Two members of the Daniels Faculty community, Behnaz Assadi and Wei-Han Vivian Lee, will be among those weighing in on the future of design this week at Toronto’s Interior Design Show.

Taking place in the Metro Toronto Convention Centre’s South Building from January 19 to 22, IDS Toronto is the country’s biggest design extravaganza, encompassing lectures, seminars, commercial product showcases and conceptual installations. 

Assistant Professor Assadi, a landscape designer and one of the co-founders of Ja Architecture Studio, will take part in a panel discussion on the subject of women in the design field. Called The Power of Women in Design and Construction, the talk takes place at 3:30 p.m. on Thursday, January 19.

Assistant Professor Lee, meanwhile, will be among the panelists discussing the decolonization of design. Her event, called Decolonizing the Design Industry: How to Authentically Diversify Student Bodies and Workforces, will take place at 3:30 p.m. on Friday, January 20. Lee directs the Master of Architecture program at the Daniels Faculty and is a co-founder of the studio LAMAS.

Both events, part of the IDS seminar series, have has been submitted for OAA and IDCEC accreditation. Each costs $45 to attend, although attendees who have registered as Trade Day participants get 20 percent discounts. For more information on each and the show as a whole, visit the IDS website.

Marshall Brown, the Princeton-based architect, urbanist, artist and scholar, is scheduled to speak at the Daniels Faculty on Wednesday, January 18. 

Brown’s presentation, called ENGAGEMENTS, will take place in the Main Hall of the Daniels Building at 12:30 p.m., part of the Exploring Design Practices undergraduate course being taught by Richard Sommer. 

As in previous years, the lunchtime lecture and dialogue is open to other students and faculty and to the public at large. Registration is not required.

An associate professor with tenure at the Princeton University School of Architecture, where he directs the Princeton Urban Imagination Center, Brown represented the United States at the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale and has work (examples of which are shown at top) in the collections of several major museums, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Art Institute of Chicago.

Reflecting his belief that the architect’s role is to test and expand the boundaries of reality, he constructs “visions of urban worlds yet to come” through such media as collage, architectural drawings on drafting vellum, sketches on tracing paper, video, models, objects and built projects.

Wednesday’s talk by Brown is the first of several slated for the Exploring Design Practices series this term. Anticipated future speakers include Michael Murphy, Peter Clewes, Amy Whitesides and Justin Garrett Moore. More details will be forthcoming.

Banner images from left: Vanderbilt Tower (collage on inkjet print, 51 x 40 inches), 2009; Prisons of Invention 4: The Well (collage on archival paper, 44 3/4 x 35 3/4 inches), 2021.

The John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto is excited to present its Winter 2023 Public Program.  

Through a series of exhibitions, lectures, book talks, panel discussions and symposia, we aim to foster dialogue and knowledge exchange among our local and international communities on important social, political and environmental challenges confronting our disciplines and the world today.  

Our Public Program this semester addresses a range of pertinent issues concerning the natural and built environments, including design and social justice, urbanization and housing, art and media, and ecology and landscape resilience. 

All events are free and open to the public. All lectures will be held in the Main Hall of the Daniels Building unless otherwise stated. Register in advance and check the calendar for up-to-date details at daniels.utoronto.ca/events.  

January 26, 6:30 p.m. ET 
Housing Multitudes Lecture: Freedom Schools for Accountable Architecture 
Featuring Jae Shin and Damon Rich (HECTOR) 
Moderated by Richard Sommer (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto) 
 
February 1, 6:30 p.m. ET 
Designing Black Spaces with Community Accountability  
Featuring Tura Cousins Wilson (Studio of Contemporary Architecture), Jessica Kirk (Wildseed Centre for Art and Activism) and Jessica Hines (Black Urbanism Toronto) 
Moderated by Anne-Marie Armstrong (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto) 
 
February 7, 12:30 p.m. ET  
Understanding and Predicting the Changing Environment in the Coming Decades 
Featuring Brian Leung (Department of Biology, McGill University)  
Moderated by Patrick James (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto) 

February 9, 6:30 p.m. ET 
Book Launch—Innate Terrain: Canadian Landscape Architecture  
By Alissa North (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto) 

