectations come to fruition, recruitment and retention will be top of mind for employers and people-leaders.

Looking at prospective candidates, more than half of employees of these firms are expected to be in the office three days per week or less.

Firms that expect employees in the office more than that may lose out on talent accustomed to, or appreciative of, their current work arrangements. Likewise, employees that dismiss employment opportunities based on days-in-office policies may be losing out on meaningful career and learning opportunities. Employees, of course, consider a great deal of factors other than days-in-office when deciding on employment.

Days-per-week policies are not the only enabler of f lexibility or remote work. Indeed, unless appropriately managed, remote work may work in opposition to f lexibility. Flexibility is an honourable and useful attribute, but it needs to be manageable, managed, and supported by leadership, project resources, and other business capabilities.

CA Nov 23.indd 36

10%

NO ACCOMODATION

8% TEXT

5%

16%

ONE DAY

TWO DAYS

FIRM EXPECTATIONS OF DAYS PER WEEK EMPLOYEES ARE TO BE IN OFFICE

NOT SPECIFIED

FIVE DAYS

17%

THREE DAYS

FOUR DAYS

27%

16%

10%

3% NO ACCOMODATION

NOT SPECIFIED

19%

5% 13%

ONE DAY TWO DAYS

DISTRIBUTION OF EMPLOYEES IMPACTED

BY FIRM DECISIONS ON REMOTE WORK

FIVE DAYS

THREE DAYS FOUR DAYS

33%

18%

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

EXPERIENCES OF REMOTE WORK AND PRODUCTIVITY Employees

48%

Firms / principals

36%

36%

We design.

We manufacture.

We build.

30%

17%

15%

hambro.com 1-866-466-8769 7%

5%

4%

2%

Decreased significantly

For 2 to 30-storey multiresidential steel construction.

Decreased somewhat

No change

Increased somewhat

Increased significantly

Decisions on remote work are not as simple as a days-per-week policy, especially given the collaborative nature of the profession. Cybersecurity, technology, project flow, and fairness are just some of the considerations the hyper adoption of remote work. As with any change, getting this right will take time, communication and iteration.

Although some discourse encourages an employee-versus-employer mentality, more productive dialogue is directed toward alignment.

This comes from how organizations are managed, how people are led, and how individuals work in relation to each other, no matter whether they are across the studio, across the country, or across national borders.

With homage to Peter Drucker’s “what gets measured gets managed,” defining objectives and expressing them meaningfully for each person in the organization can align people in how they work and what they work toward. Remote work is perhaps less about where people are working—and more about how they are working and how they are appropriately supported, both independently and together.

Russell Pollard (he./him), MBA, is the founder and principal of business consultancy Framework Leadership. russell@frameworkleads.com

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CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

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CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

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COMPETITIVE COMPENSATION TEXT

Vered Klein

In the ever-evolving landscape of architecture, the key to success lies not only in designing high-quality buildings, but also in nurturing a talented workforce that drives innovation and growth. Architecture firms face the challenge of retaining top-tier talent while ensuring their continued profitability. This delicate balancing act involves a multifaceted approach that harmonizes compensation strategies with organizational sustainability.

At the heart of any effective talent retention strategy is a competitive compensation package. Architecture firms that offer enticing base sal­ aries, accompanied by benefits such as health benefits, RRSP matching, and generous paid time off, stand out as employers of choice. A wellrounded compensation package demonstrates a firm’s commitment to the well-being of its employees.

According to the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report, several elements of the compensation package demonstrate relative stability within the industry. To illustrate, Junior Architects earn a base salary ranging, by median, from $59,000 to $65,000—a range that bumps up to a median high salary of $70,000 among mid-sized and larger firms. Intermediate Architects earn an annual salary ranging, by median, from $70,000 to $80,000.

There is an approximately 15% variation in base salary associated with the size of the firm. For instance, an Intermediate Architect at a smaller firm earns an average of $72,125, while an Intermediate Architect at a larger firm commands, on average, a salary ranging from $72,967 to $85,187. Senior Architects earn an annual salary, by median, from $90,000 to $100,000; but in firms of over 26 people, the average salary range jumps to $90,164 to $125,779.

A close examination of the report’s data can help firms to compare their base salaries and bonus structures with the industry as a whole, taking into account firm size and geography.

Beyond salary structures, how can an architectural firm maintain its competitive edge?

Performance-driven incentives: Acknowledging and rewarding excep­

tional performance can significantly boost employee motivation and loyalty. By tying bonuses, profit-sharing, or project-specific rewards to architects’ achievements, firms incentivize their teams to consistently deliver high-quality work and meet performance targets. The survey shows that half of the respondent firms with over three employees did not have a bonus structure, and 80 percent of the firms that did base bonuses

CA Nov 23.indd 38

on firm profit—more specifically, on the company’s financial performance as a whole. Tying bonuses to each contributor’s performance, or to project-specific performance, can better incentivize employees.

What can this look like in practice? Project managers might be evaluated based on project delivery and client satisfaction, while design teams might be assessed on quality of design. This should be combined with clear communication around bonus structure, performance metrics, and how performance will be evaluated. Making a clearer connection between performance and reward should have a significant impact on employee performance.

Navigating clear career paths: Architectural professionals seek purpose and direction in their careers. When we speak to candidates about their motivation for changing jobs, career growth is the second-most common reason, compensation being the first. Firms that provide transparent career progression paths pave the way for junior architects to move towards senior roles. This not only fosters commitment, but also encourages longterm engagement, enabling the firm to retain and nurture its future leaders.

The Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report shows that only 31 percent of firms with 3-10 employees had a career path for advancement, and this number remains relatively low in larger firms, with only 60 percent of firms over 10 employees offering a career path for advancement. Similarly, only 23 percent of firms from 11-25 employees have an HR professional, and even among firms of more than 26 employ­ ees, only 13 percent have dedicated staff for in-house training. This is a huge gap in the industry. What architects crave is progression and growth—and that is something that most firms do not provide. A firm that invests in the resources to create clear pathways for growth will find itself in a competitive position in this market.

Mentorship and skill enrichment: The transfer of knowledge and skills

is paramount in sustaining architectural excellence. Establishing men­ torship programs that pair junior architects with experienced mentors facilitates this exchange. Moreover, by investing in continuing education, certifications, and workshops, firms empower their workforce to stay at the forefront of industry developments. When employees know that they can move up the ladder by means such as project management training, leadership development, and Revit courses, they are motivated to stay with a firm to achieve those goals.

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

Succession planning for continuity: Succession planning is a strategic

imperative for architecture firms. Identifying and grooming potential leaders ensures a seamless transition when senior architects retire or move on. This approach safeguards the firm’s legacy while demonstrating a commitment to its employees’ growth.

Optimized resource allocation: Enhancing productivity hinges on judiciously matching architects’ expertise with project requirements.

Optimizing resource allocation strategies can help curb unnecessary expenditures, while also elevating project outcomes by leveraging specialized skills.

Flexibility to foster balance: Acknowledging the importance of work-

Monitoring utilization rates: Tracking architects’ utilization rates

life balance, firms that offer f lexible work arrangements, including remote options or adaptable hours, attract and retain architects seeking a harmonious professional and personal life. Hybrid work arrangements have become the norm, with 82 percent of respondents on the staff side saying their firm accommodates remote work, with the majority working remotely two to three days per week. 95 percent of firms have the neces­sary technology for respondents to be successful when working remotely, and 66 percent of staff experience no change or an increase in productivity.

Despite the increased acceptance of remote work, work hours remain an issue in the industry. About half of the individual respondents reported working more than 40 hours/week, and about 23 percent reported work­­ ing over 45 hours per week. We all know overtime is at times needed to meet deadlines. Offering a manageable workload that only requires occa­ sional overtime will surely offer a competitive advantage in this industry.

Recognition and client exposure: Providing architects with the chance to interact with clients and recognizing their contributions goes a long way in boosting their pride and motivation. When employees have client exposure, it brings about positive outcomes like greater job satis­ faction, skill improvement, and more opportunities for career growth.

Recognition isn’t just about making employees happier; it also promotes a culture of excellence and teamwork.

Many firm owners that our consultancy has spoken to say that the fees in the architecture industry simply don’t allow for further expenses.

Achieving a harmonious equilibrium between talent retention strategies and profitability considerations requires a comprehensive approach.

Here are some strategies to consider:

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

39

is important for ensuring the maximum value from their capabilities.

This practice optimizes revenue generation potential, while upholding job satisfaction levels.

Staying market-competitive: Continual monitoring of industry compensation trends through salary surveys such as the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report empowers firms to remain competitive while judiciously managing costs, ensuring an advantageous intersection of talent retention and financial stability. Monograph’s 2021 Best Practice Report shows that high-performing firms are better at retaining their employees. These firms are also more likely to track their budgets and schedules, modernize their operations, and invest in technology solutions.

In the dynamic world of architecture, achieving the equilibrium between talent retention and profitability is a journey that demands strategic planning, continuous monitoring, and adaptability. Architecture firms can best navigate this balance by intertwining compensation strategies that foster talent development with operational optimization that maintains profitability. Ultimately, the synergy between a skilled and motivated workforce and a financially sound organization supports architectural excellence and positive outcomes for all involved.

Vered Klein is a recruitment expert who specializes in the architecture and design sector. Over the past two decades, Vered Klein Recruitment Consultants has focused on developing a deep understanding of its clients’ practices, nurturing talent within the industry, and refining its methods by actively listening to both candidates and clients.

In her role as a trusted advisor, Vered plays a pivotal role in the success of globally recognized architecture and design firms.

COMPENSATION OF OVERTIME HOURS TOTAL %

FIRM SIZE (BILLINGS) <$500K

$500K<$2M

$2M+

FIRM SIZE (EMPLOYEES) 1 OR 2

3 TO 10

11 TO 25

PROVINCE / REGION 26+

BC

AB/SK/ MB

ON

QC

ATLANTIC

What is the firm’s policy for overtime hours that are worked by staff other than owners and principals?

