On the occasion of winning the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada’s Gold Medal with her partner, Howard Sutcliffe, Professor Brigitte Shim took the time for a virtual interview to reflect on her 33 years of teaching at the Daniels Faculty.

You have been teaching at the Daniels Faculty at the University of Toronto since 1988. Why is teaching so important to you?

Educating the next generation of architects is essential to fostering design excellence in Canada and to helping to guide the future of our world. I see teaching as a form of design advocacy: part of permeating, contributing and being deeply invested in what really matters.

The Daniels Faculty fosters an environment of tremendous reciprocity: The Faculty is comprised of esteemed colleagues who feel equally serious about this commitment to the future of the profession and students who draw on diverse backgrounds, cultures and perspectives. Together we all invest a tremendous amount of our time, energy and optimism into our undergraduate and graduate students sharing our knowledge and experiences with them.

How do you determine the topics of your studios?

My studios always addressed pressing themes, and are often taught in collaboration with other architects, landscape architects, urban planners, artists, and academics to cultivate rich, cross-disciplinary perspectives. With each new studio, I try to seek out themes that are not just exercises, but rather opportunities to explore and test issues that are fundamentally shaping the future of cities and the broader environment.

We aim to empower our students to not only discover these themes, but to develop a different reading of the city and to think about how they can shape better futures. Take for example: advancing the intensification of Toronto laneways, building for northern climates, rethinking community-based healthcare, interrogating the challenge of contested and sacred sites, and more recently, the role of places of production linking our forests to factories – to name just a few.

How would you encourage new students to approach experimentation and invention in the design process?

The work that my students undertake while in architecture school must push the boundaries and rethink the possibilities of design to reshape the built environment. Through collaboration, exploration, and experimentation there will be invention and discovery.

Are there particular lessons from your time in university that have proven resonant as you have moved through your career?

As a young architecture student, seeing built work in person enabled me to experience different kinds of spaces and to understand the importance of landscape and context. The many field trips to visit buildings while in architecture school at the University of Waterloo had a huge impact on my understanding of architecture’s potential.

Subsequently, as a faculty member at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design, I led many field trips to give Daniels students the same opportunities to see buildings and their landscapes. These travels have helped my students to develop a deep respect for, and understanding of, the physicality of architecture, landscape, and to understand the importance of site and context.

Brigitte Shim and a group of students visit Robert Smithson's earthwork "Spiral Jetty" (1970) during a reading week trip to Utah in 2017. 

Your studio, Shim-Sutcliffe Architects Inc. is recognized for uniting architecture and landscape; and for its experimentations — of materiality, craft and light. What do you think a student should understand about these themes?

Howard and I regard our practice as a part of a broader conversation about making, feeling, learning, expressing, and cultivating responsible stewardship. Each project, regardless of its scale or budget, is part of this continuum. The process is as important as the outcome. Clients and craftspeople are also friends and teachers, helping us to find great pleasure in making things. We see through drawing and model-making. There’s irrational intent behind the movement of the pencil. Drawing allows us to see and explore possibilities – it literally enables us to see.

Building buildings is a physical act. To realize architecture, we are reliant on materiality, craft, and light. Our designs develop from ideas that are rooted in materials and the landscape. We assemble materials such as brick, steel, glass, wood, and concrete and ask them to speak eloquently about who we are and what we value. This notion of connecting ideas, craft, production, materials, architecture, landscape, and the participation of clients and craftspeople is important for creating meaningful places.

And finally, do you have any other advice for current students before they enter their professional life?

I believe that the perceived boundaries between the disciplines of architecture, landscape and urban design, visual art and forestry are false. The best thing about being a student at the Daniels Faculty is that you are under one big roof with engaged students in all these disciplines. Each student must take advantage of this opportunity to discover the disciplines and the very interesting territories in-between.

Daniels Faculty community,

It has been the greatest privilege of my career to work for you as dean during this time of immense change within the Daniels Faculty and around the world.

After a year of loss and uncomfortable (and necessary) conversations, we are now emerging into an uncertain future. The challenges that we face today: climate change, inequity, racial injustice, mental health, and the impacts of the pandemic — are not going away.