February 14, 6:30 p.m. ET 
Exhibition Opening—Recent Work by Marina Tabassum Architects (MTA)  
Curated by Marina Tabassum, 2022-2023 Frank Gehry International Visiting Chair in Architectural Design (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto) 

February 16, 6:30 p.m. ET 
George Baird Lecture: Becoming Frank Gehry  
Featuring Jean-Louis Cohen (The Institute of Fine Arts, New York University) 
Moderated by Jason Nguyen (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto)  

March 2, 6:30 p.m. ET 
Michael Hough/OALA Visiting Critic in Landscape Architecture Lecture: What Would Cornelia Do? 
Featuring Julie Bargmann (School of Architecture, University of Virginia) 
Moderated by Elise Shelley (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto) 

March 7, 6:30 p.m. ET 
Phyllis Lambert: Observation Is a Constant That Underlies All Approaches 
Featuring Phyllis Lambert (Canadian Centre for Architecture) 
Moderated by Juan Du (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto) 

March 14, 12:30 p.m. ET 
Civic Urbanism Without Borders 
Featuring Jeffery Hou (College of Built Environments, University of Washington)  
In collaboration with the Global Taiwan Studies Initiative at the Asian Institute, Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto 

March 16, 6:30 p.m. ET 
Exhibition Opening—Resolutions for the Antarctic: International Stations & the Antarctic Data Space
Curated by UNLESS and featuring works by International Collaborators  

March 30, 6:30 p.m. ET 
Ruinophilia 
Featuring Lyndon Neri (Neri&Hu Design and Research Office) 
Moderated by Juan Du (Daniels Faculty, University of Toronto) 

Located in the heart of Canada’s biggest city, the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto offers graduate programs in architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, forestry and visual studies, as well as unique undergraduate programs that use architectural studies and visual studies as a lens through which students may pursue a broad, liberal arts-based education. Take a virtual look at everything we have to offer.
 

A tree planting and additions to Forestry’s commemorative Woodwall were on the program when the Daniels Faculty community gathered at the Earth Sciences Centre on November 24 to celebrate past and present forestry achievements. 

The ironwood tree (Ostrya virginiana) was planted in the Carolinian Forest Courtyard in honour of former professor Erik Jorgensen, who founded the University of Toronto’s Shade Tree Research Laboratory in the 1960s and is considered the father of urban forestry, a previously unexplored branch of forestry studies that he largely defined and promoted. 

Born in Denmark in 1921, Jorgensen and his colleagues at the Shade Tree Lab were especially instrumental in the study and control of Dutch Elm Disease (DED). Jorgensen passed away in 2012. 

Others honourees on the 24th included a dozen new additions to Forestry’s commemorative Woodwall, located inside the Earth Sciences Centre. Initiated in 2007, when Forestry at U of T celebrated its 100th birthday, the Woodwall recognizes illustrious alumni, faculty and staff on an artfully hung array of individual square wood plaques. 

The installation of the 12 new plaques — an initiative supported by Forestry’s Class of 1966 and led by alumnus Derek Coleman, who acquired his Bachelor of Science degree in Forestry that year — completes the current display.  

“Our increasing awareness that forestry reserves are key to mitigating climate change,” says Dean Juan Du, who attended both events and addressed attendees afterward, “makes forestry knowledge more important than ever. The research and instruction done in forestry at the University of Toronto has been vital in contributing to regional and national practices and policies. Now that our various forestry programs share a home with our programs in architecture, landscape architecture, visual studies and urban design, we have an opportunity to refine our educational and research approaches with a more comprehensive understanding of one environment, the natural alongside the built.” 

This perspective resonated with many in attendance, says Forestry Director Sandy Smith, who describes attendees as “a very receptive crowd of urban foresters who have been waiting for this opportunity to build on the beginnings of urban forestry at U o T.” 

“It was great to get together in person and to celebrate past achievements in urban forestry,” she adds. “Everyone who participated was excited by the new vision for forestry at Daniels shared by the Dean.” 

Among those on hand for the planting in the Carolinian Forest Courtyard, a studiously maintained space studded with native trees and shrubs, was Erik Jorgensen’s granddaughter, Stoney Baker.  

