How do networks of technology, resources, energy, transportation and culture operate in contexts as far-flung as Canada and Ghana? Are there similarities that might prove illuminating? Differences that could inspire new strategies? More broadly, how can architecture, landscape architecture and urban design become catalysts for positive change at the scale of both communities and whole systems?

These were just a few of the questions on the minds of 14 University of Toronto students (both graduate and undergraduate) when they set out for West Africa this past July to take part in the Daniels Faculty’s summer studio in Kumasi, Ghana, the second-largest city in the African nation and a centre of Ashanti culture.

The two-week overseas course, conducted in collaboration with the Department of Architecture at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), was part of a multiyear initiative seeking to exchange local knowledge among participants and to encourage cooperation on innovative and sustainable strategies for transforming communities and cities.

This year —the course’s second, following a collaborative online studio studying four communities in Canada and Ghana over six weeks last summer—the 14 students from U of T met up in Kumasi with approximately 20 students from KNUST.

“Last summer we looked at four sites: two in Ghana (Assin Kushea and Kyebi) and two in southern Ontario (Innisfil and York South Weston),” says Associate Professor Jeannie Kim, who taught the Summer 2023 course in Ghana and Toronto with Farida Abu-Bakare, a Sessional Lecturer at the Daniels Faculty and the director of global practice at the architecture and urban design firm WXY.

“With mixed teams from both schools,” says Kim, “students examined the hard and soft infrastructure of each site while taking into consideration the ambitious future-oriented plans for all of them. Despite the very different contexts, the teams found that some of the challenges and opportunities were similar, and we had a very productive series of discussions that we sought to build upon this summer and will continue to study in subsequent summers.”

This year, what the contingent from Canada experienced collectively, Kim says, “was a valuable cultural immersion in parts of Ghana that most international tourists do not visit, as well as privileged access to various stakeholders in these contexts and the opportunity to better understand what the practices of architecture, landscape architecture and urbanism look like in the West African context.”

Moreover, “we were very fortunate to spend time with the individuals who live with and work on these issues and to get some sense of what practice is [there] and how it is similar to or different from what we know in a North American setting.”

The highly immersive nature of the trip, which took in the Ghanaian capital of Accra as well as Kumasi, Kyebi and Assin Kushea, was especially appealing to second-year MARC student Mo Bayati, who “was interested in studying the typology of buildings in Ghana and the vernacular approach towards construction.”

The course, he feels, “allowed us to think about bottom-up opportunities for improving cities. And it was amazing to see and to hear from the people and institutions involved in designing and overseeing not only cities, but also forestry and education. [Accessing them] allowed us to understand both their problems and their strategies.”

For Leila Rashidian, currently in her third year of the undergraduate program in Architectural Studies, the people she met throughout the course, from her fellow KNUST studio mates to Ghanaian royalty, also stood out.

“Thanks to our hosts in Kyebi and Assin Kushea, an experience that was exclusive to this trip was the opportunity to meet and interact with the chiefs and kings of these regions. I would never have imagined receiving this honour if I had visited these places on a personal trip.”

Rashidian was also impressed by the multiyear structure of the studio, especially the ability to build on past research. “Based on the previous year’s research in Assin Kushea and Kyebi, we could focus on subjects such as healthcare, mining, cocoa products, drainage and many others. This meant that I could concentrate on one system and create a unique project based on the context and my first-hand observation.”

Bayati, too, was struck by the cumulative aspect of the Ghanaian studio. “After the trip,” he says, “I created a photo journal documenting the landscape, the building typologies, the building materials and the everyday interactions in urban and village settings.

“Also, I made a short video of our full time there. The video examines the urban fabric and the street life of all the places we visited. I would like the journal to help students next year have a clear understanding of the context and build upon different research topics presented in the sections.”

The Summer Studio in Ghana was one of four global studios offered by the Daniels Faculty in 2023. Other courses included studies in Athens, Greece; Berlin, Germany; and Fez, Morocco. A domestic studio also took place on Fogo Island, Newfoundland and Labrador.

Ja Architecture Studio, the Office of Adrian Phiffer and artist/designer Tom Ngo are among the Faculty-related contributors to this month’s Drawing For Food auction in aid of maintaining healthy food supplies to vulnerable Toronto residents.

