The colonial fishing villages and maritime infrastructure along the shoreline of early modern Newfoundland are the foci of an article by Assistant Professor Jason Nguyen in the international quarterly Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes.

Nguyen’s essay, titled “Encountering the Shoreline: Ecology and Infrastructure on the Early Modern Newfoundland Coast,” is part of a special issue, “Port Cities and Landscapes of the Sea,” edited by Kathleen John-Adler and Stephen H. Whiteman.

The issue also includes articles by Christy Anderson from the University of Toronto, Edward Eigen of Harvard University and Jeremy Foster of Cornell University. 

An historian of architecture, landscape and urban planning in the early modern world, Nguyen (pictured below) contends in his essay that, during the 17th and 18th centuries, the establishment of settlements and construction of seagoing vessels, preservation stations and other logistical sites at and across the littoral line supported the commercialization of the global cod market while fundamentally altering the coastal ecologies of North Atlantic waters. 

The Grand Banks of Newfoundland—the underwater plateaus that provided shallow feeding conditions for underwater life—made the sea shelf one of the richest fishing regions in the world. 

On a global scale, the commercial extraction and preservation of cod supported the expanding diet and political economy of the early modern imperial state. 

On a local scale, the construction of buildings along the shoreline intruded on the littoral ecosystem and impelled the relocation of the native Beothuk inhabitants to the island’s interior, thereby highlighting the genocidal ramifications of European coastal development. 

How, Nguyen’s article asks, might one conceptualize the logistical architecture of the Newfoundland fisheries as both a spatial node within a global network of trade as well as a material intrusion into the ecology of the North Atlantic coastline?

To read the article, click here. Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes is an open-access journal.

Banner image: Matthäus Merian’s “Richard Whitbourne and the Mermaid of St. John’s Harbour,” in Theodor de Bry’s Dreyzehender Theil Americae, 1628. The etching and engraving is in the Huntington Library in San Marino, California.

The annual Thesis Booklet showcasing the final thesis projects of Master of Architecture (MARC), Master of Landscape Architecture (MLA), Master of Urban Design (MUD) and Master of Visual Studies (MVS) students at the University of Toronto’s John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design is now available for viewing.

Thesis booklets are a Daniels Faculty tradition, printed for and distributed to graduate thesis students, as well as thesis advisors, external reviewers and guests.

The booklet contains images and brief statements by students who are presenting thesis projects for the semester(s) listed at the culmination of their studies.

Flip through the latest booklet below or download a PDF here.

Black City Builders in Canada, Daniels Faculty sessional lecturer Kaari Kitawi’s new video series profiling some of the country’s leading Black design professionals, has launched.

The four-part series—for which Kitawi (pictured below) received a grant from the Landscape Architecture Canada Foundation (LACF) last year to produce—will be shown on her existing YouTube channel, called Careers Unboxed with Kaari.

That channel features interviews with Black professionals from around the world and a variety of fields about their respective career journeys. Black City Builders in Canada, by contrast, hones in on the experiences and perspectives of architecture and design professionals working in this country.

“It is important for us to tell our stories in order to change the narrative,” Kitawi said when she received the LACF grant, referring to the need for BIPOC students to see themselves reflected among those already making their mark in disciplines such as architecture, landscape architecture, urban design and planning.

Both her YouTube channel and the new series expand on the in-person outreach that she has also conducted, such as giving career talks to BIPOC high-schoolers in her Toronto neighbourhood and elsewhere.

The first, 50-minute instalment of Black City Builders in Canada, featuring Nigerian-Canadian landscape architect Emeka Nnadi, is currently available for viewing, as is a trailer offering sneak peeks of future subjects.

Among those who’ll be profiled in upcoming segments are architect and Daniels Faculty assistant professor Anne-Marie Armstrong, urban designer Eldon Theodore and landscape architect Kellie Spence.