The names completing the Woodwall include Dr. Smith, Dr. Coleman, Dr. Shashi Kant, Dr. Sally Krigstin, Dr. Jay Malcolm, Deborah Paes, Fred Pinto, Dr. Danijela Puric-Mladenovic, Dr. Mohini Sain, Dr. Sean Thomas, Tony Ung and Amalia Veneziano. 

Image slideshow: 1. Attendees gather in the Earth Sciences Centre after the November 24 tree planting honouring former professor Erik Jorgensen, a pioneer of urban forestry. 2. Forestry Director Sandy Smith and alumnus Derek Coleman (Class of ’66) unveil the newest honourees on Forestry’s Woodwall, which recognizes illustrious alumni, faculty and staff both past and present. 3. Daniels Faculty Dean Juan Du addresses the gathering after both ceremonies. (Photos by Evan Donohue and George Wang)

Banner image: Erik Jorgensen’s granddaughter, Stoney Baker (holding shovel), joined Dean Du (third from right), Forestry Director Smith (second from right) and others for the tree planting ceremony in honour of her grandfather. Jorgensen founded the Shade Tree Research Laboratory at U of T in the 1960s. (Photo by Evan Donohue)

Monday, December 5 to Tuesday, December 20
Daniels Faculty Building,
1 Spadina Crescent, Toronto, Ontario 

Throughout December, students in architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, visual studies and forestry will present final projects to their instructors. Students of the Daniels Faculty will also present to guest critics from both academia and the professional community in attendance. 

Staying up to date with COVID-19 vaccinations is strongly encouraged, and UCheck continues to be available for uploading proof of vaccination. Please see the latest University of Toronto COVID-19 FAQS. 

Follow the Daniels Faculty @UofTDaniels on Instagram, and join the conversation using the hashtag #DanielsReviews22.
 

Monday, December 5 | Graduate

Design Studio I
LAN1011Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Behnaz Assadi (Coordinator), Pete North, Elnaz Sanati
Rooms: 230, 330

Tuesday, December 6 | Graduate

Design Studio I
ARC1011Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Vivian Lee (Coordinator), Fiona Lim Tung, Miles Gertler, Chris Cornecelli, Julia DiCastri, Carol Moukheiber, Tom Ngo
Rooms: 230, 330, Main Hall (170)

Wednesday, December 7 | Graduate

Intergraded Urbanism Studio
ARC2013Y, LAN2013Y, URD1011Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Roberto Damiani (Coordinator), Fadi Masoud (Coordinator), Michael Piper (Coordinator), Christos Marcopoulos, Aziza Chaouni, Laurence Holland, Drew Adams, George Baird, Lisa Rapoport, Jon Cummings, Natalia Echeverri, Rob Wright
Rooms: 215, 230, 240, 330

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Marina Tabassum
Room: 340

Thursday, December 8 | Graduate

Intergraded Urbanism Studio
ARC2013Y, LAN2013Y, URD1011Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Roberto Damiani (Coordinator), Fadi Masoud (Coordinator), Michael Piper (Coordinator), Christos Marcopoulos, Aziza Chaouni, Laurence Holland, Drew Adams, George Baird, Lisa Rapoport, Jon Cummings, Natalia Echeverri, Rob Wright
Rooms: 215, 230, 240, 330

Friday, December 9 | Graduate

Design Studio Options
LAN3016Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Ivan Valin
Room: 230

Design Studio Options
LAN3016Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Liz Wreford, Rob Wright
Rooms: 330

Tuesday, December 13 | Graduate & Undergraduate

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Jeannie Kim
Rooms: 230

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Zachary Mollica
Rooms: 330

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Brian Boigon
Rooms: 240

Architecture Studio III
ARC361Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Petros Babasikas (Coordinator), Shane Williamson, Carol Moukheiber
Rooms: Main Hall (170), 215

Capstone Project in Forest Conservation
FOR3008H
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Catherine Edwards
Rooms: 200

Wednesday, December 14 | Graduate & Undergraduate

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Petros Babasikas
Rooms: 330

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Shane Williamson
Rooms: 230

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Laura Miller
Rooms: 315, 340

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: John Shnier
Rooms: 1^st Floor Hallway