“Since the pandemic, homelessness in Toronto has become more visible, but there is a lot of invisible homelessness and food precarity,” say the auction’s organizers. “Drawing for Food leverages the power of architectural drawing and spatial illustration to advocate for the needs of our most vulnerable community members. The auction…solicits drawings from designers and architects in support of social causes,” with the entire proceeds from this month’s going to a Toronto organization, Seeds of Hope, assisting community members experiencing homelessness, precarious housing and food shortages.

“Lots of architecture studio briefs have taken on themes such as affordable housing,” say the auction team leaders, which include assistant professor Adrian Phiffer of the Daniels Faculty, architects Stephanie Davidson and Georg Rafailidis of Davidson Rafailidis and fourth-year TMU student Eira Roberts. “However, this project aims to leverage our architectural work to help vulnerable community members more directly.”

More than two dozen firms and individuals have donated drawings to the auction, including all of the team members above, Daniels Faculty sessional lecturer Tom Ngo (a widely exhibited visual artist and a project architect at Kongats Architects) and Ja Architecture Studio (the Toronto-based practice co-founded by Daniels Faculty assistant professor Behnaz Assadi with architect and alumnus Nima Javidi).

Others on the list of international contributors include Fala Atelier of Portugal, NOMOS of Spain, Drawing Architecture Studio of China and Studio Märkli of Switzerland, to name only a few.

For now, the drawings are viewable as a gallery on the auction’s website. The auction will go live at 9:00 a.m. ET on November 24 and conclude at midnight ET on December 1.

All of the drawings have the same starting price of $100 Canadian and buyers will make their bids on the website. Top bidders will be contacted via e-mail on December 2 and asked to donate their bid amount directly to Seeds of Hope using an online donation portal. Credit cards, Google Pay and PayPal will all be accepted.

Once payments have been processed, each donor will ship the drawing to the buyer. Drawing for Food will act as a go-between, hosting the website, taking any questions from bidders and verifying that bids have been donated so that tax receipts can be issued.

“The hope,” says the organizing team, “is to add to the collection of drawings with a new auction each year,” ideally generating funds for a different organization in Ontario or Western New York.

“A broader aim of this auction project,” team members add, “is to explore ways that architectural drawings can be used for public good. Realizing spatial projects of any scale typically relies on a financial backer: an owner, a client, an entity with a commercial interest, etc. The interests of the moneyed participant drive, or at least influence, the interests of the spatial project. But the instrument of drawing, we argue, is entirely ours. It belongs to us, and as designers we can decide what and how we draw, who we draw for, and who benefits from our work.”

Drawings in banner by 1. Ja Architecture Studio. 2. Office of Adrian Phiffer. 3. Tom Ngo. 4. Fala Atelier. 5. Nathalie Du Pasquier. 6. Kemetic Blue. 7. Studio Märkli. Drawing for Food logo on homepage by Claudia Draghia.

Celebrated architect Douglas Cardinal will be giving a lunchtime lecture at the Daniels Faculty on Thursday, November 16.

Entitled “Indigenous Principles for Architecture,” the talk will take place from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. in Room 200 of the Daniels Building at 1 Spadina Crescent.

To register for the lecture, at which lunch will be provided, click here. The talk is free and open to all Daniels Faculty students and instructors.

In addition to designing such iconic buildings as the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau (pictured above) and the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C., Dr. Cardinal has been a long-time advocate for the dignity and advancement of Indigenous peoples and last year joined the Daniels Faculty as Decanal Advisor on Indigenous Knowledge.

In his talk on November 16, he will outline how adopting an Indigenous worldview can guide architects and planners in the creation of sustainable built environments that harmonize with nature for at least “seven generations,” the traditional Indigenous benchmark for decision-making and stewardship. Among his key focuses will be planning.

“The planning that cities and communities are conducting presently,” he says, “is not only not sustainable, but destructive to all life, including our own. Indigenous principles offer an innovative way [of building] that is rooted in their traditions [and] accounts for all life-givers that the land hosts, so plants, animals and humans may have a future together.”

One of the projects that Dr. Cardinal will cite in his talk is the 2017 planning work he conducted for the Ojibway community of Stony Point in Ontario. Previously, the land in question had been occupied by Canada’s Department of National Defense as a military training base. “I will show the multifaceted analysis and holistic integration necessary to reach a sustainable community,” he says of his work, which at Stony Point “integrated all my life experience” in terms of both process and result.

