A beautiful renovation and addition to a Los Angeles home — the house where renowned poet, playwright and theatre director Bertolt Brecht wrote “The Caucasian Chalk Circle,” and other plays in the 1940s — was recently featured in the Los Angeles Times. Dub Studios, the firm of Assistant Professor Michael Piper, designed the expanded family home.

From the Los Angeles Times:

So after architect Gabriel Sandoval and principals Natalya Kashper and Michael Piper renovated the Brecht house, they worked with the landmark commission to design and build the addition alongside the original structure. The new building stretches from the front of the site, on what was once the garage, to the back of the 12,000-square-foot property. They call the addition "the Bar" for its long and slender shape.

…

Though the addition is understated in front, in back it is enlivened by glass walls that connect it to outdoor dining and living areas, lush landscaping and a pool. The floor-to-ceiling glass is a modern juxtaposition to the more traditional exterior of the Brecht house.

Inside the sun-filled first floor of the new home, the outdoors is always present. From here, the family can watch Leah swim or Alek pick blueberries in the garden.

Two years after breaking ground, the new compound stands largely as envisioned: It's an open, sunny and surprisingly quiet environment deeply in unison with the outdoors.

For the full article, the Los Angeles Times website.

NADAAA, the architecture firm that won an international competition to redesign the Daniels Faculty's new building at One Spadina Crescent, has been named the Top American firm in Design by Architect, the magazine of the American Institute of Architects.

Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson, of Architect magazine writes:

Flip through NADAAA’s 2012 portfolio and you see a practice skilled in designing for all scales. For instance, a 600-square-foot retail space in San Francisco for skin care brand Aesop, in which a seemingly simple wall of randomly stacked recycled boxes utterly transforms a narrow, deep space into a dynamic interior. Or two new schools of architecture in Canada and Australia, both of which challenge the traditional assumptions of academic buildings with creative uses of material and assembly.

The building project at One Spadina Crescent will renew the south-facing 19th century Gothic Revival building and build out the unrealized northern face of the circle with a stunning work of contemporary architecture. Designed by architect Nader Terhani and his collaborator Katie Faulkner of the internationally renowned firm NADAAA, One Spadina will include dynamic, flexible learning and research environments for faculty and students, and will nurture the next generation of leaders in the field.

Below is a presentation of the design for One Spadina given on June 11, 2013 by NADAAA Architects Nader Terhani and Katie Faulkner.

Models and renderings of the designs for One Spadina are now on display at the Eric Arthur Gallery as part of the exhibition ONE FUTURE: The Daniels Faculty @ One Spadina.

The Toronto Star wrote an article on Toronto's 99th library, which is now under construction and set to open in November. Near the historic Fort York to the east of the Bathurst Street bridge, the modern building was designed by University of Toronto Alumna Shirley Blumberg of the award winning Toronto firm KPMB.

"It’s an elegant glass pavilion that will glow like a welcoming lantern at night," says Star writer Leslie Scrivener. "It’s such a presence that the neighbourhood of condominium towers and community housing has been named by the developer, Context, in its honour: the Library District."

Scrivener speaks to Blumberg about the odd angles and trapezoid shape of the building as well as the architect's approach to designing a library on such a historic site.

When it’s finished, the building will have perforated vertical fins that will hold illustrations by artist Charles Pachter. They are taken from a book, The Journals of Susanna Moodie, a collaboration of Margaret Atwood’s poetry and his drawings. (Moodie was a 19th century settler whose book Roughing it in the Bush is a lively account of pioneer struggles.) Sections of Atwood’s poetry will be used on the exterior, too.

The Toronto Public Library’s 100th branch, designed by LGA Architectural Partners (formerly Levitt Goodman) with Philip H. Carter, Architect will open in Scarborough in 2014.

For the full article visit the Toronto Star.

On Tuesday, June 11, the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design unveiled its plans to revitalize and renew One Spadina Crescent, one of Toronto's iconic landmarks. At an event held at One Spadina that day, the lead architects for the project, Nader Tehrani and Katie Faulkner of the firm NADAAA, gave a short presentation to media, donors, and members of the community about the design of the new complex, which will incorporate the existing heritage building.

A 10-minute video of this presentation is posted below and is also available on the Daniels Faculty’s YouTube channel.

The One Spadina project is part of the Faculty’s recently announced 50 million dollar fundraising campaign, of which 24 million remains to be raised. Tehrani, Faulkner and the broader Toronto-based design and engineering team have worked with Professor Richard Sommer, Dean of the Daniels Faculty — as well as faculty, students, and staff across the entire university — on transforming this historic site.

“This project is the result of a collaboration that brings together the accumulated talents and experiences of many, many people,” said Dean Sommer at the June 11 event. “Imagine designing a project for a group of architects, landscape architects, and urban designers — it’s like cooking for a room full of fussy chefs.”

The result is a building that has been thoughtfully considered from countless perspectives — from those of the students and faculty to those of the surrounding communities.

Tehrani and Faulkner brought a wealth of experience to the project. Both have designed award-winning buildings for other educational institutions and schools of architecture, including the University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning; the Rhode Island School of Design's Fleet Library; and Georgia Institute of Technology’s Hinman Research Building.