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Lukas Pauer
Rooms: 240

Architectural Design Studio 7:  Thesis
ARC4018Y
9 a.m.–1 p.m. ET

Instructors: Michael Piper, Miles Gertler, Reza Nik
Rooms: 209, 242

Landscape Architecture Studio III
ARC363Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Behnaz Assadi
Room: 215

Technology Studio III
ARC380Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Nicholas Hoban (Coordinator), Nathan Bishop
Rooms: Main Hall (170)

Capstone Project in Forest Conservation
FOR3008H
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Catherine Edwards
Rooms: 200

Thursday, December 15 | Graduate & Undergraduate

Architectural Design Studio:  Research 1
ARC3020Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Marc McQuade
Rooms: Graduate Studio

Drawing and Representation I
ARC100H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: James Macgillivray (Coordinator), Brandon Bergem, Saarinen Balagengatharadilak, Sonia Ramundi, Si Fei Mo, Danielle Whitley, Monifa Charles-Dedier, Jeffrey Garcia, Anamarija Korolj, Quan Thai, Ji Hee Kim, Anne Ma, Angela Cho, Kara Verbeek, Andrea Rodriguez Fos, Nicholas Barrette
Rooms: Principal Hall (170), 215, 230, 240, 315, 330, 340

Friday, December 16 | Graduate & Undergraduate 

Thesis 1
ALA4021Y
9 a.m.–12 p.m. ET

Instructor: Mason White
Rooms: 242

Urban Design Studio Options: Density
URD2013YF
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Angus Laurie, Lorne Cappe, Mariana Leguia
Rooms: 209

Drawing and Representation II
ARC200H1
9 a.m.–2 p.m. ET

Instructors: Roberto Damiani (Coordinator), Phat Le, Michael Piper, Rez Nik, Matthew DeSantis, Sam Dufaux, David Verbeek, Katy Chey, Simon Rabyniuk, Nova Tayona, Noheir Elgendy, Kara Verbeek
Rooms: Main Hall (170), 215, 230, 240, 315, 330, 340
 

Monday, December 19 | Undergraduate

Design Studio II
ARC201H1
9 a.m.–2 p.m. ET

Instructors: Miles Gertler (Coordinator), Brian Boigon, Jennifer Kudlats, Jamie Lipson, Jeffrey Garcia
Rooms: 170C, 209, 215, 240, 242

Senior Seminar in History and Theory (Research)
ARC456H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Simon Rabyniuk
Room: 230

Senior Seminar in Design (Research)
ARC461H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Laura Miller
Room: 330

Senior Seminar in Technology (Research)
ARC486H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Nicholas Hoban
Rooms: Main Hall (170)

Tuesday, December 20 | Undergraduate

Senior Seminar in History and Theory (Research)
ARC456H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Simon Rabyniuk
Rooms: 230

Senior Seminar in Design (Research)
ARC461H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Laura Miller
Rooms: 330

Senior Seminar in Technology (Research)
ARC486H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Nicholas Hoban
Rooms: Main Hall (170)
 

Banner photo courtesy of GALDSU

The Daniels Faculty’s Ted Kesik, Professor of Building Science, has been made a Fellow of the California-based Facade Tectonics Institute.

He was inducted into the FTI’s College of Fellows during the organization’s World Congress last month in Los Angeles.

Based at the University of Southern California School of Architecture, the FTI was established in 2015 with “the mission of carrying out progressive and broad-based research in building facade technology.”

In addition to its research activities, the Institute conducts a biennial World Congress and an annual series of Regional Forums. It also publishes the Facade Tectonics Journal and produces various publications ranging from technical guides and research reports to books addressing diverse areas of building facade technology.

According to the Institute, Professor Kesik’s induction “acknowledges over three decades of leadership in professional practice and building science education for the advancement of building enclosure design.”

Professor Kesik first became involved in the construction industry in 1974, and he continues to practice as a consulting engineer for leading architectural offices, forward-thinking enterprises and progressive government agencies. Among his numerous areas of research are building resilience and sustainability, high-performance buildings, life cycle assessment and building performance simulation.