TOTAL RESPONDANTS

175

55

54

63

43

65

40

35

32

45

81

18

7

NO ADDITIONAL COMPENSATION

11%

15%

9%

10%

14%

11%

5%

17%

6%

7%

14%

22%

14%

HOURS PAID FOR AT BASE RATE

34%

36%

35%

26%

37%

35%

30%

31%

22%

24%

41%

28%

86%

HOURS PAID FOR AT TIME AND A HALF

25%

11%

22%

32%

7%

23%

38%

31%

28%

24%

19%

39%

14%

TIME OFF IN EXCHANGE FOR ADDITIONAL HOURS WORKED

46%

29%

54%

55%

26%

51%

53%

60%

50%

58%

37%

50%

71%

OTHER

19%

25%

11%

19%

28%

11%

18%

20%

16%

20%

19%

22%

0%

CA Nov 23.indd 39

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CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

41

WOMEN IN CANADIAN ARCHITECTURE: AN UPDATE TEXT

Rhys Phillips

Six years ago, I wrote an article for Canadian Architect entitled Because it’s 2017: Gender Diversity in Canada’s Architectural Profession (see CA, Jan 2017). It identified at least thirteen significant barriers to Canadian women architects achieving equity—from low or unequal pay and slower rates of promotion, to inflexible working hours and poor returnto-work training following parental leave. Despite women’s university enrolment and graduation rates for architecture exceeding 50 percent for many years, only 28.8 percent of employed architects at that time were women. Quebec was an outlier at 38 percent, a result my research attributed, at least in part, to the province’s earlier introduction of affordable daycare. This said, the tenor of the article was cautious optimism. Despite the consequential obstacles that remained, change was happening, and there was some evidence that major firms were taking action and that the rise of grassroots women in architecture groups across the country was having a noticeable impact.

In the half-decade since, a lot has happened. In particular, the #MeToo movement turned its attention with force to architecture, spurred by troubling allegations against prominent American architect Richard Meier. One outcome was the 2018 appearance of an anonymous list of abusive male architects bluntly titled “Shitty Architecture

Men,” which included some Canadians. Although taken down quickly because of feared legal repercussions, it catalyzed numerous articles painting the profession in a very harsh light.

In March of 2018, for example, S. Surface, a Seattle-based art, architecture and design curator, wrote in The Architect’s Newspaper: “As a compendium of case studies identifying specific behaviours as misconduct, the list rejects the normalization of bullying, coercion, and abuse of power as standard architecture culture.” More recently, in the wake of allegations of abuse levelled at starchitect David Adjaye earlier this year, The Observer’s Rowan Moore wrote a scathing assessment of both educational and work culture in the profession. This negative spotlight also coincided with the Covid-19 pandemic and its far-reaching impact on the economy, work arrangements and family care.

But a brighter picture of the status of women in Canadian architecture emerges from looking at current gender-based data, including from Statistics Canada and the current Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report. When the earlier article was written in 2017, the 2016 Canadian census data was not yet available, and the analysis was based on statistics from the earlier 2011 census. Now available are census employment data for both 2016 and 2021.

GENDER DISTRIBUTION, ARCHITECTS IN CANADA

Canada

Atlantic Provinces

QC

ON

MA

SK

AB

BC

Territories

Total

19455

545

5520

8120

460

125

1120

3506

60

Male

12075

360

2935

5210

300

75

795

2360

40

Female

7385

185

2585

2910

165

45

325

1145

20

% Fem

37.9%

33.9%

48.8%

35.8%

35.9%

36.0%

28.6%

32.7%

33.3%

CA Nov 23.indd 41

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

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What the data indicates: Architects by gender and province/territories, 2021 The 2016 Census employment data reported that 33 percent of architects nationally were women. More current is the table below, which breaks out the numbers both nationally and by Province/Territory for 2021.

(A caveat: The totals probably overestimate the number of registered architects. Whether this affects the gender ratios depends on whether people of one gender are more likely to be registered than the other.)

The latest census indicates the national representation of women has now risen to 37.9 percent. PEI and Quebec are positive outliers with 60 percent and almost 48.8 percent representation, respectively. If Quebec is removed from the data, the combined representation for the other regions drops to 34.5 percent compared to 24.5 percent in 2011. Either way, the statistics indicate that women’s representation in architecture has improved around ten percent over the last decade.

Architectural education, from undergrad to Master’s It has been argued that while representation continues to improve in the profession, the rate of change does not reflect the graduation levels of women in accredited architecture schools in Canada. In 2021, the Canadian Architecture Certification Board (CACB) published a task force report entitled “Canadian Architectural Education, Accreditation, and Certification trends in a Changing Environment,” which provides extensive historical gender data on enrolment and graduation from both pre-professional degrees (Bachelor) and professional degrees (M Arch) in eleven Canadian schools from 2003 to 2019.

The CACB’s report found that for pre-professional programs in this period, the percentage of women’s enrolment f luctuated, but never dropped below 50 percent, and topped out at 63.6 percent in 2018-19.

All schools, except Dalhousie, reported that women’s aggregate enrolment (each school summed for the full 16 years) exceeded 50 percent, with Laval and McGill at the top, with 65 percent. Women’s graduation rates fell below enrolment levels in nine years and exceeded enrolment in seven years; the total net loss appears to be marginal.

Compared to men, women’s aggregate Bachelor graduation rates exceeded their enrolment representation in four schools: the University of Manitoba and the three Quebec schools (Laval, McGill and Université de Montréal).

When it comes to the Master’s degree, a requirement for the Apprenticeship Program leading to licensure exams and registration, however, the report indicates a larger drop-off in women relative to men between pre-professional graduation and enrolment in professional programs, even in 2018-19. Although in six of the 15 years covered by the study, women’s enrolment in professional degree programs exceeded 50 percent, overall, their rates fell short of women receiving pre-professional degrees. For the last four years of the study, the gap

CA Nov 23.indd 42

has averaged just over six percent per year. For those that did start professional degrees, however, women’s graduation rate exceeded their rate of enrolment half of the years, suggesting limited (if any) loss between enrolment and graduation. Over the full aggregated 16-year period, only Waterloo and again, the three Quebec schools, reported graduation rates for women over 50 percent.

From Master’s graduation to the internship program and licensure Another argument suggests an adverse effect for women during the transition from professional degree to licensure. Overall, we do not have the data to measure this key potential adverse impact. However, there is one exception: in 2023, the Architectural Institute of British Columbia (AIBC) reported that women constituted 43 percent of those achieving registration through the Internship in Architecture Program (IAP) in BC. Positive indicators, however, can be found by examining a break-down of the 2021 census data on architecture employment by age groups and gender. This data indicates a growing wave of women entering the profession. As the graph opposite shows, nationally, the number of women architects under the age of 30 exceeds 60 percent. In the three largest provinces, Quebec and Ontario dip below 50 percent—and only barely for the former—for the 35 to 44 age group. BC lags slightly behind for those under 30, although it falls in line with the other two provinces from age 35 to 44 and up, suggesting there may be leakage in the transition from graduation to registration in that province. However, if we take the average Master’s graduation rate for women from 2011 to 2016, which averages 53 percent, and compare it with the percentage of 30-to-35-year-old women architects in the 2021 census at 53.8 percent, there is an argument that there is no leakage through apprenticeship, licensure and early careers.

The 2023 Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report offers some data addressing the question of whether unequal pay remains an issue. While sample sizes are low for individual staff categories, the survey data suggests that average salaries for the positions of senior architect, intermediate architect, junior architect, and intern architect are comparable for men and women.

Beyond the numbers Missing, despite the above, are well-defined, verifiable data covering Apprenticeship Program uptake, licensure attainment and initial employment. Even less available is good data on advancement rates as well as statistics on firm ownership, principals and partners. To get a deeper picture of the current status of women in Canadian architecture, therefore, we undertook interviews with six experienced women architects who have also been strongly engaged in the gender equity in architecture movement.

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2021 CENSUS: CANADIAN WOMEN ARCHITECTS BY AGE 80

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/23

43

70 60 50 40

still play a determining role. Women are now more likely to be treated equitably when it comes to assigned responsibilities, and being sidelined has diminished. More equitable mentorship, in part because of groups like BEAT and Women in Architecture Vancouver, is emerging, although still not fully realized.

30 20 10

20-24 25-29 30-34 35-44 45-54 55-64

65+

Age National Quebec

Ontario BC

National all ages

This included Kate Gerson, Associate Architect, Dialog Design, and Jessica Yarish, Associate Architect, d HKA rchitects, both active leaders in Women In Architecture Vancouver; Heather Dubbeldam, Principal, Dubbeldam Architecture + Design and Jennifer Esposito, an Associate at Superkül and now an Assistant Professor at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU), both active leaders in Building Equality in Architecture Toronto (BEAT); and Melissa Mazik, Associate Architect, B+H Architects as well as the subject matter expert for the RAIC ’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion webinar. Finally, we also interviewed Annmarie Adams, Professor in the School of Architecture and Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, where she is currently teaching a course on women in architecture.

When asked about the barriers identified in the 2017 article, there was consensus that progress has taken place in removing many barriers, but the assessment of the level of that progress differed. From BC, Gerson and Yarish tended to emphasize the slowness of progress, with the latter reporting that an informal poll of women colleagues found that most suggested pasting the original 2017 list into this article. She provides, however, a more balanced conclusion: “I think people are more aware and are trying to address [those barriers]; but, I also think there are still problems in most firms.” They, along with Adams, believe that while progress has been made in the universities, this is not reflected by a correlating increase of women entering and staying in the profession. Conversely, Dubbeldam and Esposito, along with Mazik, believe pro­gress over the last six years has been considerable, although significant work remains.

Dubbeldam, for example, says the movement to appren­ticeship, licensure and hiring has undergone significant positive change.

There is some general agreement on where progress has been made.

Equal pay is less of an issue, although Gerson warns stereotypes may

CA Nov 23.indd 43

The pandemic, flexibility and leadership Some have argued that Covid impacted women negatively by forcing them to undertake even greater childcare responsibilities; others, includ­ ing Mazik, found the experience isolating in a profession increasingly built on teamwork. This said, the pandemic also introduced ideas of flexible work, including remote working. Both Gerson and Esposito report their firms have returned primarily to in-office work, but the idea of f lexibility remains. According to Gerson, this increased flexibility is a real positive: “If you can work from home quite easily, then it gives more flexibility in terms of working hours as well.” Mazik agrees. As a parent, she leaves work as required, but logs on in the evening to make up for the time.

Mazik also reported another positive pandemic impact. She has found the informality introduced through regular online staff town halls has helped humanize leadership at B+H. “Instead of having that traditional hierarchy of, ‘I’m your boss, you do what I say,’ a more collaborative approach has emerged,” she says.

But barriers to accessing partnership levels remain for women, including roadblocks related to leadership styles and communication skills.