Yet, during a time when we could have felt stagnant or immobilized, the Daniels community demonstrated great resilience. And you seized the opportunity to enact positive change.

Students, alumni, faculty, and staff called on our institutions and professions to transform, adapt, and evolve — not only to meet a changing world, but to be a part of the solutions ahead.

We went “on air” for final reviews and hosted more than 60 public events with global leaders in our fields. We grew our faculty by welcoming new colleagues in building science, visual art, and forestry – and maintained enrolment numbers across our programs. Faculty and students navigated time zones, oceans of distance, and new ways of learning together. Not only adapting to the circumstances but producing some of the highest-quality work I have ever seen during my 35 years at the Faculty (some of which you can explore in our virtual end-of-year show).

My goal as your interim dean was to engage in a process of self-examination to develop new approaches to professional education that will lead to long-term change. Addressing representation and inclusion at all levels was, and will continue to be, a critical part of this change.

One of the highlights of my time as dean was to welcome Elder Whabagoon as the inaugural First Peoples Leadership Advisor to the Dean. With Elder Whabagoon's guidance, we will find new ways to introduce Indigenous values, knowledge, and languages to our programs and reach out and support Indigenous communities. We also established the position of Director of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. This critical new role will sit jointly between the Daniels Faculty and U of T’s Division of Human Resources and Equity. The search for this position will recommence under Dean Du’s leadership.

At the beginning of my term, I shared my belief that it is our shared responsibility to create the future that we want. The successes of this past year are a reflection of the collective efforts of students, staff, and faculty. To continue this work we need transparency, dialogue, collegiality, and mutual respect. With these values as our foundation, I know that we can tackle the challenges ahead.

And now it is my pleasure to pass the torch to Dean Du. Her demonstrated skill at research and administration, her extensive professional and academic experience, along with a strong socially conscious design approach, make her the ideal person to lead our school into the future.

Thank you all for pushing me, and the Daniels Faculty, forward. I am proud of what we accomplished together and I look forward to our future.

Stay safe this summer, and I hope to see you all on campus this fall.

Robert Wright
Interim Dean

Photographs by Thai Go. Follow Thai on Instagram @gothaigo.

In recognition of National Indigenous Peoples Day, the Daniels Faculty is excited to announce an upcoming mural for the north façade of the Daniels Building that will be created by an Indigenous artist. 

“Today is National Indigenous Peoples Day – a day for all Canadians to celebrate the heritage and outstanding contributions of First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples. However, to truly celebrate Indigenous communities we must commit ourselves to Truth and Reconciliation,” said Interim Dean Robert Wright. “These are not just words but our obligation and direct calls to action. First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples have shown us a path, and it is one that we must walk together.” 

This inaugural Indigenous installation at the Daniels Building is intended to address Indigenous Spaces within the University’s response to the national Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC Steering Committee’s Report, Answering the Call. Wecheehetowin) specifically, Call to Action #2: A strategy for the funding and placement of more Indigenous public art across all three campuses should be developed, in close consultation with local Indigenous communities.

“It is important for our Daniels community to come together as one and expand our listening to the land and to all our relations,” said Elder Whabagoon, the First Peoples Leadership Advisor to the Dean. “As we walk this path together, we are gathering new voices to learn new ways of knowing. I am grateful to have the opportunity to share my knowledge and teachings with the Faculty and students.” 

The collaborative process to create the mural is being organized by the Daniels Art Directive (DAD), a student-led art collective, with guidance from Elder Whabagoon, the First Peoples Leadership Advisor to the Dean, and supported by the Daniels Faculty’s Office of External Relations and Outreach. An advisory panel of Indigenous members will create the call-for-proposals and then select the artist.

Located at 1 Spadina Crescent, the site is part of the historic Ishpadinaa – one of two historic Indigenous trails in Toronto that were recently recognized with Anishinaabemowin signs. Ishpadinaa is an Ojibwe word that means “a place on a hill.”

This project follows the first installation of a mural on the Daniels Building: the ‘Support Black Designers.’ mural curated by DAD, in collaboration with designers and Daniels alumnae Ashita Parekh and Tolu Alabi, was on view from October 2020 to May 2021.