In the early 1980s, when the University of Toronto’s School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture was struggling with space and budget constraints and even faced the possibility of closure, many voices came to its defence, both within and outside U of T. Among them was Diamond Schmitt Architects co-founder Jack Diamond, who had directed the Master of Architecture program at the school from 1964 to 1969 and was a firm believer that effective city building required a strong instructional foundation. 

“If Toronto loses the school of architecture,” he told The Globe and Mail in 1983, “it loses much more than a museum or art gallery. The university’s pitch [for closure] is like saying painting and music aren’t important to society. [The school] must be part of the environment, as well as aspiring to scholarship.” 

In the end, of course, the school wasn’t closed, it was reconstituted a Faculty in the 1990s, and it grew in size and reputation to become the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design. At the same time, the surrounding city of Toronto also grew, with Diamond playing an important role in its development as well.  

Among his legacies as an architect in the city are some pioneering examples of infill and social housing, dexterous incorporations of heritage structures into new projects, and the most glamorous of Toronto’s performing arts venues. 

Diamond, who died on October 30 at the age of 89, just one week short of his 90th birthday, co-established his now-venerable firm with partner Donald Schmitt after leaving U of T. The fact that the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts on University Avenue should be among his best-known projects is appropriate: In addition to architecture, he was passionate about music, and exemplary stage and concert venues became a specialty. 

Besides the Four Seasons Centre (pictured below), Diamond Schmitt also oversaw the design of La Maison Symphonique in Montreal and the Mariinsky II Concert Hall in Saint Petersburg, Russia. All have been acclaimed for their acoustical properties. 

Born Abel Joseph Diamond in the South African town of Piet Retief, the graduate of the University of Cape Town and the University of Oxford left his home country for good during the apartheid era. After a brief stint in the Philadelphia office of modernist legend Louis Kahn, he was lured to Toronto by the job at U of T. Canada’s largest city would from then on be his home. 

“He came to Toronto in 1964 and worked for the next 58 years to make it a better place,” his family says in a notice it released. 

The same could be said about his mark on the Daniels Faculty. In addition to his defence of the architecture school at a time when it was imperilled, his firm’s support of the Diamond Schmitt Ontario Graduate Student Scholarship, which recognizes academic excellence among students in the Master of Architecture program, continues to create a living legacy of scholars within the Faculty and beyond. 

According to Diamond’s family, two achievements of which the onetime college rugby star “was extremely proud were scoring the winning try for Oxford University against Australia, and being made an Officer of the Order of Canada.” Diamond was also a Member of the Order of Ontario and a recipient of the Gold Medal of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada. 

Among his survivors are his wife Gillian (whom he met at Oxford), his sister Stella, his children Andrew and Suki, five grandsons, and Andrew’s two stepsons.  

At his family’s request, anyone wishing to honour Diamond’s memory is encouraged to do so by donating to the Diamond Schmitt Ontario Graduate Student Scholarship. (To make a donation, click here. For more information, contact Stacey Charles at 416-978-4340 or stacey.charles@daniels.utoronto.ca.)  

A celebration of Diamond’s life will take place on Saturday, November 19, between 4:30 and 6:30 p.m., at the Four Seasons Centre. 

It is with sadness, respect and tremendous gratitude that the Daniels Faculty reflects on the recent death and extraordinary life of alumnus and benefactor John H. Daniels (BArch, 1950; Hon LLD, 2011), who passed away on Saturday, October 22. 

An architect, developer, philanthropist and civic leader, Daniels had an immeasurable impact on the city of Toronto, on the University of Toronto, and on the Faculty, which has been forever transformed by the magnanimity and vision that he and his wife, Myrna Daniels, displayed over many years.

“The legacy of Mr. Daniels’ life will be felt for a very long time,” says Dean Juan Du. “His commitment to lifting communities around him, his dedication to excellence, and his optimism for the future are values that inspire and drive our school. John and Myrna’s generosity has contributed not only to the creation of the Faculty’s dynamic world-class hub at 1 Spadina Crescent, but to the lives and futures of the many who have passed and will pass through it. Our thoughts are with John and Myrna’s families, friends, and colleagues, and with the many people whose lives he has touched.”