Prior to signing on as Decanal Advisor on Indigenous Knowledge, Dr. Cardinal was the Faculty’s 2020-2021 Frank Gehry International Visiting Chair in Architectural Design. He was also awarded an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree by the University of Toronto in June of 2022.

The University of Toronto’s John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design is an unparalleled centre for learning and research, offering graduate programs in architecture, landscape architecture, forestry, urban design and visual studies, as well as unique undergraduate programs that use architecture and art as lenses through which students may pursue a broader education.   

Situated in the heart of Toronto—a hub for creative practice and home to many of Canada’s leading architects, landscape architects, urban designers, foresters, artists and curators—the Faculty focuses on interdisciplinary training and research in architecture, art and their allied practices, with a mission to educate students, prepare professionals and cultivate scholars who will play a leading role in creating more culturally engaged, ecologically sustainable environments.

U of T, which year after year ranks among the top universities in the world, provides a framework of knowledge and expertise on which all Faculty members may draw. Additionally, the environment in which our students learn and congregate is as unique as our program offerings.

The Daniels Building at 1 Spadina Crescent is a bold work of architecture and landscape on a prominent urban site between U of T’s St. George campus and the vibrant centre of Toronto. Across Spadina Crescent, the North and South Borden buildings (home to our visual studies programs) and the Earth Sciences Centre (HQ for forestry studies) complete the Faculty’s trifecta of sites. 

To learn first-hand how you can study at the Daniels Faculty, visit our campus throughout November for the following information-gathering events.

November 7 and 8: Graduate Open House

Stop by the Daniels Building at 1 Spadina Crescent or connect via Zoom on Tuesday the 7th and Wednesday the 8th to learn about the Faculty’s graduate programs in architecture, landscape architecture, urban design and forest conservation, as well as our research stream programs: our PhD in Architecture, Landscape, and Design, our Master of Science in Forestry, and our PhD in Forestry.

Learn, too, how to prepare for the application process, and pick up information on funding, financial aid and awards.  

Four tours of the Daniels Building will also be offered on Tuesday, November 7. 

To register in advance for this Graduate Open House and the individual tours, click here.

November 16: MFC Program Open House

Learn about the Faculty’s Master of Forest Conservation program—either in-person or online—by joining Assistant Professor Sally Krigstin, MFC Program Coordinator, for a presentation on the subject. The in-person session will take place at 3:00 p.m. in Room ES 1016B of the Earth Sciences Centre. For further Zoom, dial-in or other access, contact Laura Lapchinski, Program Administrator, at laura.lapchinski@daniels.utoronto.ca.

If you can’t make it on the 16th, recordings of the sessions will be made available. For more information, please visit the Daniels Forestry website.

November 23: U of T Fall Campus Day 2023 

U of T’s annual fall event for future undergrads, Fall Campus Day provides the opportunity for prospective students, as well as their parents, families and friends, to visit the downtown St. George campus and get details about our programs, colleges, residences, student life and more. Campus and residence tours, mini-lectures and presentations from the different faculties will be running throughout the day.

At the Daniels Faculty, tours and information sessions will take place at 1 Spadina Crescent from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Join us then to learn more about our undergraduate programs in Architectural Studies and Visual Studies, meet with faculty and students, tour Daniels Faculty facilities and more. 

Click here to register for the in-person FCD!

For more information on all three days, check out the Events page on the Daniels Faculty website.

Standing 7.5 metres tall and weighing three metric tons, The Lodestar is the British Columbia city of Kelowna’s newest civic landmark, animating a previously underused public plaza and serving as “a guide and a gateway” to a burgeoning mixed-use neighbourhood formerly defined by railway tracks, a mill and abandoned warehouses.

Located in North Kelowna, the recently completed wood structure, which has a radius of four metres at its base and includes a canopy, lighting and seating, was designed and executed by Toronto-based DS Studio, of which Daniels Faculty alumna and sessional lecturer Dina Sarhane is a founding partner, along with multidisciplinary company Fishtnk and architectural consultant Tom Svilans.

The Lodestar was the top choice in a 2018 design competition, and functions as both “a place maker and a shining example of how an age-old material can be digitally modified to suit contemporary needs,” according to the project team.

“We summarized what we absolutely needed to make this a successful public space that draws people to it,” says Sarhane, who holds a Bachelor of Architectural Science degree from Carleton University (where she is also a professor of urban design) and a Master of Architecture degree from U of T. “The three necessary components were: an enclosed structure for protection and to bring the massiveness of the city’s scale down to the human scale, a colonnade to define space and signal that something special is happening here, and a marker so that the gathering space can be seen from afar.” 