"The north façade is a window into the Daniels Faculty. As students at this school, we are honoured to support all artists and the messages they want to share," said Michelle Ng on behalf of DAD. "Through community-driven art, we hope to decolonize spaces and create opportunities that will lead to concrete changes for an intersectional, inclusive future."

The call-for-proposals will be announced at the end of June and an information session is scheduled for Tuesday, July 13, 1-2 pm. Mural installation is slated to begin late August – early September 2021.

Indigenous Mural Project logo design by Mariah Meawasige (Makoose).

Dr. Danijela Puric-Mladenovic, assistant professor in the Daniels Faculty’s forestry program, has contributed to the recently published study “Natural Climate Solutions for Canada” led by global conservation organization the Nature Conservancy, and its Canadian affiliate: Nature United. 

The study was published in Science Advances and details an array of low-cost natural climate solutions that “are broadly scalable and deployable now” to help combat climate change and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The study details how natural measures – forests, urban green areas, and other similar spaces – have the potential to mitigate emitted carbon.

Significantly, it is the first full assessment of these solutions for Canada and follows a similar study for the United States. If wholly implemented, the peer-reviewed study ultimately concluded that the natural climate solutions proposed could potentially reduce Canada’s annual emissions by as much as 78 megatonnes of CO2e in 2030 (the approximate equivalent of what it would take to power every house in Canada over a three-year period).

Puric-Mladenovic acted as the urban forest lead and University of Toronto representative for the study, analyzing Canada’s existing urban forest canopy, as well as its potential as a carbon mitigator and its many other impacts.

“We are one of the most urbanized countries globally, and about 82% of our population lives in urban areas. Thus, urban forest and its many benefits, including climate change mitigation, is essential to the urban land base and urban population,” said Puric-Mladenovic. “The study examined the area of opportunity to increase urban forest canopy across Canada's population centres with at least 1,000 people - across different land-use categories - with varying covers of canopy, tree mortality rates, management requirements, development pressures, and costs.”

Urban forest canopies considered by the study were wide ranging, including street trees, parks, residential areas, urban woodlands, and other open land that exists within an urban context. The outcomes of the research showed there was significant benefit to expanding these urban canopies (planting new trees) and replacing existing trees when necessary. The study determined the most cost-effective approach was through management, conservation, and restoration of existing natural areas.

“If we just focus on Canada, natural climate solutions for urban areas are negligible at a national scale and when compared to other pathways. However, this study's importance included forest canopy pathways as they are critical to the urban land base and 82% of our population. It also recognized that natural climate solutions for urban areas are more complex, and that carbon is only one component,” said Puric-Mladenovic.

“Though we identified limited opportunity to capture carbon with trees in urban canopies, it (the study) recognized that the urban tree canopy pathway has high value as it provides important environmental, biodiversity, and human health benefits and delivers mitigation through reduced energy saving.”

Read "Natural Climate Solutions for Canada" here.

Top image by James Thomas.

Assistant professor Fadi Masoud has recently published two pieces of writing on a topic that is central to his research: zoning for climate adaptation and resilience.

The first of the two, which Masoud co-authored with David Vega-Barachowitz, director of urban design at WXY, is a book chapter titled "Flux Zoning: From End-State Planning to Zoning for Uncertainty." It appears in A Blueprint for Coastal Adaptation, from Island Press*. The chapter details ways cities and regions might adapt zoning into a tool for long-term coastal and environmental adaptation.

Find out more about the book

Masoud's writing also appears in the latest issue of Landscapes | Paysages, the official magazine of the Canadian Society of Landscape Architects. In an article he co-wrote with research associate Isaac Seah, he argues that municipal zoning would be better able to respond to changing climate conditions if urban planners were empowered to take into account data on environmental factors that affect urban land, including topology, geology, and water permeability. As a case study, the article presents some of Masoud's efforts, with the Platform for Resilient Urbanism at the Daniels Faculty's Centre for Landscape Research, to use new technologies to model geophysical and environmental risk factors in flood-prone Broward County, Florida.