“There’s a perceived idea of how to be a leader,” says Esposito, “but [in reality] there’s lots of ways to be a leader in the profession.” Demon­ strating different, but effective, leadership styles is now one of the focuses for BEAT. Closely related is the skill of communication, and it’s a particular challenge for younger women to find an effective voice that still remains their own. Communication is a two-way street, however, where current biases tend to favour the “male voice.” Thus, says Dubbeldam, BEAT ’s forums and workshops will continue to address communication skills while also seeking to broaden the definition of effective communication.

Underlying many of these issues is the lingering presence of uncon­ scious biases that either favour the male stereotype, or underestimate the specific competency levels of women architects. In the interviews, the issue of women architects’ technical expertise being underestimated was frequently mentioned. In reality, the increase in women in the profession has coincided precisely with the profession’s increasing technical requirements. Mazik, a graduate of the technology-focused program at TMU, finds the stereotype perplexing. “A lot of my female classmates were extremely knowledgeable technically, it was a technical school

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[…] so I’ve been definitely surrounded by very technical women.”

Bias is also suggested by the results of an Ontario Association of Architects (OAA) membership survey in 2023. Women respondents were somewhat less likely to feel included (69 percent) and supported (66 percent) than their male counterparts (at 75 percent and 72 percent, respectively). Conversely, they were more likely to report experiences of barriers (24 percent for women, to 15 percent for men) and discrimination (14 percent for women and seven percent for men).

A significant dual change related to leadership over the past few years, according to Dubbeldam and Esposito, was first a big movement towards succession planning with younger people moving up into more senior roles, fairly rapidly coupled with broad implementation of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) initiatives. Almost all larger architectural practices have EDI committees and EDI profile criteria, they note.

“The whole profession became much more competitive in the last ten years,” says Dubbeldam. “I think firms realize we really need to keep all these good people.”

The elephants in the room I have left to the last two of the biggest barriers still facing women, both of which were broadly discussed in all the interviews. The first, perhaps not surprisingly, is the demands of childcare and the broader family. Increased work f lexibility is helping, as is a generational shift to a broader role for fathers, supported by parental leave programs.

But all agreed that the new National Daycare Program has potential to have a significant positive impact, just as Quebec’s earlier pathbreaking program appeared to have. Still, there was a broad view that architecture is a high-demand, high-pressure profession that can have difficult implications for both men and women. Muzik says she feels the door to the top is already open to a woman if they want it—but it takes some hard choices.

Second, architecture is a profession closely tied to interaction with its clients. If the culture of architecture and its approach to women practi­ tioners has lagged behind our broader culture, as suggested by some in the interviews, the construction site culture involving developers, consultants, engineers and trades hasn’t changed much, says Dubbeldam. “[BEAT] would like to focus on developing some standards that could be adopted by the construction industry in terms of addressing some of these issues.” There is a need to “unpack conversations about issues related to site and those kinds of behaviours that we run into,” adds Esposito. While Gerson agrees that progress has been slow, albeit still apparent, she does note a significant shift in generations, and better relationships with younger practitioners. Mazik sees more women overall— both sitting across the table and on-site. She says that although “there remains a lot of men still on the site, [contractors] have been bringing women into their offices, even as site supers.”

CA Nov 23.indd 44

A new paradigm?

Dubbeldam, Esposito and Mazik suggest the last five years has seen major advances for women, although, in line with Gerson’s and Yarish’s more restrained assessment of progress, they believe further work is definitely required. That said, there are emerging indications that, spurred by effective advocacy, labour market pressures, and generational change across architecture and related professions, the next five to ten years may produce significant advances for Canadian women in architecture.

Rhys Philips is an Ottawa-based architecture critic. He helped craft and enforce the Federal Government’s employment equity policies as an official with both the Canadian Human Rights Commission and Labour Canada.

Canada Compared with Other Countries At 37.9 percent women architects, Canada’s performance appears to be in the middle of the pack internationally. Although a 2021 AIA survey reported that 36 percent of architects in the US were women, the career platform Zippia provides a table for the same year that found women represented only 23.3 percent of architects.

According to the Bureau of Labour Statistics’ 2019 survey, at that time, 25 percent of architects were women.

A massive 2020 report for 31 European countries, compiled by the Architects Council of Europe, reported 42 percent of architects were women. But like the rates between Canadian provinces, national rates varied widely. Topping the list for women architects, eight countries—Croatia, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Poland, Serbia, Slovenia, and Sweden—reported rates above 50 percent. This is followed by six countries—Belgium, France, Italy, Norway, Portugal and Romania—that reported rates between 40 and 50 percent.

Of Europe’s five major countries, only France and Italy had reached the 40 percent level, while the others were all modestly below Canada’s national levels—the UK at 32 percent, Germany at 34 percent and Spain at 34 percent. In the case of the UK, women in 2023 were 31 percent of architects according to the Architects Registration Board (ARB), although new architects joining the register in 2021 were nearly 50 percent female. As in Canada, Europe’s age tree bulges at the bottom for women, while still being mostly populated by men in the higher age brackets.

Some other countries for which statistics on women in architecture are available include South Africa at 21 percent, India at 47.3 percent, and China at 33 percent.

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

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FUTURE FORWARD: ADAPTIVE CHANGE IN ARCHITECTURE EDUCATION AND PRACTICE TEXT

Terri Peters and Ted Kesik

RECENT SURVEYS POINT TO THE NEED TO ADAPT EDUCATION AND PRACTICE TO ADDRESS SUSTAINABILITY CHALLENGES. In an era of momentous change, architecture is facing the challenge of reskilling to design for sustainability. This will necessarily involve both the formal education of architecture students, and the continuing education of architectural practitioners. Adaptive reskilling will involve developing competencies related to climate change mitigation and adaptation, but also addressing converging issues under the umbrella of sustainability: inhabitant health and wellbeing, affordability, accessibility, equity and resilience. The future relevance and vitality of architecture in Canada will hinge on its ability to assume a variety of competencies, all related to design for sustainability.

In 1969, Herbert Simon defined design as “transforming an existing condition into a preferred one.” In making this transition, it is vital that we do not throw out the baby with the bath water. Design must be at the heart of an architectural response to climate change and to the other pressing issues facing society.

If architects want to be seen as sources of knowledge and authority in the fight for more equitable, comfortable and healthy cities, it will also involve making some serious changes beyond technical reskilling.

These will involve choosing optimism, listening to stakeholders and communities, and meaningfully collaborating beyond our disciplinary silos. Clients, regulators, municipalities, manufacturers, constructors and many others in the planning, design, and construction processes will also need to skill up and do better.

As the Rise for Architecture initiative reports, “Canadians are facing many intersecting challenges that are both impacting—and being impacted by—architecture. The climate crisis, social justice, truth and reconciliation, human health and wellbeing, economic disparity, and political instability can all be hindered or helped by architecture. Yet few

CA Nov 23.indd 46

Canadians truly understand the impact it has on their everyday lives.”

“These complex challenges, paired with architecture’s obscure policies, restrict meaningful public participation and hinder communities from becoming healthier, more affordable, just, and resilient. For architecture to truly help Canadian communities thrive, we need a new social contract between the profession of architecture and the public we serve,” the report concludes. “We imagine a future where all Canadians are empowered to guide the design of their communities; where social and environmental justice shape every design decision; and where architecture is leveraged to celebrate diverse cultures and contribute to a prosperous future.”

How do we get from here to there? Recently, two Canadian surveys have attempted to gauge one aspect of where we are at now, by including a focus on climate change competency.

Climate Curriculum The ClimateCurriculum.ca initiative was launched in 2022 at Toronto Metropolitan University to better understand how students of architecture are engaging with climate change and sustainable design. The first phase involved a web-based survey for Canadian students and instructors; the second phase was the launch of an international poster competition where students graphically presented their ideas about how architecture should engage with climate change. The data collected in the 19-question web survey is the first national data of its kind, and it was inspired by and adapted from a survey by the ARCH4 Change Erasmus+ consortium, led by Tampere University in Finland, with Aarhus School of Architecture in Denmark, Bologna University in Italy, Taltech in Estonia, and TU Dublin in Ireland.

The premise of these surveys is the belief that future practice will require a greater understanding of the environmental impacts of architecture, and that future professionals will be asked to design net-zero buildings and understand metrics for embodied carbon and renewable energy. The Climate Curriculum survey sought to understand:

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Within these responses, there is a lot to be optimistic about. Students overwhelmingly report they are interested in learning more about sustainable design, and incorporating climate action into their curriculum.

But until such time as sustainable design and the essential knowledge and skills are clearly defined, it is difficult to formulate fundamental course content. Further, if this learning is not embedded and reinforced across the curriculum—both in lecture and studio courses—then it will remain challenging to assure students will graduate with a high degree of competence in sustainable design.

will students be ready for their future professional lives in the context of a changing climate, extreme weather, and a focus on higher building performance? Do they feel satisfied and prepared by their architectural education?

The initiative collected 196 survey responses from across all 12 of Canada’s accredited architecture schools, and results were presented in an Issue Paper at the 2022 CACB conference. More than 92 percent of responses either agreed or strongly agreed that sustainable design should be a core part of architecture education, and more than 94 percent of responses either agreed or strongly agreed that sustainable design should be embedded in architectural design curricula. 59 percent of respondents indicated they were being explicitly taught about sustainable design, and more than 88 percent of responses either agreed or strongly agreed that sustainable design provides a creative input or inspiration in their designs.

Yet just 36 percent of responses either agreed or strongly agreed that they are satisfied by the level and depth of teaching content on sustainable design. Only 45 percent either agreed or strongly agreed that their school successfully teaches sustainable design.

When asked about a number of specific aspects of sustainable design, the overall feedback indicates that students lack confidence that they are well prepared, and want more of the curriculum devoted to sustainable design. In particular, respondents believe there is a gap between what they are taught—and what they feel they need to know, or should be taught.

Respondents expressed strong opinions about the connection between architecture, climate change, and sustainable design, but reported they do not have confidence in their knowledge about many key terms and concepts. A climate-centred curriculum should be explicitly part of the education of architects, as has now been mandated in the UK. The survey also points to the need for educators and accrediting bodies to embed sustainable design in the architecture curriculum, in particular by reinforcing sustainable design concepts in studio. While 74 percent of students believe that successful design studio projects must address sustainable design, only 38 percent feel this aspect of their designs is being formally evaluated.

Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Survey (2023) The RAIC and Canadian Architect’s recent benchmarking survey refreshes a previous 2011 survey, adding new sections related to Indigenous themes and reconciliation, EDI, and climate action.

When asked: “Does your firm have a formal commitment to leadership on climate action?” one-third of responding practices indicated they did.