Born in Poland in 1926, John H. Daniels immigrated to Canada when he was 12 years old, escaping Nazi oppression on the cusp of World War II. He later graduated from Toronto’s Central Technical School, addressing the rights and responsibilities of Canadian citizenship in the speech he made as class valedictorian. In 1949, while a student in the architecture program at the University of Toronto, he made his first foray into real estate development by co-founding Modern Age Construction. Though only intended as a summer building project to raise tuition money before he graduated in 1950, the work demonstrated Daniels’ entrepreneurial capacities and established the tenor of his future career. 

As CEO of the Cadillac Fairview Development Corporation, he later helped build such impressive properties as the Eaton Centre in Toronto and the Erin Mills community in Mississauga. In 1983, Daniels left Cadillac Fairview to start The Daniels Corporation, a company that would quickly become synonymous with vibrant communities, affordable housing, social infrastructure and architectural innovation. Responsible for countless Canadian residential developments, The Daniels Corporation also worked closely with government agencies to create thousands of not-for-profit rental units and to lower market barriers for first-time homebuyers. Among its many noteworthy projects, the company was instrumental in revitalizing the Regent Park neighbourhood, transforming it from a failed public housing estate into a vital, growing community at the centre of Toronto.

Beyond Daniels’ work as a developer, he was also a remarkable Toronto philanthropist. Together with Myrna, he invested in a broad number of causes and gave significantly to cultural, healthcare and academic institutions, changing the city for the better at every step.  

John and Myrna Daniels’ gifts to the Daniels Faculty through their Foundation are unprecedented, totalling more than $30 million and resulting in its gateway building at 1 Spadina Crescent, a host of new scholarships, and an expanded global reputation. 

In 2008, John and Myrna Daniels gave the University of Toronto a $14-million gift, the largest private donation ever given to a Canadian architecture school. In recognition, the Faculty was officially named the  John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design. The $14 million was designated to the capital renewal and expansion of the school (at that time located on College Street) and created an endowment and award program named The John and Myrna Daniels Scholars.

Gift to 1 Spadina Crescent Building Project 

The revitalized 1 Spadina Crescent site, to which John and Myrna Daniels contributed $10 million through their Foundation, opened in 2017.

In 2013, John and Myrna Daniels donated an additional $10 million through their Foundation to revitalize and expand an existing landmark building at 1 Spadina Crescent. Daniels Building, the Faculty’s new home, opened in November of 2017. Heralded in The Globe and Mail as “one of the best buildings in Canada of the past decade,” it has been awarded 30 international awards for its design so far. 

“John would joke that his favourite hobby was pouring concrete, an allusion to the more than 300 buildings he created during his lifetime,” says Richard Sommer, former dean of the Faculty and director of the Global Cities Institute. “In our case, John asked a deceptively simple question: How could he and Myrna help us make our school one of the best in the world, and in the process raise the prospects for young people from a broad section of society wanting to study architecture. The answer was Daniels Building, which speaks to John’s passion for architecture and cities. Together with the John and Myrna Daniels Scholars award fund and other financial-aid programs they support, they have created a unique place at 1 Spadina Crescent as well as the endowments that sustain many students who study there.” 

Former University of Toronto president David Naylor (standing in opening photo) joins John and Myrna Daniels for the design reveal of the future Daniels Building at 1 Spadina Crescent in June 2013. Mr. and Mrs. Daniels (in second photo) at the official opening of the Daniels Building in November 2017. U of T president Meric Gertler (at right in third photo) and Professor Ronald Daniels, president of Johns Hopkins University, take part with Mr. and Mrs. Daniels in the ribbon cutting ceremony at the Daniels Building opening.

The John and Myrna Daniels Scholars

To date, the endowment has provided 287 individual awards to 128 graduate students, many of whom are the first in their families to access post-secondary education.

John and Myrna Daniels pose with former Daniels Faculty dean Richard Sommer and a group of John and Myrna Daniels Scholars. (Photo by Yvonne Bambrick)

In 2013, John and Myrna Daniels Scholar Nicholas Gosselin addressed Mr. and Mrs. Daniels at a luncheon, noting: “You are influential city builders in Toronto and beyond. However, you also shape cities indirectly — through the unbelievable support you provide the University of Toronto and future professionals. Toronto is going through incredible change and, consequently, behaves as a laboratory for students to experiment with different ideas and concepts. Unfortunately, not all students can support themselves to participate in this endeavour. Your generous donation to U of T makes a world of difference for students and has personally made graduate school a possibility for me — thank you.” 