Masoud and Seah write:

In many places, these normative zoning codes have rendered themselves extraneous in truly dealing with the impacts of climate change. For example, some regions continue to be zoned for typical future residential land use, knowing they are under severe risk of future flooding. We simply ask: why does land use zoning continue to remain static when we know that landscapes are dynamic?

Read the full article in Landscapes | Paysages

*(Use the code ADAPT at checkout for a 20 per cent discount on the book.)

Top image: Generative codes for an expanded littoral gradient. Image from the Centre for Landscape Research.

The Daniels Faculty is pleased to announce the appointments of two new tenure-track faculty members to its forestry department. Rasoul Yousefpour will join the Faculty as an assistant professor of forestry economics and policy. And Danijela Puric-Mladenovic, who has been teaching forestry at the University of Toronto since 2006 as an adjunct professor and limited-term assistant professor, will join the Faculty permanently as an assistant professor, in the teaching stream.

"A new page turns for forestry at the University of Toronto with the recent hiring of new colleagues in teaching and research," says Sandy Smith, director of the Daniels Faculty's forestry program. "We are excited to welcome Dr. Danijela Puric-Mladenovic and Dr. Rasoul Yousefpour to our complement in forestry and conservation at Daniels."

Danijela Puric-Mladenovic

Danijela Puric-Mladenovic earned her PhD from the University of Toronto's Faculty of Forestry in 2003. Soon afterward, she embarked on a career that would combine academic pursuits with applied science and research for Ontario's Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, where she was a senior analyst until 2019.

Puric-Mladenovic specializes in applied and problem-solving science and research, vegetation monitoring, strategic conservation, restoration, and integrated spatial planning of green systems. Her work on the development of a conservation plan for Ontario's Oak Ridges Moraine strategically guided the restoration of 680 hectares of land. She also developed an innovative natural heritage system design methodology that several conservation groups in southern Ontario have now implemented.

As part of her applied research program, Forests in Settled and Urban Landscapes, she works with dozens of partner organizations on a variety of different research themes, including development of monitoring indicators, predictive mapping of vegetation, forest biomass, carbon and ecological goods and services, historical ecology, and analysis of the effects of anthropogenic climate change on Ontario's forests. As part of an international team, she worked on a just-published paper for Science Advances, titled "Natural Climate Solutions for Canada," for which she led urban forest analysis.

Danijela envisioned and developed Vegetation Sampling Protocol (VSP) — a strategic, broad-scale inventory monitoring and research program supporting the Lake Simcoe Protection Plan. It has been implemented by municipalities, NGOs, and conservation groups across southern Ontario. Puric-Mladenovic also performs a considerable amount of public outreach through Neighbourwoods, a community-based tree inventory, monitoring, and stewardship program she co-founded in 1995 with Daniels Faculty professor emeritus W.A. Kennedy. Neighbourwoods is currently working with communities in the Toronto neighbourhood of Long Branch, and in the cities of Hamilton and Ottawa.

“I am incredibly pleased to be joining the Daniels Faculty on a permanent basis in this exciting time, when societies and communities across the globe are mobilized and united in their efforts to conserve and restore nature and landscapes," Puric-Mladenovic says. "With its unique programs, Daniels has been at the forefront of this green wave through its research, teaching, and professional and community outreach."

Rasoul Yousefpour

Rasoul Yousefpour earned his PhD from the University of Frieburg, Germany, in 2009. He has been an assistant professor there since 2014. His area of specialty is adaptive forest management and decision-making. He uses ecological modelling approaches to forecast the ways forests will grow and change over time, then performs analysis on those models to determine the effects of different human interventions.

Yousefpour has published extensively on these topics. For a 2018 paper in Scientific Reports, he modelled the effects of Climate-Smart Forestry management techniques — which aim to maximize the climate benefits of forests — in 18 European countries. He and his co-authors found a potential forest management strategy that could sequester between 7.2 and 11.1 billion tonnes of carbon during the 21st century and produce up to 141 billion euros in economic value.

For a 2019 paper, published in the Journal of Forest Economics, Yousefpour and his co-author used Bayesian inference to model the growth of European beech trees in central Europe under 12 different potential climate change scenarios. The study concludes that the risks and uncertainties introduced by climate change will require forest managers to take into account unpredictable variations both in the growth of forests and in public demand for forest products.