These commitments varied across a wide range of initiatives, such as LEED, Passive House, 2030 Challenge, net-zero and a diversity of internal policies. Regardless of whether they have a formal commitment, nearly half of the responding architecture firms are engaged in the mitigation of operational and whole life carbon. About a third of firms engage in climate change adaptation, and roughly one in seven firms advocate for climate justice. About one-third of firms indicated they did not engage in any form of mitigation, adaptation or climate justice measures.

A follow-up question asked: “To what extent do you feel that your organization is engaged in climate action, relative to its capacity to be?”

A third of firms believe they apply up to one-quarter of their potential capacity towards climate action. Another third felt they applied between one-quarter to one-half of their potential capacity towards climate action initiatives. 24 percent of firms reported they achieved one-half to threequarters of their climate action capacity, and 11 percent indicated achieving better than three-quarters of their potential capacity to engage climate action leadership in practice. Based on these responses, it appears that one in ten practices are highly engaged and committed with respect to their potential capacity, about six out of ten are moderately engaged,

CLIMATE ACTION ENGAGEMENT AND CAPACITY TOTAL %

FIRM SIZE (BILLINGS) <$500K

$500K<$2M

$2M+

FIRM SIZE (EMPLOYEES) 1 OR 2

3 TO 10

11 TO 25

PROVINCE / REGION 26+

BC

AB/SK/ MB

ON

QC

ATLANTIC

To what extent do you feel that your organization is engaged in climate action relative to its capacity to be?

TOTAL RESPONDENTS

97

28

28

37

19

33

27

21

19

23

44

9

5

0%

2%

4%

0%

0%

11%

0%

0%

0%

0%

4%

2%

0%

0%

1 TO 24%

31%

29%

29%

38%

16%

30%

30%

43%

16%

35%

34%

33%

40%

25-49%

31%

36%

43%

30%

32%

33%

37%

29%

26%

39%

30%

33%

60%

50-74%

25%

14%

21%

27%

16%

27%

26%

24%

53%

17%

16%

22%

0%

75-100%

11%

18%

7%

5%

26%

9%

7%

5%

5%

4%

18%

11%

0%

CA Nov 23.indd 47

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and that three out of ten are marginally engaged in climate action leadership activities. Another way of interpreting these results is that only about one-third of respondents believed they were working to 50 percent or more of their potential capacity to engage climate action initiatives.

When asked, “What is your sense of the importance of climate action?” over 80 percent of survey respondents indicated they sensed climate action as being highly to extremely important. Clearly, a vast majority of architecture firms acknowledge the importance of climate action in professional practice.

Finally, respondents were asked: “How would you rate your own climate action knowledge and competency development?” Based on a scale of 0 (Poor) to 10 (Excellent), about one in 10 respondents rated their climate action knowledge and competence as somewhat less than half of what would be considered excellent (0-5). Roughly six out of ten rated their climate action knowledge and competence as ranging from moderate to high (6-8), while some three out of ten rated themselves as possessing a very high to excellent level (9-10). Assuming that selfassessed levels of climate action knowledge are reasonably well correlated with externally assessed levels of competence, there is clearly justification for improving general levels of expertise. At present, there are no mandatory continuing education requirements related to climate change competence for practicing architects.

The key takeaways from the two surveys? Both architecture students and practitioners believe that climate action is extremely important.

Both groups are aware there are gaps in their climate action knowledge and skills, and that they could be learning and doing more about climate action leadership. It is encouraging that some firms reported significant commitments to, and competencies in, climate action leadership. This indicates that a transition toward greater emphasis on climate action and sustainable design is desirable, realistic and achievable.

Moving forward, taking action Transitions necessarily generate tensions as academia and the profession stretch to adapt to a changing context. In 1970, American futurist Alvin Toffler identified “future shock” as a psychological state of individuals and society, stemming from enormous structural changes in a post-industrial society. The architecture discipline has attempted to buffer many significant changes—globalization, environmental responsibility, sustainability, computational design—in order to preserve the traditional core of the discipline. However, the intensity and magnitude of significant changes have now reached a threshold where difficult choices must be made between core traditions and emerging realities.

What happens when existing courses compete with climate change competency courses? How can computation and digital fabrication be integrated within design studios? These are difficult challenges that are generating discomforting conversations as they start to happen across architecture schools everywhere.

On the professional front, architecture offices are looking for ways of reskilling their staff while recruiting interns suitably prepared to tackle the 3-Ls: long life, loose fit, and low-impact buildings. Archi-

CA Nov 23.indd 48

tects need to be able to speak the languages of the various expert consultants that are routinely retained to conduct assessments that inform early stages of design, and later, to ensure compliance with codes and standards. While larger practices can afford to retain resident, in-house expertise, the vast majority of smaller practices need to make tough choices between attempting to learn enough about energy modelling, daylighting, and life cycle assessments to do the work themselves, or convincing their clients to agree to additional fees for specialty consultants that were unheard of over a decade ago. A divide is emerging between architecture practices that have ample resources to engage the sustainability challenge, and those that do not have sufficient bandwidth or access to clients with long-term sustainability goals and the deep pockets to attain these targets.

The consumers of architecture services are caught in the middle.

Many want to build better, but do not have access to a competitive diversity of competent practices with a demonstrated track record. Industry-wide, a lack of post-occupancy evaluation has resulted in a performance gap between sustainability promises and what is actually delivered.

This kind of situation would never be tolerated by consumers of automobiles—and the day is nearing when mandatory building performance measurement and reporting will require architects to consistently hit environmental performance targets, in the same way that cars must comply with fuel efficiency and emissions standards.

Stakeholder engagement will be key to a successful transition.

Architecture accreditation requirements need to be brought up to date. Professional licensing bodies and educational institutions will have to ensure the ongoing competence of practitioners and instructors, respectively. A more frequent and effective means of reviewing and updating curriculum and continuing education content will need to be instituted. The rate of change must be managed so that the transition is not overwhelming, while still being sufficiently responsive to meet new challenges. Most importantly, the change must begin now.

Adaptive reskilling of architecture—not as we have known it up to the present, but as it needs to evolve in order to manage massive change— is a daunting challenge that schools and the profession cannot afford to ignore. The good news is that the essential knowledge is finite and readily available for dissemination. But letting go of past academic traditions and anachronistic modes of professional practice will not get any easier with time. The recent Canadian surveys indicate a broad awareness that much needs to be done to adapt architecture education and professional practice. This should be celebrated, even if it is accompanied with some degree of shock and discomfort. If architects could transition from drafting tables to computer-aided design and digital fabrication, it is imperative to take the next leap into a rapidly unfolding future. Is there any other option?

Terri Peters is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Architectural Science at Toronto Metropolitan University. Ted Kesik is Professor of Building Science in the Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto.

2023-11-06 4:04 PM

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LOOKING AHEAD: SUCCESSON PLANNING AND FIRM VALUE

TEXT

Elaine Pantel

In the Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report, half of firms identified economic factors as one of the greatest challenges to the profession in the coming decade, followed by challenges related to workforce and human resources, at 34 percent. These two sets of issues intersect in succession planning, which is at the forefront of firm leaders’ strategy to build long-term value and generate sustainable growth and profitability for their firms.

A succession plan may include a number of avenues, which are not mutually exclusive: Organic succession—building the next generation of firm leadership from the employee team; Recruitment of external senior talent; Acquisition/sale/merger of the firm.

This article focuses on the key elements of a well-planned organic succession plan, using Benchmark Report data to provide insights into firms’ approaches. Succession planning will focus on a firm’s revenues and profitability, as well as its culture, with the goal of creating a place that employees feel is worth a significant financial and personal investment. With only 41 percent of individual respondents rating their job satisfaction as 8 to 10 on a scale of 0-10, and just 50 percent pegging their work-life balance as an 8 to 10 on the same scale, there are clearly improvements available in making the prospect of firm ownership an attractive proposition for the next generation of leaders.

The pathway for employees to develop the skills to take on management and leadership roles is a long-term, multi-phase process. It is essential for firms to establish clarity regarding career advancement pathways, mentorship and education of employees who are identified as future leaders, and the use of bonuses and financial incentives to reward performance.

CA Nov 23.indd 50

Career advancement According to Canadian Architectural Practices Benchmark Report data, less than half of firms, across all sizes, have a succession plan or ownership opportunities in place. For those that don’t, it may be time to start.

Among the firms I’ve advised, most firm owners have come to understand that the organic succession process needs to be considered much earlier than they had previously thought. Owners will need to be willing to admit new owners at some point in the firm’s development, and this may take time to develop. Furthermore, it may be years before an individual is ready to move into an ownership position. A “Pathway to Ownership” program will itself evolve over time. It is good practice to develop a document that outlines the process. Some of the key components of such a program may include:

Description of the firm’s culture, values, and vision for the future; Progression of positions in the firm, with reference to a skills matrix; Coaching and mentorship opportunities and programs; Professional development in the areas of leadership and management; Incentives, such as bonus structure and profit-sharing plan, as well as other perks.

Positions, functions and skills The report lists over 15 staff categories that are currently in use by firms.

This is an indication that firms are offering their employees an array of opportunities for career advancement. Although smaller firms have fewer categories, there is a clear progression to more senior roles. Notably, many larger firms are providing their Associates with management responsibilities. Within firms, the best practice is for each position category to be well defined, with a detailed skills matrix, to highlight what skills are needed to advance. Employee evaluations—formal and informal—should focus on skills development, milestones, goals and steps forward.

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Bonus structures and profit-sharing plans While just under half (49 percent) of firms of 3 to 10 people have a bonus structure, this grows to 73 percent in firms of over 11 people. Likewise, just 11 percent of 3-to-10-person firms have a profit-sharing plan; this grows to 20 percent of 11-to-25-person firms, and 26 percent of firms larger than 26 people.

Performance-based bonus structures and profit-sharing plans are effective incentives that can be used to reward performance and increase employee engagement in the years leading to a potential offer of ownership.

Bonus structures, which may or may not be based on the level of a firm’s profitability, may be offered by employee position or throughout the firm. Profit-sharing plans are generally used for more senior employee positions, and may be based on the firm’s overall financial performance, or the profitability of individual offices, business units, or service lines. In both scenarios, firm leaders need to determine the level of transparency, and how much of the firm’s financial information is to be shared with employees.

Financial literacy and understanding firm value The sustainable growth of a firm is driven by consistent and healthy profits. It’s important for architects to understand how to make a connection between the design process, project management, and the financial results for the firm. This applies throughout the firm, with the level of understanding dependent on the position of each individual.