A key part of Tehrani and Faulkner’s presentation on June 11th was the role that sustainability played in the building’s design.

“One can't talk about a building in this day and age, and least of all a school of architecture, without speaking about sustainability and environmental responsibility,” said Faulkner. “We were given a mandate that the building had to be absolutely overtly sustainable, that it needed to be a teaching tool for the students, the faculty and those in the city of what a building can be.”

Some of the sustainable features of the building include:

Daylighting: The roof and north-facing windows will bring light into the core of the building. In total, 61% of the building will be served by daylighting, resulting in energy savings that will amount to 54% less emissions than would otherwise be needed.

Storm water harvesting: The roof of the new building has been designed to channel and harvest rainwater (approx. 1096 m² per year). Rain that falls on the roof will be directed into a cistern and will be used to irrigate green roofs and surrounding landscape. One hundred percent of the site’s greywater needs will be satisfied by storm water harvesting.

Accommodation for pedestrians and cyclists: Parking spaces for 280 bikes will be provided underneath a terrace in front of the historic building on the south side. The current fencing around the site will be removed and walkways will be created around the entire site to ensure open pedestrian access.

Heat reduction: The new building will incorporate white roofs (to reflect, rather than absorb, the sun) and green roofs (which help keep buildings cool). Calculations to date suggest that this will make the building up to 30 degrees Celsius cooler on a hot, sunny day, without the use of air conditioning. The new building’s green roof will provide an additional site for the Faculty’s Green Roof Innovation Testing Laboratory (also known as the GRIT Lab), where researchers working with industry partners and the City of Toronto, are working to determine how to improve the efficiency of green roofs.

Overall building emissions rate: 58% of Model National Energy Code for Buildings.

The video of the architects’ presentation on the expansion and renewal of the Daniels Faculty at One Spadina Crescent can be found on the Daniels Faculty’s YouTube Channel here.

For more on the Daniels Faculty's campaign and the One Spadina project, click here.

For the first time in the history of Canada’s involvement in the 2014 Venice Biennale of Architecture, the Canadian exhibition will be centered on Canada’s north — and the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design is thrilled to announce that Assistant Professor Mason White and his colleagues at the design firm Lateral Office have been selected by a national jury to organize and curate the exhibit.
 
This is an incredible honour for the Daniels Faculty professor, who has been studying and developing projects in the Canadian arctic since 2008. The 2014 Venice Biennale in Architecture, scheduled to take place from June 7 to November 24, 2014, is the world’s most prestigious architecture exhibition and competition. Each year, the Canada Council for the Arts and the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada select a proposed exhibition to represent the country. In 2014, the Canadian showcase will be entitled “Arctic Adaptations: Nunavut at 15”
 
“Given the rise in national and international interest in the Arctic, this is a timely exhibition,” said Robert Sirman, Director and CEO of the Canada Council. “‘Arctic Adaptations’ will bring attention and insight to the unique challenges and opportunities that Nunavut is facing, and the possibility for architecture to positively impact its future.”
 
White and Lateral Office — which includes University of Waterloo Associate Professor Lola Sheppard and Daniels Faculty graduate Matthew Spremulli (MArch 2011) — are ideal curators for the exhibition. In December, the experimental design firm was awarded the inaugural Arctic Inspiration Prize. In February, it received a Progressive Architecture Award from the American Institute of Architecture. Both awards were for the firm’s project Arctic Food Network — a network of contemporary buildings designed to encourage and inspire traditional hunting, fishing, and gathering practices.
 
White's interest in the arctic has extended to his teaching. In 2010, he took Daniels Faculty students to Nunavut as part of a sudio entitled “63 Degrees North,” which explored reconceiving Iqaluit’s public realm to better accommodate snowmobiles. In the last year and a half, the professor has travelled to all eight circumpolar countries to study the role that architecture can play in addressing the unique challenges faced by arctic communities.
 
In preparation for the exhibition, five design teams, each made up of representatives from a Canadian school of architecture and a Canadian architecture office, will work with Nunavut-based organizations to create proposals along the themes of health, education, housing, recreation, and arts. The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication, and will be taken on a tour across Canada after the Biennale closes.
 
For more information read, the Q&A with White recently published on the U of T News website and the Globe and Mail’s coverage of the 2014 Venice Biennale announcement.

For news and updates on "Arctic Adaptations" like it on facebook and follow it twitter.

On December 13, Mason White — Assistant Professor at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design — and his colleagues at the design practice Lateral Office became the inaugural recipients of the Arctic Inspiration Prize.

Lateral Office includes White’s partner Lola Sheppard (Associate Professor, University of Waterloo) as well as Daniels Faculty graduates Matthew Spremulli and Ali Fard (M.Arch 2011). The ceremony took place in Vancouver, and was organized by ArcticNet, a network of scientists focused on the Canadian North.