Yousefpour is a leader of several national and international projects related to risk management in forestry. He's the coordinator of the International Union of Forest Research Organizations working group on risk analysis. Last year, he organized an international training workshop for researchers interested in learning about economic models for water protection in forests. He's also an associate editor of the journal Annals of Forest Science.

"Joining the Daniels Faculty is a unique opportunity for interdisciplinary research between art and science," Yousefpour says. "I am excited to join this innovative school and collaboratively develop nature-based and climate-smart solutions for society."

Statement from the Dean's Office 

Since my last update in March, we have seen promising developments across the province as we prepare for a safe return to campus. If you are a new or returning student, plan for in-person learning and increased on-campus opportunities at the Daniels Faculty this fall. 

On May 28, 2021, the Province of Ontario announced it reached a key milestone in the fight against COVID-19: 65 per cent of eligible Ontarians have now received the vaccine ahead of schedule and the province is now accelerating second dose appointments.  

This is promising news, but it is critical that we continue to do our part: get vaccinated, follow the guidelines, and stay safe this summer. We will provide another update on June 30 when new information is available. 

How is U of T planning for a safe return to campus? 

U of T is closely monitoring the Government of Ontario’s plans for safely re-opening our province. Efforts are underway to prepare for the arrival of new and returning students, including preparation of residences and programs to assist students arriving from outside of Canada. Sandy Welsh, U of T’s vice-provost, students, recently spoke with U of T News about University plans for the fall. 

• International Student Arrival 

• Quarantine Information for Students Entering Canada 

• Residences and Off-campus Housing 

From upgraded building ventilation and air filtration to rapid screenings and vaccination clinics,  read “12 ways U of T is preparing for a safe return to in-person instruction” for details on University-wide safety measures. 

What will fall 2021 look like at the Daniels Faculty? 

Students, faculty, and staff should make appropriate plans to be on campus this September. 

At the Daniels Faculty, we are prioritizing activities that benefit the most from an in-person experience – like undergraduate and graduate studios, on-campus research activities, and student services and workshop access – while maintaining the best practices we have learned from virtual teaching.  

As vaccination rates increase and public health guidelines are updated, we will share more information around physical distancing and capacity limits in the classroom. 

We understand that there will be questions as plans progress this summer. Please reference the related links, including the UTogether hub and the Daniels Faculty COVID-19 FAQs.

Take good care, 
Robert Wright 
Interim Dean 

Ontario's provincial government announced last week that it has entered into a collaborative research partnership with Daniels Faculty associate professor of forestry Patrick James to study the effects of the eastern spruce budworm on Ontario's boreal forests.

Ontario will provide James's lab with a three-year, $56,000 grant, which he'll use to conduct an extensive analysis of aerial and satellite imagery. By combining and interpolating these two data sources, he expects to be able to produce a greatly improved set of data on the Ontario spread of the budworm, a native pest that kills balsam fir and white spruce trees by the millions.

The data produced by the study will be made available to other researchers, for use in further studies of the way the budworm impacts Ontario's forests. It will also have applications in forest management.

"The spruce budworm is the most significant disturbance in Canada's boreal forest. It disrupts more area than harvesting and fire combined," James says. "We're on the precipice of a new outbreak in Ontario. An outbreak in Quebec has been going for 10 or 15 years. Because of the spatial extent of these outbreaks, they touch all aspects of the forest sector, including productivity, risk of future disturbance, forest carbon budgets, and biodiversity. Accurate mapping of these outbreaks is essential to guide management and understand the consequences for forest ecosystem function."

The research will be conducted by Clara Risk, a PhD student who works in James' lab as a research assistant.

Patrick James and Clara Risk.

The reason aerial and satellite images are useful for tracking the budworm is that budworm-infested trees have a distinct appearance. As the trees die, their foliage takes on a reddish hue, which makes them relatively easy to visually identify from above.