While the focus of owners is on short-term management and longerterm strategic planning, senior architects will ideally have a solid understanding of the efficiencies and profitability related to project management. Understanding how to read financial reports is critical, as this information provides valuable feedback to assist in planning and decision making. Project management software packages include the ability to design custom dashboards to be used throughout the firm— a feature that is underused by many firms.

There is a direct link between the firm’s financial performance and its value. The value of the firm—a key consideration for succession plans—can be determined in a number of ways, including hiring a Certified Business Valuator to provide a formal valuation, or using a formula based on the ongoing profitability of the firm. The former is costly and time consuming, whereas the latter can be developed and customized by firm leaders, with assistance from external advisors, and updated on a regular annual basis. In some cases, the value formula can be inserted in the firm’s ownership agreement.

External advisors can play a key role in developing an education program to increase financial literacy for firm leaders and management.

Possible topics include:

L earning how to read Financial Statements, including differences between the Balance Sheet and Income Statement; Understanding the difference between profitability and cash f low; Understanding working capital, i.e., the amount of money the firm needs access to on an ongoing basis to fund operations; K nowing what the firm’s profit margin is, and how to set targets; Using budgets and forecasts for earnings and cash flows, and reviewing budget variances to update forecasts; Setting and tracking “Key Performance Indicators” (KPIs) to benchmark the firm’s performance.

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Ownership transfer A well-planned organic succession plan includes several phases: Employee Assessment, Offer of Ownership, and Implementation. When embarking on an organic succession project, firm leaders will engage with a circle of external advisors with experience handling transactions in the architectural industry, such as a business consultant, financial and tax advisors, a lawyer, and an insurance specialist.

In the Employee Assessment phase, firm leaders will identify significant challenges facing the business in the next three to five years, critical positions that will be needed to support business and ownership continuity, and key competencies and skills needed for success. Next, they will identify a pool of talented and high-potential employees who will be coached and mentored to move into more senior roles through specific career development strategies and compensation incentives.

These strategies and incentives would be detailed in the Pathway to Ownership program. An experienced business consultant can provide additional value to guide the firm through this phase. At the end of this phase, firm leaders will have identified a group of key employees to be presented with an Offer of Ownership.

The Offer of Ownership phase can be a lengthy process, as it involves a number of steps and is an organic process whereby the needs of sellers and buyers of ownership interests may change over time. This phase usually proceeds concurrently with the Employee Assessment phase.

Firm leaders would engage with an external financial advisor, tax advisor, and lawyer at different points during this phase.

As a financial advisor, I have guided firm leaders through the following steps, collaborating with other advisors:

1 Set the overall scope of the project and engage with firm leaders to discuss the firm’s succession strategy and owners’ long-term plans, review the current ownership structure and financial position, and consider the general plan to transfer ownership (percentage of the business to be sold, timeframe, and financing options). This includes the preparation of financial modelling of various scenarios for the transfer of ownership interests over time.

2 Consider the valuation methodology and terms of the Offer of Ownership, and have a series of in-depth discussions with firm leaders on options for pricing ownership interests and how this relates to a consideration of the value of the firm. This includes the preparation of financial analysis of the firm’s performance over the past three to five years, including adjusted (normalized) earnings, base level of capital to be retained in the firm, and other factors. On occasion, I have been asked how other firms in the industry have set the pricing of ownership interests. There is a wide range of methods and approaches which are tailored to suit each firm’s unique culture regarding organic succession, as well as the needs of the sellers and buyers. As the Offer begins to take shape, cash flow models are prepared to illustrate the impact for sellers and buyers over an appropriate period of time. A tax advisor is engaged to provide guidance on the structure of the sale of ownership interests, including any pertinent tax considerations. At the completion of this step, firm leaders have agreed on the terms of the preliminary Offer of Ownership, although there may be iterations as the process continues.

3 Prepare and present a Proposal and Offer of Ownership to key employees. The plan for the sale of ownership interests is presented to the

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key employees who have been identified in the Employee Assessment phase of the project. The initial presentation is coordinated by firm leaders and external advisors (business consultant, financial advisor and tax advisor). As this will be the first interaction presenting an Offer of Ownership to the employees, it is important to craft a narrative that illuminates the firm’s history and plans for the future. Financial information is then presented in a way that simplifies the firm’s financial position and valuation methodology, phased plan for the transfer of ownership, and cash flow models that illustrate the impact for buyers. An Executive Financial Dashboard is an excellent tool to be used in this process (refer to Sidebar). In a series of follow-up meetings, the details of the Offer will be discussed and employees’ (and their respective advisors’) questions and concerns addressed. During this period, various terms of the Offer may be revised. At the completion of this phase, the terms of the Offer have been finalized.

I have occasionally seen a general reticence on the part of some employees to take this important step in their careers. They may be concerned about making a long-term commitment with the firm, possibly taking on debt (depending on the pricing and financing mechanism), assuming risk as an owner, and the lack of clarity about how they will become involved in the management of the firm. All of these concerns need to be addressed in the series of meetings, and it is possible that not all of the selected employees will ultimately accept the Offer.

4 In the Implementation phase, firm leaders will engage their corporate lawyers to draft the Ownership Agreement. This agreement covers many areas including the management of the firm, key decisionmaking, financing the firm, legal and financial terms for changes in ownership interests, and dispute resolution. Overall, there is a need to provide clarity to all owners regarding future transactions and to protect the interests of minority owners. Firm leaders may engage with their financial and tax advisors to review certain clauses of the agreement dealing with the buy-sell of ownership interests. Once the agreement has been completed, it is then passed to the employees’ lawyers for their consideration. There may be a number of amendments as the parties work through the agreement. Once agreement is reached, the lawyers will prepare all additional required documentation for review. The date for the finalization of the transaction will be set, and final preparations will be undertaken.

The implementation of the human resource aspect of the transaction will be an ongoing process of mentorship and skill development for the new owners, and the plan to integrate the new owners into the management of the firm will be set in motion.

Conclusion The architecture profession is experiencing a period of significant change and shifts. Developments in the area of organic succession planning are focusing on success for all parties and the firm, augmenting personal satisfaction and firm value over the long term. It’s an exciting time, and there is much room for creativity and innovation in developing and evolving organic succession plans and ownership models for firms.

Elaine Pantel, CPA, CGA, ICD.D is a strategic advisor to leaders of Architecture, Engineering and Design (AED) firms, as an independent consultant. She is a former partner of a Toronto-based firm of Chartered Professional Accountants, where, over many years, she played a key role in developing and growing the firm’s vibrant AED industry client practice, helping clients achieve success. Elaine has provided educa-

Executive Financial Dashboard A customized Executive Financial Dashboard of KPIs can be used to align with strategy, assess and monitor the financial health of the firm, manage day-to-day operations, and set performance targets. The Dashboard is also useful in organic succession planning, to communicate summarized financial information to key employees who have been presented with an Offer of Ownership.

The Dashboard is intended to be a “living” tool that is reviewed and referred to on a regular basis (eg. quarterly, semi-annually or annually). By assessing the firm’s performance over time, firm leaders can identify areas in which changes are occurring, and assist in strategic planning, risk management and operational decision making. The Dashboard can also be used for comparison with industry trends. Ideally, the Dashboard should be concise— one to two pages—to allow leaders to focus on critical metrics.

The Dashboard can be designed to link to data from the firm’s Financial Statements, creating more clarity about the firm’s financials for individuals at different levels of responsibility.

Here are some KPIs that I suggest to clients for inclusion in an Executive Financial Dashboard: Balance Sheet KPIs focus on the billing cycle and overall financial position of the firm: Days Aging in Accounts Receivable: average Accounts Receivable x #days / Gross Fees Days Aging in Work in Progress: Work in Progress x #days / Gross Fees Current Ratio (liquidity): Current Assets / Current Liabilities Debt to Equity Ratio (liquidity): Total Liabilities / Shareholders or Partnership Equity Income Statement KPIs focus on performance and efficiency: Net Fee Multiplier: Net Fees / Total Professional Labour Net Fees per Full Time Equivalent (FTE): Net Fees / Full-time Equivalent employees Overhead Rate: Total Overhead / Total Professional Labour P rofit on Net Fees (also known as Operating Profit Margin): Pre-tax earnings / Net Fees Utilization Rate: Hours spent by professional staff on projects / Total hours worked Key Costs as a percentage of Net Fees Note: In his article “How is Your Firm’s Financial Health” (see pages 30-31) Rick Linley takes a deep dive into two key metrics: Net Fees per Full Time Equivalent and Operating Profit Margin, and provides profiles of firms that are evaluated to be Struggling, Strong and Super.

Predictive KPIs set the groundwork for budgets and forecasts: C ontract Backlog: total value of revenue yet to be earned on existing contracts H it Ratio, or Proposal Win Rate: percentage of proposals the firm is winning Proposals pending: prospects and suspects (based on probability of winning)

tional presentations to clients and industry members as well as the OAA, OALA, IIDEX and SDA Canada.

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BUILDING IMPACT TEXT

Jake Nicholson

Architects often seem to have a relationship with their work that connects deeply with the idea of artistic legacy. Like painters, they design an oeuvre by which they are judged, and these projects are what they leave behind.

Firm by firm, you can see this sort of narrative being purposefully develop­ ed in books, corporate websites, firm profiles, presentations. As a proposal writer, I was a dutiful student of this type of storytelling for a long time, and it became part of my career. After all, it was (and remains) a necessity of marketing for architecture firms to create a body of work and put it forward. Behold, these are the works that we have designed.

This is a straightforward enough idea of professional legacy—appealing even—but buildings aren’t like other artworks. They get lived in, added on to, renovated, worn out, torn down. Design work itself is also more complicated than the stories that tend to follow. Finished buildings mark the culmination of what is usually a huge and messy group project, as opposed to a work of single authorship. The actual process of design and project management takes months or years before a building’s completion. How that day-to-day work is handled by different individuals is in itself a significant professional legacy: one that often gets completely omitted or overlooked when talking about architecture. (You can get through an entire retrospective of Frank Lloyd Wright’s career without reading about how he treated students in his Taliesin Fellowship, which

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to me is one of the aspects of his legacy worth remembering and learning from.) As always, reality is both richer and more complicated than meticulously photoshopped images of finished buildings, or stories about how design challenges were successfully resolved.

So how does this square with the question of legacy and how architects tend to think about it? I spoke with four architects from three different firms across Canada. Their responses were varied, unexpected, and all ran deeper than the idea of simply cultivating a portfolio of photogenic or recognized work.