Posted just outside a new RCMP station, the sculpture is made from FSC-certified and laminated Yellow Alaskan Cedar (a carbon-negative material) as well as custom-fabricated steel braces. 

Its design, says the project team, was not predetermined—the resultant shape was driven by exploring the strength and capacity of the wood. Through an iterative process, the legs and cells of the piece were gradually stretched and pulled into the augmented straight and curved pieces now in place. 

“Repeat prototyping and testing was key, as was developing strategies for custom joinery and detail resolution,” says Svilans.

Only braced where necessary, The Lodestar gives a nod to the history of Kelowna’s timber industry, with its nearly vertical legs suggesting tree trunks that coalesce into a canopy overhead.

Adding to the drama of the soaring structure is a carefully considered lighting system composed of LEDs tucked into the ground. Their positioning illuminates the interior faces of the installation’s components while also creating exterior silhouettes. 

The result, says one team member, is akin to “a campfire in a dark forest,” with attendant warm embrace and safe locus for gathering.

Photos by Andrew Latreille

The John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto is proud to announce that ᐊᖏᕐᕋᒧᑦ / Ruovttu Guvlui / Towards Home, an Indigenous-led exhibition organized by and first presented at the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) in Montreal, will be on view in the Architecture and Design Gallery at 1 Spadina Crescent from October 25, 2023 – March 22, 2024.

ᐊᖏᕐᕋᒧᑦ / Ruovttu Guvlui / Towards Home was co-curated by Joar Nango (a Norway-based Sámi architect and artist), Taqralik Partridge (Associate Curator, Indigenous Art - Inuit Art Focus, Art Gallery of Ontario), Jocelyn Piirainen (Associate Curator, National Gallery of Canada) and Rafico Ruiz (Associate Director of Research at the CCA). The exhibition showcases installations by Indigenous designers and artists, reflecting on how Arctic Indigenous communities relate to land and create empowered, self-determined spaces of home and belonging.

Through the exhibition, as well as its accompanying publication and programming, ᐊᖏᕐᕋᒧᑦ / Ruovttu Guvlui / Towards Home aims to have long-term impact, opening new forms of dialogues and ways of thinking about Northern Indigenous practices of designing and building that are not normally considered in the canons of architecture.

“Towards Home recognizes that architectural design in this country has been generally insensitive to Indigenous peoples’ traditions and cultures,” says Jeannie Kim, Associate Professor at the Daniels Faculty and organizer of the Toronto exhibition. “Participating in this project, our Faculty hopes to broaden understandings, and to support our shared efforts towards fostering practices of land-based design.”

Work on view will include Taqralik Partridge and Tiffany Shaw’s The Porch, a transitional space unique to Northern living that welcomes Indigenous visitors into an institutional setting that has historically excluded them. Geronimo Inutiq’s I’m Calling Home presents a commissioned radio broadcast that recalls the central role that radio plays in both connecting Inuit communities and expediting colonialism. Nuna, an installation by asinnajaq (in conversation with Tiffany Shaw), is a tent-like structure that invites both sharing and reflection while evoking the four elements. Offernat (Votive Night) by Carola Grahn and Ingemar Israelsson is an altar featuring a birch burl that evokes the burning of Sámi drums during Christianization in the 1700s.

The exhibition also facilitated the Futurecasting: Indigenous-led Architecture and Design in the Arctic workshop (co-curated Ella den Elzen and Nicole Luke) that brought together nine emerging architectural designers and duojars (craftpeope) to convene across Sapmi and Turtle Island to discuss what the future of design on Indigenous lands might become.

The full list of contributors includes: asinnajaq, Carola Grahn and Ingemar Israelsson, Geronimo Inutiq, Joar Nango, Taqralik Partridge, and Laakkuluk Williamson Bathory. The original exhibition design was by Tiffany Shaw, Edmonton, with graphic design by FEED, Montreal.

The Exhibition Opening will take place on Wednesday, October 25. Additional updates and related programming will be announced soon.