But scientists who study the budworm in Ontario have, so far, been bottlenecked by a lack of comprehensive data. Satellite imagery captures wide swaths of land, but lacks the level of detail necessary for researchers to precisely identify budworm-affected forests. Aerial surveys, done by technicians in aircraft, have the right level of detail but lack completeness. There are gaps between the flight paths of the planes, which lead to omissions in the resulting aerial sketch maps.

James and Risk will attempt to solve this conundrum by using artificial intelligence to combine the two types of image data into a single, unified data set, covering all of Ontario and parts of Quebec. Other researchers have previously attempted variations on this technique, but never at this scale.

"Our main goal is to ameliorate the data we have so that it can be used by others and by us to analyze and forecast defoliation patterns," Risk says. "For example, we might be able to investigate why outbreaks appear in certain locations."

The project's provincial grant is a product of Ontario's forest sector strategy, which calls upon the government to support research to inform evidence-based decision-making. The province also announced this week that it is entering into a similar research partnership with McMaster University, to study the effects of climate change on forest growth and yield.

"The research will not only further our understanding of environmental pressures on Ontario's forests by harnessing leading technology, but also ensure Ontario's forests remain healthy today and for future generations," John Yakabuski, Ontario's Minister of Natural Resources and Forestry, said in a press release.

Top image: Aerial survey information and remote sensing data for a 2018 spruce budworm outbreak near Timmins, Ontario.

Assistant professor Alstan Jakubiec has been named the latest beneficiary of the Mayflower Research Fund, an endowed research fund established at the Daniels Faculty in 2019. Jakubiec will use his grant to fund research into the effects of interior light on human psychology and physiology in Canada's subarctic and polar regions.

"Mayflower funding is going to be super helpful in pushing this project forward," Jakubiec says. "It's great because it allows me to focus specifically on design questions, which I think a lot of this type of work doesn't look at very rigourously."

The Mayflower Research Fund was established by a generous donor to encourage and stimulate research in the fields of architecture, landscape architecture, and urban design. Each year, the Daniels Faculty's research committee recommends a top applicant for consideration and selection by the dean. Daniels faculty members with full-time appointments are eligible to apply for the annual $10,000 grant.

Jakubiec, who is the third faculty member to receive Mayflower funding since the fund's inception, plans to take the opportunity to fill what he sees as a glaring gap in the existing research on the relationship between far-north residents and light.

"The research that has been done has been mostly through the eyes of people working at climate monitoring stations or in the military, not long-term residents of the north," Jakubiec says. "I really want to understand how long-term residents perceive and react to light."

Jakubiec's Mayflower project will build on his earlier research into light and human biology. In 2017, Jakubiec worked with the software development firm Solemma, where he's the director of engineering, to create ALFA, a computerized tool that lets designers simulate the effects of various lighting conditions on human health and cognition. In 2020, he worked with a research assistant to scour the latest research on light, sleep, and human health.

An example of spectral daylight simulation in a dwelling, from Jakubiec's previous research.

From these investigations, Jakubiec has concluded that the presence or absence of light in buildings can have profound effects on the wellbeing of occupants. "We have this internal biological clock, which is regulated by some subcomponents of the hypothalamus," he says. "In places where there's very little light exposure for parts the year, it can have impacts on your mood and cognition. It can make you feel more sleepy throughout the day."

"Excessive light exposure, on the other hand, has been shown to have significant impacts on things like blood sugar. You can effectively have the symptoms of type-two diabetes."

The reason Jakubiec has chosen to focus his latest research on Canada's far north is that it's a part of the world where lighting conditions are especially variable — and therefore especially challenging to the human psyche. Iqaluit, Nunavut, for instance, gets more than 20 hours of daylight in summer and fewer than four hours of daylight in winter.

Working with a graduate student, Jakubiec will gather data on existing structures in Canada's subarctic and polar regions, and also conduct interviews with permanent residents of those regions, in order to get a sense of how they feel about the levels of light exposure the receive in their homes and workplaces throughout the year.

Using all that data, Jakubiec hopes to create a computational model that will allow architects and engineers to evaluate tradeoffs between natural light and energy efficiency in far-north building design. This computerized tool will, Jakubiec hopes, interface with 3D-modelling software to help designers figure out, for example, whether the potential heat loss from a large window is worth the potential benefit of increased natural light during the dark winter months — or whether it's better to make up some of the light deficit with artificial illumination.