Throughout one of these conversations, Daniel Cohlmeyer, Principal at Cohlmeyer Architecture, unpacked tensions that exist between popular narratives about architects and the day-to-day reality of the work. Rather than creating major, well-recognized projects, the majority of his time is spent on unsung background projects, smaller renovations, and minor upgrades.

Daniel is a fourth-generation architect—the son of architect Stephen Cohlmeyer (who passed away in 2021) and landscape architect Cynthia Cohlmeyer (who works at Cohlmeyer Architecture). In our conversation, Daniel expressed pride in a family legacy of design that runs back generations. He was also thoughtful about what it means to contribute to the ongoing meta-projects of designing cities and architecture firms themselves.

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“There’s no doubt there’s an ego deep down, and you think of legacy. You look at your colleagues and what they’ve done, and you look at what some people have done at a very young age,” says Cohlmeyer.

“There’s no way to not compare yourself, because we’re taught to look at other architects and what they’ve built, and why they’re important, and what kind of legacy they have brought to the world of architecture. “Right from the outset of school, you’re taught about the legacy of architecture. I don’t think that many architects end up creating legacy, and I mean that in good terms. Many architects—at least in Canada—work on projects that are definitely not seen by the public.”

Cohlmeyer sees so-called background projects as one of the things often omitted in a discussion of professional legacy, but does not discount their importance. Recalling his father’s work, Cohlmeyer notes that while design work was being done on The Forks in Winnipeg (a beloved and well-known public space), his father was also working on a project to replace 300 locks on high-security prison doors—one of a litany of necessary projects, both for the world, and for the sake of maintaining a viable architecture practice.

To Cohlmeyer, this type of understated contribution to the built environment isn’t the only thing missed by the more conventional stories

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COHLMEYER ARCHITECTURE

OPPOSITE Cohlmeyer’s work on The Forks in downtown Winnipeg began by creating a public space strategy for the 80-acre site, and extended to long-term planning for a future development initiative. ABOVE At Upper Fort Garry Provincial Park, Cohlmeyer Architecture and HTFC Planning and Design’s work included creating a 400-foot-long interpretive wall from layered Corten steel. BELOW Daniel Cohlmeyer (left) with his late father Stephen Cohlmeyer (right).

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JAMES DOW / PATKAU ARCHITECTS

that are told about architectural legacy. We also tend to miss just how many people are involved in the work.

“I feel very awkward talking about me, when we all know it’s a team of people. A lot of people are implicated in every single project. Legacy specifically points out one name of a firm or a person, but rarely talks about the ninety-nine percent of the work was done by others. So that’s a problem. And we train that in school. We train that with Canadian Architect too,” says Cohlmeyer. The client, too, is an essential player, he adds: “Legacy is as much the client as it is the architect.”

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I spoke with John Patkau in December of last year. John is one of the principals at Patkau Architects in Vancouver, a design firm recognized with many Governor General’s Medals—most recently, in 2020 for the Polygon Gallery in Vancouver. Throughout our discussion, I was struck by how many of his comments made me think of the traditional notion of architectural legacy as something that almost looked unhealthily backwards. At the close of our call, Patkau summed up his thoughts: “The buildings that you make do comprise a legacy. My view is that being overly concerned about that might not be the best thing, because I think it would tend to cause you to focus on what you might call your ‘brand’, which is an anathema to me, the idea of a brand,” he said. “While I recognize that legacy is very important, and a brand, I guess, is important, it’s something that I don’t like to think about. I would like to always be open and growing and changing, so that the legacy is an ever-growing,

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OPPOSITE TOP John Patkau with Cut/Drawn, a piece that explores the properties of steel by precisely cutting an industrially extruded metal plate and drawing it out with enormous tension. OPPOSITE BOTTOM GNaum, named for the Russian Constructivist sculptor Naum Gabo, is a habitable sculpture made through folding and bending light-gauge stainless steel sheets. ABOVE Patkau Architects’ entry to a design competition for a public library in Daegu, South Korea, proposed a curvilinear shell structure made from timber members and panels.

ever-changing thing, rather than something that is being consolidated, concretized and frozen into a repeated pattern. I’m looking for expansion.”

This type of thinking directly informs work at Patkau Architects.

The firm often engages in research projects that are smaller, intentionally open-ended, and done with the purpose of both playing with and investigating new ideas. Patkau even sees a trap in people trying to bundle their work into a single comprehensible package: “I would see that as shutting down the willingness to risk, the willingness to push into new areas that aren’t well-worn. And certainly, the idea of limiting yourself to the scope of thinking that you’ve previously thought—as opposed to moving into new areas—is something that I would think is not a good thing. […] For us, it’s always been more about trying to find new things to address, new issues to enrich what we do.”

Throughout my Zoom call with Shallyn Hendry and Silva Stojak, Principals at Nine Yards Architecture in Prince Edward Island, I watched as they bounced ideas off each other about the idea of a professional legacy, and what it meant to them. Their firm opened in 2017; since then, it’s being recognized with an RAIC National Urban Design Award for their Urban Beehive Project and was featured in this magazine’s “Twenty + Change: Emerging Talent” selection. They agreed they had never intentionally set out to develop a “legacy” per se as a firm, and that any legacy created was a natural extension of their own values, including their interests in equitable work and fulfilling designs.

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“I do think legacy for some architects is probably recognition of a body of work—I mean, that’s the first thing that comes to mind, talking about the legacy of architects that are more well-known, for example,” says Hendry. “We tend to look for more meaningful work as our legacy, and I think that’s probably true for a lot of [other] architects as well— they gear their choices and what they want to leave behind as a fulfillment of their own careers and what they believe in.”

Says Stojak, “You never think about anything that you are doing as a legacy at all, because you are not doing things to make it a ‘legacy’, necessarily. It’s just too presumptuous to think about. […] We are interested to do things that equalize everyone in our community.”

Asked about what meaningful work meant to her, Hendry mentioned the firm’s not-for-profit housing designs. She also discussed the recently completed Charlottetown Library (with design collaborators MacKayLyons Sweetapple Architects), and smaller single-object and public art projects. Of the latter, she says: “It gives us that opportunity to design freely and be a bigger part of the community. Those art projects, it’s usually something in a park, somewhere that the community sees it and can engage with it.”

Hendry sees a shift in how people have thought about architectural legacy—a move from seeing things as more portfolio-based, to something that takes a more holistic view of the business. Both Hendry and Stojak mentioned the importance of having a diverse workplace, providing opportunity and work-life balance to staff, as well as providing fair pay for work.

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STEWART MACLEAN MEDIA

“I think there’s some legacy in that, too: having a firm that is better balanced and looking at the profession in a different way than maybe it was looked at before,” says Hendry. “You practice the person that you are, what you believe, and that somehow becomes—if you’re looking for it—your legacy.”

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I asked everybody I talked with how the necessity of marketing an architecture firm forced them to contend with certain types of storytelling or legacy-building. For all, there was a necessity to tell stories about their projects that followed from the need to market a firm, but how they thought about it varied.

“My pessimistic answer is yes, it’s absolutely [needed] for business,” says Cohlmeyer. “It’s not about legacy. You can’t compete without a website. You can’t compete without doing RFPs.” For Patkau, the question hit a bit of a nerve.

“That’s a sore point. You’ve really hit me in an area that I find really frustrating. The fact that buildings are now compelled to be stories.

Buildings aren’t stories. They’re buildings,” Patkau says through a laugh on our call. “They’re dumb objects that just sit there, and they’re not storytellers. And architects, if they’re storytellers, are maybe more bullshit artists than anything else. So that whole narrative dimension drives me nuts, and it always has. We’ve always tried to be reticent about that, and to basically—to use the expression—let the work speak for itself.”

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OPPOSITE TOP Built for Charlottetown’s Art in the Open festival, Sh*t Load of Tubes was made from inexpensive paper tubes used to transport carpet and flooring. OPPOSITE BOTTOM Nine Yards Studio principals Silva Stojak (left) and Shallyn Murray (right). ABOVE Nine Yards Studio and MacKay-Lyons Sweetapple Architects collaborated on the refurbishment of the ground floor of a 1950s government building into the Charlottetown Library Learning Centre.

Hendry at Nine Yards seemed to view the firm’s marketing initiatives as less focussed on portfolio, and more a natural expression of the firm’s personality in the world. “We use Instagram as a main tool to sometimes get work, but also promote who we want to be. I very much feel like that has made us relatable to many people that probably never knew an architect, or even knew what architects did.” Hendry continues: “I think marketing plays a big role in our legacy—what we would leave behind, what people would know us as, or what impact we would make in the community.”

One of the last questions I asked everybody was how they thought of their own finished projects—whether they remembered them as experiences, or maybe thought of them as their own distinct entities.

“The buildings themselves do take on an independence,” says Patkau. “It does change, and when you go back to them you look at them at a distance, because you’ve moved on, too. What was fascinating, and what you were really trying to accomplish on a project 15 years ago, is not the same as what you’re thinking about today. So, when you get back to them, they have acquired some separation, some distance, and in that sense, you are able to see them more clearly perhaps—because you have gotten that separation.”

For Cohlmeyer, there was a kind of lovely balance between wanting to contribute to a city while still contributing distinct and recognizable work. “I really like the idea of my buildings evolving. However, the one

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we just did for Montauk Sofa Montreal [see February CA, 2023], it’s so crystalline. It’s so perfect. I would feel hurt to see that modified.”

As for the work of his family, Cohlmeyer expressed a sense of pride, both in seeing past projects come to fruition, and in continuing some of them into the present day. “I feel very proud to go see my Dad’s work.

There’s just pride. It’s as simple as that.”

For Stojak and Hendry at Nine Yards, there is some variation in how they think of their past work, depending on the context of the project.

Stojak noted a bit of sadness in being done with some of her projects, while others—like the firm’s Urban Beehive Project—have continued directly in a way that she finds rewarding.

“We are just part of the life of the building,” says Stojak. “We can’t give more life and soul to the building after we are done. It’s up to users to do that.”

There is potency in looking at what a legacy means, beyond just creating a portfolio of works. The practice of designing buildings is spectacularly varied, and it leaves its mark. Asking what this adds up to in terms of legacy is a thought-experiment worth luxuriating in—if for no other reason than it might change how you think about what you’re doing right now.

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

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INSITES

APHANTASIA AND ARCHITECTURE TEXT AND PHOTO

Christian Maidankine

AS AN ARCHITECTURE STUDENT WITH APHANTASIA, THE WAY I EXPERIENCE MY ENVIRONMENT OFFERS LESSONS ON BEING PRESENT IN THE EVERYDAY. I often wake up forgetting where I am. In the weeks of preparing this article, I’ve been surprised to find myself in airplanes, friend’s apartments, cabins on the beach, in taxis—each occurrence requiring a moment to recollect myself.