John and Myrna Daniels Scholar Devin Tepleski with Mr. Daniels.

In 2016, Scholar Devin Tepleski spoke about the impact of John and Myrna Daniels’ support at a celebration at the school, saying: “What excites me most about my studies in landscape architecture is the opportunity to work on solutions — answers to the questions I’ve been asking for the last five years since finishing an undergraduate degree in anthropology. What makes places matter to the people who live there? What is worth protecting?

“I have been extremely lucky to be able to travel with my work, firstly to Ghana, where I worked as an ethnohistorian and documentarian with communities displaced by a hydroelectric dam. From there I went on to spend four years working with Cree and Dene communities in northern Alberta and on a marine use study with Salish nations of southern Vancouver Island. I got to interview everyone from the wisest elder to the youngest schoolchild about what matters to them about the places they live.

“Such opportunities have continued in no small part due to the generosity of the Daniels. Over the course of the last year, it is clear to me that John and Myrna have been asking these same questions about the importance of community and place. We could all learn a lot from the answers they have no doubt reached over their years of community service and philanthropy. I am inspired by their genuine curiosity in others and commitment to making a difference in Toronto. I thank them wholeheartedly for all that they have done for me and those around me.” 

Mr. and Mrs. Daniels with John and Myrna Daniels Scholar Bahia Marks.

At an event in honour of John and Myrna Daniels in 2018, Scholar Bahia Marks thanked them for bringing everyone together and spoke about the opportunities she had had as an undergraduate in the U.S. and then as a Master of Architecture student at the Daniels Faculty: “When you are in the trenches of people’s lives in the projects of Brooklyn, you can see how the design of the projects and housing affects the lives of families and young people. You begin to see the direct impact of design on people's lives. It is this search for justice that led me to pursue architecture and choose the Daniels Faculty. In my research, I was really looking for a school that would allow me to learn the skills, attitudes and qualities of an architect, the role of housing in society, and about empowering youth to contribute to the betterment of their neighbourhoods.” 

The John and Myrna Daniels Foundation Opportunity Awards

In April 2018, the couple gave an additional $6 million, establishing The John and Myrna Daniels Foundation Opportunity Awards, an endowment prioritizing the financial need of undergraduate and graduate students within the Faculty.

On November 12, 2018, Mr. and Mrs. Daniels were hosted by University and Faculty leadership at a luncheon recognizing graduate-student beneficiaries of the John and Myrna Daniels Scholars award program.

“In a way, John Daniels never left his alma mater,” says David Palmer, U of T’s Vice-President, Advancement. “His giving at U of T was strongly tied to a desire for future generations of students to enjoy the education he had, to make Canada a global leader, and to share in his vision for sustainable, innovative architecture that is accessible to all. For that, we will be forever grateful.”

It is with much sadness that the Daniels Faculty has learned of the death of Blanche Lemco van Ginkel, architect, urbanist and the first woman to hold the title of dean at the Faculty.

Born in England in 1923, van Ginkel grew up in Montreal and was educated at McGill University (where she received a professional Bachelor of Architecture degree in 1945) and at Harvard University (where she acquired her Master of City Planning degree in 1950).

After moving to Toronto in the late 1970s, she was appointed Dean of U of T’s School of Architecture in 1977. Three years later, the School reassumed administration of the Department of Landscape Architecture to become the Faculty of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. Van Ginkel served as dean of the reconstituted Faculty for two more years. After completing her five-year term as dean, she continued to teach at the Faculty until 1993, leading a number of graduate and undergraduate design studios. 

“Professor van Ginkel was among the first women leaders of architecture institutions in Canada and the U.S. in an era and a discipline largely dominated by men,” says Dean Juan Du, who assumed her position in 2021, becoming the Faculty’s second woman dean and the only full-time female faculty member at the rank of full Professor in Architecture.