Land Acknowledgement 

We wish to acknowledge this land on which the University of Toronto operates. For thousands of years, it has been the traditional land of the Huron-Wendat, the Seneca, and the Mississaugas of the Credit. Today, this meeting place is still the home to many Indigenous people from across Turtle Island, and we are grateful to have the opportunity to work on this land. The land of 1 Spadina Crescent has been the home and an important trail of the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinaabe, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat peoples. Spadina is synonymous with Ishpadinaa, meaning “a place on a hill” in Anishinaabe. 

Also, we are acutely aware as architects, that unjust settler strategies and logics denigrated Indigenous land and architecture, particularly harming Indigenous people’s ability to create safe places to call home. Today, many of the ways these lands are used conflict with Indigenous values, practices, and histories. The acknowledgement of past wrongs and current realities are only the beginning of redressing and improving conditions, and creating a more just built environment. 

Image captions: 1) Nuna, asinnajaq in conversation with Tiffany Shaw. qulliq, asinnajaq in conversation with Ludovic Boney and Tiffany Shaw. 2) J'appelle chez nous / I'm calling home / Uvatinni Uqallajunga, Geronimo Inutiq. 3) All images credit ᐊᖏᕐᕋᒧᑦ / Ruovttu Guvlui / Vers chez soi / Towards Home exhibition view, 2022. Photos Mathieu Gagnon © CCA. 

The Daniels Faculty is profoundly saddened to have learned of the death of Professor Emeritus George Baird, alumnus (BArch 1962), former dean and beloved friend of the Faculty. 

Professor Baird was a preeminent figure in the history and evolution of both the Faculty and the architectural profession. As an architect, scholar, educator and mentor, his contribution to the discourse around and practice of architecture was profound, progressive and international in its reach.  

Within the Faculty, Baird’s impact as a leader, teacher and guiding influence cannot be overstated. Five years after graduating from what was then U of T’s School of Architecture, he joined the faculty in 1967, serving as acting chair and chair of the architecture program from 1983 to 1985. In 1993, Baird left U of T to teach at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, then returned to serve as Dean of the Faculty from 2004 to 2009. As academic leader, he was dean when John H. Daniels and Myrna Daniels made their historic gift to the Faculty, changing its trajectory and reputation as the newly named John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design.   

After the completion of his deanship, Baird continued to teach courses, serve as a thesis advisor and participate in thesis reviews as professor emeritus. The George Baird Lecture—established in his honour upon his retirement as an enduring legacy at the Faculty and the University—continues to bring scholars and practitioners from around the world to speak at the Faculty. (This fall’s George Baird Lecture, scheduled for Thursday, October 19 and featuring architect Bruce Kuwabara, took place as planned.) 

It is the rare architect whose voice and contributions straddle the worlds of practice and theory so significantly, but Baird’s very much did. The Faculty would like to offer its condolences to his wife Elizabeth and to his many colleagues, friends and admirers.  

Those who would like to share their remembrances are encouraged to do so in the comments on our social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn) or to send an email to communications@daniels.utoronto.ca and we will post them below. 

“George Baird was a brilliant intellectual who combined teaching and practice, design and building, research and writing, public lectures and criticism. I [had] known him since I was 18, when I began my first year at the University of Toronto. 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.

“At George’s office, we [alternated] 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. He played at the level of what was happening in the context, whether it was a review, a symposium or just lunch. It was very fluctuating. 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 and municipal issues. He was all over it. [But] what I will cherish most is George’s generosity and kindness.”

– Bruce Kuwabara, alumnus (BArch 1972) and founding partner at KPMB Architects

“I knew George Baird for many decades, since my first year as a teacher, which for me began at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design in 1994, a year after George joined its faculty as a senior member, already a renowned architect and critic.

“I mention the year and the venue simply to point out that, while George has been a central figure for the life of architecture in Toronto, his presence and impact were international. In addition to educating generations of architects during two different eras in Toronto—from the late 1960s through the time of his departure for Harvard in 1994, and then again beginning in 2004, when he returned as Dean of the Daniels Faculty—he also trained a generation of GSD students during his decade-long sojourn there. George’s impact on architecture, however, was far wider than even his direct role as teacher and mentor at this or any other school. He had been a critical voice in architecture since his continuous wave of criticism, commentary and analysis began in 1969. 

“But while George was an erudite scholar and critic, he was also the sort of architect and teacher who would scrutinize—in a student review, for instance—the placement of a column in parking bays, noting when it would interfere with the turning radius of a car and make parking impossible. He scrutinized, in other words, the most material conditions of architecture. One of his best pieces of writing is his observation in his small essay on Alvar Aalto of how Aalto used the travel of the hand on handrails to structure the experience of space. This was George’s interest in the haptic, not readily photographed reality of architecture.   