"My goal is to have a standalone user interface that could work on top of a model for fixed geometry to give you outputs about circadian performance, or non-visual lighting performance," Jakubiec says.

While Jakubiec gears up for his research, the two previous Mayflower Fund recipients are putting their grants to work.

Assistant professor Fadi Masoud, the grant's inaugural recipient in 2019, used his funding to launch an in-depth study of the design of suburban parks, with a view towards creating a primer that would help designers, public agencies, and private developers create green spaces that respond to contemporary social and environmental needs. “The Mayflower funding enabled my research team at the Centre for Landscape Research to spend the summer documenting and analyzing a network of public parks along the Black Creek sub-watershed in Toronto –– a region that faces chronic social and environmental stresses,” Masoud says. You can view the group's findings on their website.

Assistant professor Maria Yablonina, who received the grant in 2020, is using her funding to advance research in the field of computational design and digital fabrication with a focus on innovative ways to use robotics in architecture and the environment.

Alumni, future students, and members of the public are welcome to join us online for final reviews (April 15-23). Daniels Faculty students in architecture, landscape, and urban design will present their final projects to their instructors, as well as guest critics from the professional community and local and international academic institutions.

Daniels On Air is the Faculty’s online platform to navigate through final reviews. Here you’ll sign up, browse the schedule, and learn more about each studio. Daniels On Air will re-launch in time for reviews beginning on April 15. All reviews will take place over Zoom (create a free account here).

Current students do not need to sign up for Daniels On Air to access reviews. Check the Review and Examination Schedule for all dates and times.

Follow UofTDaniels on Twitter and Instagram and join the conversation using the hashtag #DanielsReviews. Reviews take place 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. unless otherwise stated. Please note that the times and dates may change, and there may be scheduled breaks in a Zoom throughout the day.

Undergraduate 

Thursday, April 15 

Design Studio I | JAV101 
Time: 9 a.m. – 1 p.m.
Instructors: Jay Pooley (Coordinator), Alex Josephson, Danielle Whitley, Peter Sealy, Jennifer Kudlats, Katy Chey, Luke Duross, Chloe Town, T. Jeffrey Garcia, Mauricio Quiros Pacheco, Nuria Montblanch, Scott Sorli, Anne Ma, Marcin Kedzior, Avi Odenheimer 

Friday, April 16 

Design Studio II | ARC201 
Time: 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. 
Instructors: Fiona Lim Tung (Coordinator), Daniel Briker, Carol Moukheiber, Tei Carpenter, Maria Denegri, Alex Josephson, Mauricio Quiros Pacheco, Andrew MacMillan 

Drawing and Representation II | ARC200 
Time: 2-6 p.m. 
Instructors: Michael Piper (Coordinator), Jon Cummings, David Verbeek, Reza Nik, Fiona Lim Tung 

Monday, April 19 

Architecture Studio IV | ARC362 
Instructors: Dina Sarhane (Coordinator), Chris Cornecelli, Sam Ghantous 

Landscape Architecture Studio IV | ARC364 
Time: 9:30 a.m. – 1 p.m. 
Instructor: Alissa North 

Technology Studio IV | ARC381 
Time: 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. 
Instructors: Tom Bessai (Coordinator), Tomasz Reslinski  

Thursday, April 22 and Friday, April 23 

Senior Seminar in History and Theory (Thesis) | ARC457 
Instructor: Jeannie Kim 

Senior Seminar in Design (Thesis) | ARC462 
Instructor: Jeannie Kim 

Senior Seminar in Technology (Thesis) | ARC487 
Instructor: Nicholas Hoban 

Graduate 

Monday, April 19 

Design Studio 2 | ARC1012 | MARCH 
Instructors: Adrian Phiffer (Coordinator), Tei Carpenter, Petros Babasikas, An Te Liu, Brigitte Shim, Tom Ngo, Aziza Chaouni, Mauricio Quiros Pacheco 