Winning this award was no small feat for the architecture firm. Non-governmental organizations, health professionals, scientists, and cultural leaders from across the country were considered for the honour. Lateral Office was selected by a high-profile jury that included former Governor General Michaëlle Jean, CBC news anchor and correspondent Peter Mansbridge, Nobel Peace Prize nominee and Inuit activist Sheila Watt-Cloutier, and Jane Glassco Arctic Fellow Kyla Kakfwi-Scott. White and his research team will use the $360,000 it received from the award to continue to pilot prototype structures in the hamlets of Rankin Inlet and Sanikiluaq in Nunavut.

White first developed an interest in the Arctic when Lateral Office entered a design competition in Iceland in 2007. The firm was shortlisted and invited to participate in the second stage. After travelling there, the team became interested in architecture that responded to Iceland’s specific environmental and cultural challenges.

“Then we thought: Why aren’t we working closer to home?” says White. “There are architects working in Nunavut, but there were no architects doing research or experimental design work there.”

Since then, White and his team have developed a number of research projects in Canada’s northern territories, from Ice Road Truck Stops to Health Hangars. In the last year and a half, White has travelled to all eight circumpolar counties to study the role architecture can play in addressing the challenges faced by arctic communities. In 2010, he took a group of graduate students from the Daniels Faculty to Nunavut as part of a studio course that explored reconceiving Iqaluit’s public realm to better accommodate snowmobiles.

The project that has garnered the most attention, however, is Arctic Food Network: a series of contemporary cabins designed by Lateral Office that support traditional hunting, fishing, and gathering practices in a way that engages local Inuit youth (The average age in Nunavut is 25.)

In recent decades, the traditional Inuit diet, centered on hunting and fishing, has been replaced by manufactured food imported from the south. The result has been an increase in obesity and diabetes rates and the loss of traditional knowledge and culture. 

The Arctic Food Network ‘s cabins have been designed to accommodate food preparation, food storage, and lodging. Since roads and highways are next-to-nonexistent, materials to build the cabins were designed to be transported on the back of a sled and easily assembled on site. Each site will be strategically placed near food sources and at intervals that can be traveled by snowmobile.

White and his team have created kits so that members of the community can practice assembling models of the cabins and provide their feedback. They are also developing prototypes to test how a small network of cabins will perform in real-life conditions. Lateral Office has worked on this initiative with Nunavut’s Arctic College, hunters and trappers associations, and Nunavut Tunngavik Inc.

For more information on the Arctic Food Network, visit Lateral Office’s website.  Background on the Arctic Inspiration Awards — including a video featuring an interview with White — can be found here.

On May 25, Assistant Professor Aziza Chaouni participated in Sci Fri at the Ontario Science Centre. 

Sci-Fri is a free Friday night event for teens that the Science Centre holds every month (except December, July, and August), which includes snacks, DJs, and a panel discussion. Topics discussed include global issues mixed with a bit of science.

Chaouni was invited to share some innovative ways of designing cities, buildings, and products for a future where water is scarce. For her presentation, she drew from her work on the Out of Water Project, which explores how existing and future cities and landscapes can adjust to increased water scarcity. Chaouni is a principal researcher for the project along with Daniels Assistant Professor Liat Margolis. The two are now working on a book on the subject, and it couldn't be more timely: As reported on the Out of Water website,  “the United Nations projects that in the next ten years, 50 million people will be living in desert contexts, potentially causing major migration fluxes, political tensions, and instabilities.”

For more information visit: http://www.oowproject.com/

On Wednesday, January 25, Daniels Associate Professor Pina Petricone is launching her new book Concrete Ideas: Material to Shape a City. To celebrate, she is hosting an evening of wine, cheese, and book signing at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design.

Date: Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Time: 6:00 - 8:00 PM
Location: Larry Wayne Richards Gallery, John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design, 230 College Street

Concrete Ideas: Material to Shape a City is about possibilities in concrete architecture. It visually speculates, through a series of montages, drawings and photographs, about concrete architecture’s capacity as an urban catalyst, its potential for defining cities and for virtuosity in urban renewal. It asks; given the now mainstream nanotechnologies that transform the performance of materials at the molecular level without fundamentally changing the material aesthetic, can we anticipate and provoke a change in its inherent authority, perception and aesthetic culture? It represents a series of recognizable brutalist examples from around the world to be read alongside contemporary ‘new concrete’ constructions, to ultimately render their ‘generation’ undistinguishable. The work uses the case of Toronto with its predominant 60s and 70s brutalist stock, and unique minus 30° to plus 30° Canadian climate, to test these speculations with building projects that challenge the limits of concrete performance. With contributions from architects and thinkers such as Mark West, George Baird, Will Bruder, and Charles Waldheim, among others, Concrete Ideas offers a seductive argument for the reconsideration of this age-old building material as supple, light, and instrumental in the re-presentation of existing concrete ‘citizens’.

Architecture Canada | RAIC has announced Taymoore Balbaa, MRAIC, as the first recipient of its Young Architect Award.

The Young Architect Award recognizes an architect under the age of 35 for excellence in design, leadership and/or service to the profession. It is intended that this award will inspire other young architects to become licensed and to strive for excellence in their work.

For more information, see: RAIC