“T. S. Eliot once wrote of the novelist Henry James that James had a mind so refined that not an idea could penetrate it. Eliot was paying James a compliment, saying that, for James, ideas existed through the concreteness of things, of gestures, of the smallest observations of mood, of affect. Broad statements were of no value to James. Likewise, for George, the concreteness of architecture was its essence, as present to him as the voice of the political philosopher Hannah Arendt, whose thoughts and words he kept with him as some people do the verses of poets. All things precise and concrete.” 

– Robert Levit, Acting Dean of the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design

“George was my professor and then Faculty associate. He always inquired into the deep roots of architecture and modernity. He rose the bar.” 

– Brian Boigon, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design

 “RIP George, a wonderful colleague and friend. We will miss you.”

 – Charles Waldheim, John E. Irving Professor of Landscape Architecture and Co-Director of the Master in Design Studies Program at Harvard University Graduate School of Design

Upon my arrival in Canada in 1975, artist and architect Melvin Charney suggested that, with respect to my interest in urban design and the study of cities, I should go to Toronto to study and meet with George Baird. I called George on a Friday before taking the train from Montreal to Toronto. In closing our long phone conversation, George suggested that we meet at his office first thing Monday morning. 

I arrived at George’s office at 35 Britain Street, where he asked me to give him a little time to sort out a few items for the week before he took me to the University. He suggested that while I was waiting I could look at two reports that his team had produced for the City of Toronto. (The reports were On Building Downtown and Built Form Analysis.)

Later, in the car going to the School of Architecture, George asked what I thought of the reports. I replied that they were interesting but lack an explicit theoretical framework to structure their methodology.

This was the beginning of a great and long-lasting exchange, a collaborative teaching relationship and ultimately a friendship.

I introduced George to the work of European theoreticians such as Saverio Muratori, Carlo Aymonino, Bernard Huet and Christian Devillers, to name a few. These architects, teachers and theoreticians had written extensively on the relationship between architectural typology and urban morphology. I had the opportunity of having been taught by some of them.

In exchange, George introduced me to his rigorous way of looking and analyzing every aspect of life, and understanding how from most daily actions one can see trends in the slow evolution of societies. Both sides of these approaches are based on the longue durée principle as defined by Fernand Braudel.

George’s interest in semiology and the concepts of langue and parole were other possible introductions to the reading of cities through the relationship between architectural typology and urban morphology.

Although I was 26 at the time, George gave me my first teaching assignment. He asked me to give a lecture to explain these theoretical concepts to his fifth-year students. This then became a fifth-year seminar and later became the basis of the North Jarvis study and project. 

George’s next fifth-year class studied a part of downtown Toronto. Under George’s direction, students analyzed North Jarvis’ urban morphology and studied in detail several of its architectural types. Then students produced projects, showing how it is possible, being inspired by the existing, to densify and transform the whole neighbourhood, with improvements to the urban fabric.

This study was certainly the first one of its kind produced in North America. It was published in “Vacant Lottery,” Design Quarterly 108, 1978. In this publication George was associated with Barton Myers.

My relationship with George on urban design developed further at the school after George became the director of the program in 1983, when he asked me to co-ordinate the third-year programme, then dedicated to human settlement.

When I was director of the Architecture and Urban Design Division for the City of Toronto, my team produced an analysis of the morphology of the city for the 1991 Plan. George was a significant critic and contributor to this work. He wrote an introduction to our City Patterns publication, entitled “A Short History of Toronto’s Urban Form.” This introduction, as well as the study, laid the foundations and many of the objectives for Cityplan ’91, Toronto’s official plan at the end of the 20th century.

The passing of George Baird is a loss not only for the school, or for the city, but for the discipline of architecture and urban design. It is all the more poignant at a time when Toronto seems to allow a free-for-all attitude to the city’s form, lacking any sense of the rigour, culture and quality that George had brought to the design of cities.

– Marc Baraness, architect and former associate professor at the University of Toronto

“George was a gentleman and a scholar. Kind and wise. Incisive and rigorous. Most of all, a supportive colleague and friend whose advice and friendship helped me find my voice.”