Design Studio 2 | LAN1012 | MLA  
Instructors: Liat Margolis (Coordinator), Elise Shelley, Terence Radford 

Urban Design Studio Options | URD1012 | MUD 
Instructors: Ken Greenberg, Simon Rabyniuk 

Tuesday, April, 20 

Design Studio 4 | ARC2014 | MARCH 
Instructors: Sam Dufaux (Coordinator), Carol Moukheiber, James Macgillivray, Chris Cornecelli, Aleris Rodgers, Maria Denegri, Anne-Marie Armstrong, Francesco Martire 

Design Studio 4 | LAN2014 | MLA 
Instructors: Behnaz Assadi (Coordinator), Todd Douglas 

Wednesday April 21 

Architectural Design Studio: Research 2 | ARC3021 | MARCH 
Instructors: Adrian Phiffer, Vivian Lee, Mason White 

Architectural Design Studio: Research 2 | ARC3039 | MARCH 
Instructors: Jesse LeCavalier, Mauricio Quiros Pacheco 

Architectural Design Studio: Research 2 | ARC4018 | MARCH 

(L9101) Redeployable Architecture for Health—Pop-up Hospitals for Covid-19 
Instructor: Stephen Verderber 

(L9109) Towards Half: Climate Positive Design in the GTHA 
Instructor: Kelly Doran 
 

Design Studio Thesis | LAN3017 | MLA 
Instructors: Liat Margolis (Coordinator), Behnaz Assadi, Fadi Masoud, Peter North, Alissa North, Jane Wolff, Elise Shelley, Matthew Perotto, Megan Esopenko, Aisling O’Carroll 

Urban Design Studio Thesis | URD2015 | MUD 
Instructor: Angus Laurie 

Thursday, April 22 

Architectural Design Studio: Research 2 | ARC3021/ARC4018 | MARCH  

(L9103) STUFF  
Time: 1-6 p.m.
Instructor: Laura Miller 

(L9105) ARCHITECTURE ♥ MEDIA 
Instructors: Lara Lesmes, Fredrik Hellberg 

(L9106) Designing Buildings with Complex Programs on Constrained Urban Sites that include Heritage Structures 
Time: 1-6 p.m. 
Instructor: George Baird 

(L9107) What is Inclusive Architecture (Landscape Architecture, Urban Design)? 
Time: 9 a.m. – 12 p.m. 
Instructor: Elisa Silva 

(L9108) The Usual Suspects  
Time: 8:30 a.m. – 5 p.m. 
Instructors: Filipe Magalhaes, Ahmed Belkhodja, Ana Luisa Soares 

Design Studio Thesis | LAN3017 | MLA 
Instructors: Liat Margolis (Coordinator), Behnaz Assadi, Fadi Masoud, Peter North, Alissa North, Jane Wolff, Elise Shelley, Matthew Perotto, Megan Esopenko, Aisling O’Carroll 

Post-Professional Thesis 2 | ALA4022  
Time: 12-4 p.m. 
Instructors: Mason White (Coordinator), Adrian Phiffer, Maria Yablonina, Carol Moukheiber, Jesse LeCavalier, Paul Harrison 

Friday, April 23 

Architectural Design Studio: Research 2 | ARC3021/ARC4018 | MARCH  

(L9110) Anthropocene and Herd 
Instructor: Gilles Saucier, Christian Joakim, Gregory Neudorf 

(L9103) STUFF  
Time: 1-6 p.m.
Instructor: Laura Miller 

Architectural Design Studio 7: Thesis | ARC4018 | MARCH 
Time: 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. 
Advisors: Petros Babasikas, Michael Piper 

Architectural Design Studio 7: Thesis | ARC4018 | MARCH 
Time: 1-6 p.m. 
Advisors: John Shnier, Mauricio Quiros Pachecho, Carol Moukheiber, An Te Liu 

Design Studio Thesis | LAN3017 | MLA 
Instructors: Liat Margolis (Coordinator), Behnaz Assadi, Fadi Masoud, Peter North, Alissa North, Jane Wolff, Elise Shelley, Matthew Perotto, Megan Esopenko, Aisling O’Carroll 

Photo by Harry Choi.