I’ve woken up.

What do I see?

What do I feel?

I am here.

The first of these questions is the most important. I cannot see images in my mind, nor can I imagine smells, tastes, or physical feelings, but sound and my inner voice remain clear in my head. I have aphantasia.

The way I experience life and recall memories is different from others. It’s as if I’m walking through a dense fog—I can clearly see what is immediately around me, but as I take a step forward, I begin to lose what just passed.

Since I cannot fully remember the past or imagine the future, the present is the most important moment to me. This also changes how the built environment affects me: I cannot dwell in memories of places I admire, and spectacles do not remain in my mind. Where I am now is what I know, and because of this, my everyday surroundings are incredibly important. Where do I spend most of my time? What objects, places, or people fill the average hours of my life? After travelling, I know that I loved the incredible places I’ve been in, but once I leave, they almost instantly fade away from me, and all I am left with is my normal life.

As a result, I am very specific with what I choose to have close by.

Design affects everyone’s life, but oftentimes, we pay the most attention to objects or places deemed to be “special.” Why must that distinction be made? If something will be a part of someone’s life, shouldn’t it be carefully designed for them, regardless of what it is?

I’ve been drawn to design and architecture because it helps frame my world. It not only gives me something to stimulate my vision and actions, but also provides an opportunity to settle myself. Architecture can be understood as the bounding of boundless space, and, for me, creates a place of safety in which I can understand my world. The most compelling spaces are those which allow me to let my guard down and be fully aware of what is happening in my life at this very moment. In those spaces, there is a level of safety required to help me slow down and

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observe, without additional pressures that make me feel rushed. Such sense-engaging spaces are the most successful ones at bringing me down to the now. With aphantasia, I greatly value sight, but it is important to couple it with other senses—immersive experiences that include touch, smell, taste, and temperature strengthen my awareness of the present.

There are times when I’ve experienced complete immersion in my environment. While it may seem like I am “zoned out” at those moments, I am actually incredibly tuned in to both myself and my place in the world. The back-and-forth of acknowledging self and opening up to my surroundings has become an important rhythm of daily life: if there is too much of one, I can start to feel disassociated and out of place. It’s difficult to pinpoint what allows either situation to happen, but being aware of both states is part of the process. Encouraging slowness in my life, while seemingly simple, has been effective, yet uncomfortable. A paced rhythm ties my day together, otherwise, moments can become disjointed and difficult to remember. Memories become much stronger when they are connected by high and low points of stimulation.

Similarly, the composition of visuals and experiences becomes quite important to the way I absorb my environment. Disparate elements are far less moving than the amalgamation that surrounds me. This works at a variety of scales: whether I am considering a city block while walking to work, or the room at home where I am writing this text.

What is the general atmosphere I’m in? What objects, people, and environments fill my field of vision? What is the arrangement of my life? Focusing on composition is akin to treating everything as a series of still lifes, where intentional beauty not only makes me pay attention to the present, but helps me to appreciate it more.

While aphantasia creates a different experience of life, these thoughts are applicable to everyone. Our eyes are trained to fill in blanks and make assumptions. My experience emphasizes the value of truly seeing and being aware of your surroundings. Of remaining attentive and slowing down to notice the composition of your daily life: what do you have control over, and what guides you? Design surrounds us and is inescapable, yet we often focus on very specific works which “deserve” attention. We sometimes diminish the power of everyday life: yet this is the condition which has the most potent influence on our being.

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

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BOOKS

Evidently, a lot can happen in ten years, which is the time since Harold “Hal” Kalman and Robin Ward last updated their popular Exploring Vancouver—a keystone volume that has been re-issued nearly every decade since 1974. It is remarkable to look at the newest version in comparison to earlier ones, including the black-and-white edition from almost fifty years ago. The past decade, in particular, has seen an astonishing number of new entries to the book: from a plethora of new residential high-rises by an international who’s who of architects, to several new buildings at UBC, along with new developments by local First Nations.

It is this last group of entries in particular that the book’s authors call out in their introduction to this edition. Following the lead of Vancouver’s pledge to Truth and Reconciliation in 2014, this is the first edition that highlights some of the grievous wrongs that have been perpetuated since the founding of the city—in particular, that the downtown peninsula was not “empty land” as the land commissioner of the CPR declared and had immortalized on the corner of the downtown street named after him. As clearly noted on the first page of this book’s introduction: “The land was not ‘empty’—First Nations had been here for millennia.”

In acknowledgment of the damaging history of colonialism, the book no longer begins with Gastown, accompanied by a picture of John “Gassy Jack” Deighton’s statue in Maple Tree Square, as had been the case in 2012. Instead, the new edition puts False Creek at the start: the book’s authors have chosen Expo ’86, which was staged on those former industrial lands, as the event to frame the book’s narrative and nearly four hundred featured buildings. The introduction is perhaps one of the most comprehensive histories of planning in Vancouver and

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its region to-date, even more than Frances Bula‘s recent introduction to Larry Beasley’s Vancouverism, specifically because this new edition followed the release of the controversial Broadway Plan. The opening text is particularly strong in documenting the city’s history since the sale of the Expo lands in 1987, when Vancouver planner Ray Spaxman and City Council worked with developer Concord Pacific and local constituents to create what would become one of North America’s most vibrant, walkable communities.

From CityPlan to EcoDensity, from Vancouverism to the new Broadway Plan, Vancouver has seen seismic shifts in its planning sensibilities since 2012, and Kalman and Ward have chronicled the landscapes that have emerged along the way—from the new communities growing up in Olympic Village (now just “The Village”) to the bustling campus in the False Creek Flats where Emily Carr University has made its new home, designed by Diamond Schmitt and Chernoff Thompson Architects.

As well, the book includes some of the many new buildings constructed at UBC, including Tallwood by Acton Ostry Architects, which at the time of its construction in 2017 was the tallest hybrid mass timber building in the world. Other new buildings included in the ten additional pages on UBC include the Nest by DIALOG and B+H Architects, Formline’s Indian Residential School History and Dialogue Centre, a new aquatic centre by MJMA and Acton Ostry Architects, a biodiversity museum and research centre by Patkau Architects, and a pharmaceutical sciences building by Saucier + Perrotte with HCMA .

The next edition, one anticipates, will provide an update on the recent seismic upgrades to the Museum of Anthropology, the great masterwork by Arthur Erickson which anchors the west side of the campus.

PHOTOS: ROBIN WARD

EXPLORING VANCOUVER

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The šxwqweləwən ct (One Heart, One Mind) Carving Centre was designed by Joe Wai as a permanent space for cross-cultural exchange and reconciliation. ABOVE LEFT Designed by NIck Milkovich Architects and Arthur Erickson, the Waterfall Building groups live-work studios around a courtyard with a wedge-shaped pavilion intended as an art gallery. ABOVE RIGHT One of the most recent projects in the guidebook is Alberni, a 43-storey luxury condo tower designed by Kengo Kuma & Associates with Merrick Architecture.

OPPOSITE RIGHT

By presenting False Creek as the starting point for the book, the usual suspects of Gastown, Chinatown, and Strathcona are able to follow without much ado, with the downtown CBD and West End still rounding out the book’s core framework, as it has for close to five decades. As a past architectural walking tour guide for the AIBC who led variations of these six walks, I have been watching the transformation of the downtown and environs with interest since the late nineties, and was very curious to see which recent buildings the authors would be able to include at the time of the book’s publishing. The final selection includes Bjarke Ingels Group and DIALOG’s Vancouver House, Revery’s Butterfly, Kengo Kuma and Merrick Architecture’s Alberni, and Herzog and de Meuron and Perkins&Will’s design for a new Vancouver Art Gallery.

By consolidating some of the chapters from the previous edition, the authors have been able to reduce the previous fourteen walks to ten.

The tenth tour in the book requires a car as it covers a wide geographic area, including Surrey, Richmond, New Westminster, Port Moody, and Burnaby. This section is a substantial addition to the book, providing for several new buildings atop Mount Burnaby at SFU, along with a num­ber of buildings in Surrey’s growing civic precinct, including its main library by Revery.

As a resident of New Westminster, I appreciated the inclusion of the Anvil Centre by HCMA and MCM, along with the new Sapperton District adjacent to the Royal Columbian Hospital, an often overlooked transit-oriented development masterplanned by Henriquez Partners Architects. Like its older cousin at New Westminster Station, Sapperton will be home to four new residential towers at its build-out, and has turned the area into a vibrant, walkable community.

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Like the story of False Creek, the Expo Line anchors another narrative thread, as its expansion to include the Millennium, Evergreen, and Canada Lines has allowed for Metro Vancouver to remain a fifteen-minute city. The new Broadway Line is also mentioned several times in the current edition, particularly as it enables the Broadway Plan. As the book’s authors make clear, this new plan will potentially affect some 500 blocks along the Broadway corridor, currently home to twenty-five percent of the city’s rental housing stock. Perhaps the game changer here will be the arrival of Indigenous development on the Heather and Jericho lands, along with the Squamish nation’s Sen’ákw, designed by Revery with Kasian, which has already broken ground at the southern foot of the Burrard Street Bridge.

Kalman and Ward note that the most unprecedented result of Truth and Reconciliation, “unforeseen by CityPlan and EcoDensity (or previous editions of this book), is that First Nations would assert their rights and initiate development.” They ask: “Will these initiatives shift the dynamics of real estate development in Vancouver? They will certainly test the sincerity of the City’s 2014 pledge of reconciliation.”

The results of these new developments will doubtless be documented in a future edition. Meanwhile, the fifth edition offers a hopeful narrative of moving into the future together by building upon the lessons of our past. In the spirit of Expo ’86, this positive motion continues to propel this city forward to becoming a place we can all call home.

-Review by Sean Ruthen

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BOOKS

MATTHIEU BROUILLARD © CCA

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TOWARDS WRITING Arthur Erickson on Learning Systems (Concordia University Press and the Canadian Centre for Architecture, 2022) and Cornelia Oberlander on Pedagogical Playgrounds (Concordia University Press and the Canadian Centre for Architecture, 2023)

The arrival of the new book series Building Arguments, a collaboration between Concordia University Press and the Canadian Centre for Architecture that showcases the written work of Canadian architects, is a welcome sign of cultural maturity in the Canadian architecture scene.