– Nina-Marie Lister, Professor and Graduate Director of the School of Urban and Regional Planning at Toronto Metropolitan University

“A tremendous loss for Toronto, for Canadian architecture and for U of T. He will be very missed, but always remembered.”

– Siobhan Sweeny, alumna (MARC 2016) and intern architect at Sweeny & Co. Architects Inc.

North Design Office, the landscape architecture practice led by the Daniels Faculty’s Peter and Alissa North, is among the co-winners of a 2023 Toronto Urban Design Award in the category of Small Open Spaces. The Award of Merit was bestowed for Stackt Market, the popular “cultural marketplace” composed of artfully assembled shipping containers on the north side of the rail corridor between Bathurst and Tecumseth Streets.

Founded by Alissa North (Associate Professor) and Peter North (Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream) in 2005, North Design Office oversaw Stackt Market’s landscape architecture. The architecture firm behind the project was LGA Architectural Partners. Other members of the award-winning team include Blackwell (structural engineering), Hidi Planner (mechanical engineering), MHBC (transportation), Crozier (civil engineering) and Giant (shipping containers).

According to the five-member jury that granted the Award of Merit, Stack Market “is a fresh new concept for Toronto, in which sustainability—the retrofitting of containers—is the driver behind the creation of a new city destination that has grown beyond the concept of a market. It has become an iconic artform, an animator of a once-derelict place, and a unique public space to simply come and enjoy.”

Added the jury of the project, which is not permanent: “The success of the Stackt Market has been its ability to evolve and change since its inception; it continues to do so as use and program demands shift. This may be attributed to the fact that the market is deemed temporary, which provides the luxury as well as ease of change and adaptation until it is dismantled. The success of the market is also enabled by the level of flexibility and adaptability in the design of space and use.”

Administered by the City of Toronto, the Toronto Urban Design Awards are given out every two years to acknowledge the significant contribution that architects, landscape architects, urban designers, artists, design students and city builders make to the look and livability of the city.

This year’s winners also include another faculty member: Professor Brigitte Shim, whose practice, Shim-Sutcliffe Architects, was recognized with an Award of Merit for Ace Hotel Toronto, described by the jury as a “well crafted ‘brickworks’ project…that does a lot for the fabric of the city and the nearby park.”

It won in the category of Private Buildings in Context—Tall. 

Photos by Industryous Photography

The Daniels Faculty community is fondly remembering the late Claude Cormier, extraordinary designer and landscape architect, U of T and Daniels Faculty alumnus, beloved colleague and friend. The founding principal of CCxA (formerly Claude Cormier et Associés) passed away from cancer at his home in Montreal on September 15. He was 63. 

“Claude was a joy,” says Dean Juan Du, “emanating unflagging generosity, determination, creativity and joie de vivre through his life’s work, as well as in his encounters with everyone he met. Serious in intention but playfully executed, Claude’s landscape and urban designs are unique in their synthesis of art, rigour and charm, inspiring people to embrace their cities and daily environs. Claude has made pioneering and lasting contributions to the field of landscape architecture, to cities across North America, and to our Faculty here in Toronto. We are fortunate and grateful that he championed our school and that he has left such a tremendous legacy for future generations.”  

In Toronto, Cormier was responsible for some of the city’s best-loved public spaces, including HtO Urban Beach, Sugar Beach, Berczy Park (pictured below) and recently completed Love Park. The designer’s unique talent first came to widespread attention in 2000, when he unveiled his abstract Blue Stick Garden (Le jardin de bâtons bleus) for the inaugural edition of the International Garden Festival at Reford Gardens in Quebec. In his home base of Montreal, Cormier’s projects include Place D’Youville and Dorchester Square, the colourful Pink Balls and 18 Shades of Gay canopies running down Sainte-Catherine Street, Clock Tower Beach at the city’s Old Port, and his monumental Ring at Place Ville Marie. (For more information on these works and his career, click here.) 

Elise Shelley, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream and Director of the Faculty’s Master of Landscape Architecture program, worked with Cormier in her role as Director of Landscape at the interdisciplinary firm gh3*, most recently on Warehouse Park in Edmonton. 

“I know I speak for so many when I say that Claude was an inspiration, a pioneer, a mentor and a friend,” Shelley says. “His projects, his firm CCxA, and his dedication to this discipline and all of its students speak to his abundant character, his enthusiasm for life, and his overflowing passion for design. We are forever grateful for the gifts he gave to Daniels, to Toronto, and to the world.” 