“While we still have a far way to go as a discipline and profession, Blanche paved the way for many of us to follow. She contributed to the design cultures of Montreal and Toronto, and established pioneering initiatives here at the Faculty, such as the Study Abroad programs in Paris and Rome, the first of their kind in Canada. It was this kind of expansive, outward-looking perspective that helped shape the world-class school that we are.” 

Reflective of her cosmopolitan, well-travelled nature, van Ginkel’s route to Toronto and to the Faculty, where an endowed scholarship — the Professor Blanche Lemco van Ginkel Admission Scholarship — currently exists, was a circuitous one. 

Between and after acquiring her degrees, van Ginkel gained professional experience in Regina (1946), with William Crabtree in London (1947), under Le Corbusier in Paris (1948) and for Mayerovitch and Bernstein in Montreal (1950-51). After living in Philadelphia from 1951 to 1957, she returned to Montreal, where she formed a partnership, van Ginkel Associates, with her husband, H.P.D. (Sandy) van Ginkel, whom she married in 1956. She had been registered as an architect in Quebec since 1952.

It was in Montreal and with Sandy van Ginkel that she achieved what are perhaps her greatest professional accomplishments outside of academia: saving two of the city’s urban jewels — Old Montreal and Mount Royal Park — from potentially ruinous development. In the case of the former, a proposed elevated expressway threatened to desecrate the now-beloved historic district, so van Ginkel reportedly went up in a helicopter with her camera to document it from above, bringing home to many through the resulting pictures just how extensive and precious Old Montreal is.

“If  Blanche Lemco van Ginkel had never lived in Montreal,” McGill News wrote last year, when she was awarded the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada’s Gold Medal, “the city would look very different than it does today — and not in a good way.”

Over the years, van Ginkel was widely recognized for both her academic achievements and her professional firsts, which included, in addition to serving as the Faculty’s first female dean, being one of the first women to teach at the University of Pennsylvania, the first woman to become a Fellow of the RAIC, and the first woman (and first Canadian) to sit as president of the 110-year-old Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture.

In 2000, she was made a member of the Order of Canada, and in 2018 van Ginkel was one of the four subjects of filmmaker Joseph Hillel’s  City Dreamers, a documentary about the trailblazing female architects who had outsized roles in shaping North America’s urbanscapes over the past 70 years (the film’s three other subjects are Phyllis Lambert, Cornelia Hahn Oberlander and Denise Scott Brown). 

“Blanche was a first in so many ways, as a practitioner and in education,” says Laura Miller, Associate Professor of Architecture at the Daniels Faculty and one of the organizers of a 2020 event celebrating van Ginkel’s RAIC Gold Medal.

“In working on the event, I learned that, for women architecture students during the time she was Dean, she was the first female teacher and architect they had ever encountered. Blanche was therefore a visible and relatable role model that they could emulate, a source of real inspiration. That she did this with grace and elegance only added to her aura among not only her women students, but many others who were part of that time period at the Faculty.”

The event that Professor Miller helped organize in 2020 was called For Her Record, a reference to the 1986 exhibition For the Record, which “Blanche was instrumental” in creating.

“The exhibition identified women graduates of the Faculty from the very first one in 1920 through the 1960s, showing the trajectory of their careers, and documenting their contributions to the built environment through their practices,” Professor Miller recalls. “Such an accounting had not happened before, and it painted a picture of the experiences of women architects in Canada — as much a kind of social history as a design documentation.”

Van Ginkel, who died in Toronto on October 20, is survived by her two children with Sandy van Ginkel, Brenda and Marc. (Sandy van Ginkel died in 2009.) At her request, no funeral or public service will be held, but donations to the Professor Blanche Lemco van Ginkel Admission Scholarship are welcomed. (To make a donation, click here. For more information, contact Stacey Charles at 416-978-4340 or stacey.charles@daniels.utoronto.ca.)

A celebration of Blanche van Ginkel’s life will be held at the Daniels Faculty at a future date. 

Banner image: Former dean Blanche van Ginkel in a still from City Dreamers, Joseph Hillel’s 2018 film about pioneering female architects who had outsized impact on North American urban centres throughout much of the 20th Century. In 1960, van Ginkel took to the sky over Montreal in a helicopter (second image) to document why Old Montreal should be kept intact.