Apart from Dalhousie Architecture Press, whose publication program received an RAIC award in 2023, most academic and institutional presses across the country have been derelict in documenting and building an understanding of Canada’s architectural culture and history.

This new series takes seriously the ideas and investigations of Canadian designers and offers up writing that is certainly new to me—and likely would have been familiar only to the most specialized scholars of modern Canadian architectural history.

The first two volumes in the series, Arthur Erickson on Learning Systems (2022) and Cornelia Hahn Oberlander on Pedagogical Playgrounds (2023), gather writings spanning from the 1960s to the 1980s by each designer, with introductory essays. The books themselves are elegant slim volumes, printed on a coloured paper which, along with a matching cover, gives a monochrome appearance and the promise of a rainbow on your bookshelf as the series progresses. I don’t often think of colour choices as editorial, but in this instance, I can’t think of a better match than cool gray for the Erickson volume and the warm yellow of the Oberlander book.

And what about the essays themselves? All the good intentions and archival value would fall flat if the writing wasn’t interesting. Fortunately, these first two volumes in the series are excellent. Each is prefaced with an essay; Jane Mah Hutton’s introduction to Cornelia Oberlander’s

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writing is especially engaging. Oberlander’s and Erickson’s writings themselves are remarkably fresh, perhaps a consequence of the social currents that both designers engage directly in their writing.

Oberlander’s evocation of the “conserver society” in “Planning for Play Everywhere” as a counter to the emergent consumer society of the 1960s has a deep resonance with contemporary design concerns. Her profound understanding of the history of pedagogy and play in “A Short History of Outdoor Play Spaces” underpins her work on the landscapes of childhood she describes. Similarly, Erickson evinces a deep historical knowledge in his essay on “The University: A New Visual Environment,” and his acknowledgement of the pivotal importance of integrating Indigenous knowledge into contemporary design in his “McGill University Convocation Address” would not seem out of place today.

Oberlander’s and Erickson’s collections of essays aren’t prescient so much as they point to a disengagement from social advocacy that followed the collapse of “capital M” Modernism. In retrospect, the inward turn of much architectural writing towards theory in the years after these texts were written seems as dull and reactionary as the commercial forms of postmodernism from that time.

Building Arguments is especially notable for its focus on writing as a clarifying complement to the built-work legacy of these two giants of Canadian Modernism. That architects should take seriously—and engage directly with—culture through writing is the unspoken ethos of this consequential new series.

-Review by Javier Zeller

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Modest Hopes

By Don Loucks and Leslie Valpy (Dundurn Press, 2021)

Modest Hopes is a deep dive into the experiences of Toronto’s immigrants during the 1820s to 1920s, as told through the homes they once lived in. Don Loucks and Leslie Valpy invite readers to acknowledge the historic significance of these workers’ cottages, whose presence is becoming increasingly rare amidst a rapidly densifying cityscape.

The first chapters of the book highlight the historical arrival of British, Irish, Eastern European, Chinese, and African American immigrants—groups that shared the common goal of breaking loose from declining prospects in their home countries to seek a better life in Toronto. Among the city’s numerous tenements and shacktowns, five worker cottage typologies emerged to serve such immigrants: all small, but efficiently planned.

Through hope and hard work, immigrants strived to live in—or even own—such a cottage, which was considered a coveted luxury. The five typologies would eventually become commonplace across the city’s industrial landscape.

The residents and their homes ultimately contributed to the multiculturalism and mix of distinct neighbourhoods that remains a hallmark of Toronto’s urban identity to this day.

The latter half of the book documents the life stories of eight residents who lived in workers’ cottages during the nineteenth century. Many of the hundred-year-old buildings they lived in still stand today. Using detailed sketches, historic maps and both current and archival photographs, the authors examine the homes’ significant role in shaping the joys and the challenges faced by the immigrants who resided in them.

The book comes at a time when housing and heritage preservation are topical—and often competing—issues facing Toronto’s designers, politicians, and residents, many of whom come

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from an immigrant background. Modest Hopes inspires readers to celebrate these overlooked buildings, their past residents, and their roles in shaping the foundations of the city around them, while encouraging us to question to what extent these modest buildings should be a part of the city’s future.

-Review by Jason Brijraj

The Rise of Awards in Architecture Edited by Jean-Pierre Chupin, Carmela Cuccuzzella, and George Adamczyk (Vernon Press, 2022)

Historically, architectural awards were a rarity. But now, they have become part of the currency of contemporary practice in Canada. The Rise of Awards in Architecture documents and interrogates the exponential rise in the number of awards given to architectural projects, and in the number of organizations involved in the giving of awards.

“We have gone from fewer than 20 organizations in the early 1980s to more than 100 large organizations celebrating architecture annually,” write the book’s editors. In Canada alone, they document 78 organizations delivering awards in all fields of the built environment in 2020—and between them recognizing some 1,664 projects.

The book’s 10 essays tackle various questions associated with the rise of awards, from Dana Butrock’s appraisal of the Pritzker Prize and Marco Polo’s documentation of the changing formats of the Prix de Rome, to essays by Carmela Cuccuzzella and Sherif Goubran on the emergence of awards focused on the environmental performance of buildings. Jean-Pierre Chupin examines how awards define architectural quality in different ways: some taking a synthetic view that relies on architectural judgement, others relying on quantification through metrics, and still others looking at the

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social and ethical dimensions of projects.

Drilling down into other subcategories of awards, Aurélien Catros and Adélie De Marre look at the way heritage awards confer a new type of conservation status, Alexandra Paré asks how school architecture should be recognized in awards, and Lucie Palombi examines the literary ambitions of the winners of architecture book awards. Rounding out the volume, Typhaine Moogan takes a long view of architectural awards through a sociological lens, while Georges Adamczyk considers the pedagogical status acquired by award-winning buildings.

As any book of academic essays, the volume is shaped by the research of individual authors, rather than by a single comprehensive viewpoint. Nonetheless, it has much to offer in bringing a critical set of lenses to the phenomenon of architectural awards in Canada.

-Review by Elsa Lam

An Architect’s Address Book

By Robert Lemon (ORO Editions, 2022)

Robert Lemon’s An Architects Address Book is a good insight into the making of an architect. Subtitled “the places that shaped a career,” the book provides, in memoir format, careful descriptions of the places and the people Lemon has met who have had a lasting impact on his life and career. From childhood memories of St. Thomas, to his extensive visits to England and continental Europe, as well as more exotic places like Xi’an or Dealy Island in the Canadian Arctic, each illustrates how experiences are formative for an architect. While Robert has retired to Stratford, Ontario, the strongest parts of this memoir are his stories about Vancouver, where he lived for many years, and worked both in private and public practice, conserving the heritage of the city.

-Review by Michael McClelland

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BACKPAGE

Don Davis’s piece Stanford torus interior view was commissioned by NASA for Richard D. Johnson and Charles Holbrow, the editors of the book Space Settlements: A Design Study (Washington, DC: NASA Scientific and Technical Information Office, 1977). The illustration, painted with acrylic on board, was never used.

LEFT

COLLECTION DON DAVIS

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EMERGING ECOLOGIES TEXT

Cameron Cummings

AN EXHIBITION AT MOMA LOOKS AT TODAY’S ENVIRONMENTAL DILEMMAS THROUGH THE LENS OF ARCHITECTURAL IMAGINATION. The building sector accounts for nearly 40 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions: architecture is humanity’s most polluting activity. But, as Emerging Ecologies: Architecture and the Rise of Environmentalism opens at New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the entangled relationship between architecture and ecocide somehow feels lush with life.

The exhibition is the first presented by MoMA’s Emilio Ambasz Institute for the Joint Study of the Built and the Natural Environment, directed by New York-based Canadian curator Carson Chan. The show underscores the Ambasz Institute’s expansive definition of architecture: going beyond buildings, the exhibition includes political events, works foregrounding material extraction processes and historical racial and economic conditions, and impressive forms of architectural images.

While the anthropogenic climate crisis necessitates a radical rethinking of how we practice architecture today, Emerging

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Ecologies brings forward exciting ideas for what might be considered as architecture. It’s a smart curatorial move at the MoMA, delivering to new publics the imaginative potential of architectural exhibition.

The 150-some models, drawings, and video works in the show range from the Cambridge Seven Associates’ iconic Tsuruhama Rain Forest Pavilion proposal to the Eames Office’s lesser-known, unbuilt National Fisheries Centre and Aquarium. It also nods to Canada, with fantastic drawings of Solsearch Architects and the New Alchemy Institutes’ Ark for Prince Edward Island. But while the Ark was built in 1976 (and sadly demolished in the 90s), most of the material in the exhibition is highly speculative, rarely involving actual buildings. Sometimes the act of not building is the point: one convincing instance documents a 1981 protest by the Fort McDowell Yavapai Nation that ultimately prevented the construction of an environmentally destruc-

tive dam project. Can political protest be an act of architectural labour? More broadly, what new territories for productive architectural thinking can emerge when we look beyond architecture as the act of building?

The exhibition tracks dreamy proposals for alternative architectural dimensions. Highlights include drawings of orbital space colonies commissioned by NASA in the 1970s (illustrations by Don Davis and Rick Guidice have arguably been canonized by this show, despite their existing pop-cultural influence) and inter-species habitation experiments (Ant Farm’s Dolphin Embassy, a floating insect wing that the group originally proposed in an essay for an American lifestyle magazine).

The exhibition’s saturated aesthetic sensibility highlights the proliferation of images from late-20th-century American countercultural movements that have since become icons of humanity’s uncertain futures. In Emerging Ecologies, architectural speculation benefits from showy spectacle: the theme of “architecture and the environment” has never looked so cool. Many of the works in the exhibit recall the eco-digital landscapes of 128 bit-era cyber gaming worlds in Final Fantasy and Halo. Emerging Ecologies not only provokes nostalgia for the sixth-extinction-core aesthetic of those uncanny worlds, but also emphasizes the vast cultural impact of radical architectural experimentation.

Emerging Ecologies ultimately uses architectural fantasies of the past to turn towards today’s urgent environmental realities. Architecture’s environmental dilemma is that it falls on both sides of the problem/solution binary— the mentioning of which brings up a complicated mess of questions that seem to always elicit an impulse for actionable architectural activism. But the Ambasz Institute’s inaugural exhibition succeeds in its resistance of the standard fixation on environmental solutions, instead presenting a vibrant and vital articulation of architectural imagination.

Cameron Cummings is a designer, writer and educator based in Montreal, Quebec.

2023-11-06 4:05 PM

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