In 2021 the Daniels Faculty announced the Claude Cormier Award in Landscape Architecture, a $500,000 gift to his alma mater. Granted annually, the award recognizes and supports third-year MLA students who show promise in their pursuit of creative and pioneering forms or in their approaches to practice. The scholarship builds on gifts that Cormier had made to the school since 2000 and is equivalent to domestic tuition fees. It is the largest private gift designated to U of T’s landscape architecture program to date. 

“Claude wished to recognize an individual who pushes the boundaries, is unafraid to break the mould, and has the courage to take a stance and flip the script—characteristics that truly embody the ethos of Claude’s practice,” says Associate Professor Liat Margolis, former Director of the MLA program. “This award will serve as a reminder for future generations of his profound impact on the field.” 

Margolis adds: “When I think of Claude, I think first and foremost of his kindness and humility, and the way in which he approached his philanthropic gesture with such appreciation, gratitude and grace. He shared his wishes to give back, recalling individuals who provided critical mentorship and support at the start of his design career. I also always think about Claude and his team wearing pink hats on a construction site, an ingenious way to break down stereotypes with humour and sincerity, reminding us all of our humanity.” 

Daniels Faculty alumna Agata Mrozowski, who received her MLA degree in 2022, was the first recipient of the Claude Cormier Award. Mrozowski (pictured below with Cormier in 2021) was able to convey her gratitude to him in his final days, telling him in part: “You will forever hold a place in my heart. I appreciate you, and all the whimsy and joy you’ve brought to so many through your playful, thoughtful and meticulous designs. You cannot possibly conceive of the amount of people who have delighted in your creations. Your passion and vision will live on through the talented people you have mentored, the generations of landscape architects who have been inspired by your work, and all those yet to come. You are an icon.” 

Acclaimed architect Bruce Kuwabara, a friend of Cormier’s as well as a colleague, noted how the designer’s unique sensibility was a product of both his Canadian upbringing and his generational interests. “Growing up on a farm in Quebec gave Claude a deep understanding of the land and ecological issues of the landscape,” says Kuwabara. “His education at the University of Toronto and Harvard University gave him the depth of history and theory that enabled him to combine the tradition of landscape design with contemporary and pop cultural references and themes. His imagination was boundless.” 

For both Kuwabara and Michael McClelland, founding principal at ERA Architects in Toronto, the magic of Cormier’s work lay in his ability to translate that imagination into physical space and sensation. 

“Claude had a rare combination of empathy, integrity and conceptual thinking,” says McClelland. “His medium was laughter.” 

Adds Kuwabara: “Charismatic and flamboyant...Claude demonstrated his desire to make a better country through his imaginative and durable contributions to the public realm. His projects bring smiles to peoples’ faces. His landscapes reflect the best of who we can be.”  

Banner image: Claude Cormier discusses his work, including his monumental Ring at Place Ville Marie in Montreal, in the Main Hall of the Daniels Building in October 2022. Photo by Emma Hwang

Architect and academic Ludovico Centis is scheduled to speak at the Daniels Faculty on Friday, September 15. 

Based in Northern Italy, Centis is Assistant Professor in Urbanism at the University of Trieste and founder of the Verona-based architecture and planning office The Empire.

From 2010 to 2019, he also edited the architecture magazine San Rocco, of which he was a co-founder.

The title of Centis’s Friday lecture at Daniels, which will take place between 1:00 and 2:00 p.m. in Room 330 of the Daniels Building, is “On the art of reshaping lagoons.” His talk is part of this semester’s Integrated Urbanism Studio, but attendance is open to all.

In 2013-14, Centis was the Peter Reyner Banham Fellow at the University at Buffalo, and his research focuses on the ways in which individuals and institutions, as well as desires and power, shape cities and landscapes.

Recent books include 2022’s The Lake of Venice: A Scenario for Venice and its Lagoon (co-authored with Lorenzo Fabian), They Must Have Enjoyed Building Here: Reyner Banham and Buffalo (2021) and A Parallel of Ruins and Landscapes (2019).

The Integrated Urbanism Studio, in which the Faculty’s architecture, landscape architecture and urban design students collaborate on shared projects, explores design’s agency in dealing with subjects such as the climate crisis, housing, spatial justice, decarbonization and other urban infrastructures.

Centis is the first of several speakers who will be addressing the Studio this term.