To view the trailer for Black City Builders in Canada, click here. To watch the first episode of the series, click here.

9 a.m., Tuesday, April 11 to 6 p.m., Friday, April 28
Daniels Faculty Building,
1 Spadina Crescent, Toronto, Ontario

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

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

Tuesday, April 11 | Undergraduate

Design Studio I
JAV101H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Jay Pooley (Coordinator), Anamarija Korolj, Batoul Faour, Phat Le, Jeffrey Garcia, Katy Chey, Kara Verbeek, Kearon Roy Taylor, Samantha Eby, Jennifer Kudlats, Brian Boigon, Monifa Charles-Dedier, Mariano Martellacci, Jamie Lipson, Mohammed Soroor

Rooms: 215, 230, 240, 315, 330, Main Hall

Wednesday, April 12 | Undergraduate

Design Studio II
ARC201H1
9 a.m.–1 p.m. ET

Instructors: Fiona Lim Tung (Coordinator), Dan Briker, Quan Thai, Carol Moukheiber, Shane Williamson, Nova Tayona, David Verbeek, Anne Ma, Tomg Ngo, Gonzalo Munoz Vera, Francesco Martire

Rooms: 209, 215, 230, 240, 315, 340, Main Hall

Landscape Architecture Studio IV
ARC364Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Pete North

Room: 330

Thursday, April 13 | Undergraduate

Architecture Studio IV
ARC362Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Mauricio Quiros Pacheco (Coordinator), Chloe Town, Jon Cummings

Rooms: 215, 230, 240, 330

Technology Studio IV
ARC381Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Andrew Bako (Coordinator), Timothy Boll

Room: Main Hall

Friday, April 14 | Graduate & Undergraduate

Design Studio 2
LAN1012Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Elise Shelley (Coordinator), Terence Radford, Agata Mrozowski

Room: 330

Urban Design Studio Options
URD1012Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Simon Rabyniuk

Room: 230

Design + Engineering I
ARC112H1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Jay Pooley (Coordinator), Jennifer Davis, Clinton Langevin

Rooms: 200

Drawing and Representation I
ARC200H1
9 a.m.–1 p.m. ET

Instructors: Roberto Damiani (Coordinator), Jon Cummings, Francesco Valente-Gorjup, Otto Ojo, Scott Norsworthy

Rooms: 215, 240, 315, 340

Monday, April 17 | Graduate

Design Studio 2
ARC1012Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Adrian Phiffer (Coordinator), James Bird, Chloe Town, Anne-Marie Armstrong, Mauricio Quiros Pacheco, Behnaz Assadi, Julia DiCastri

Room: Main Hall

Tuesday, April 18 | Graduate

Design Studio 4
ARC2014Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Samuel Dufaux (Coordinator), Brigitte Shim, Steven Fong, Chris Cornecelli, James Macgillivray, Carol Moukheiber, Carol Phillips, Francesco Martire

Rooms: 230, 330, Main Hall

Wednesday, April 19 | Graduate

Design Studio 4
ARC2014Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Samuel Dufaux (Coordinator), Brigitte Shim, Steven Fong, Chris Cornecelli, James Macgillivray, Carol Moukheiber, Carol Phillips, Francesco Martire

Rooms: 230, 215, Main Hall

Design Studio 4
LAN2014Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Alissa North, Todd Douglas

Room: 330

Thursday, April 20 | Graduate & Undergraduate

Design Studio Thesis
LAN3017Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Fadi Masoud (Coordinator), Elise Shelley, Behnaz Assadi, Pete North, Alissa North, Jane Wolff, Francesco Martire, Matthew Perotto, Megan Esopenko

Rooms: 209, 230, 242, 330

Senior Seminar in Design (Thesis)
ARC462Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Laura Miller

Room: Main Hall A

Senior Seminar in Technology (Thesis)
ARC487Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Nicholas Hoban

Rooms: Main Hall B & C

Friday, April 21 | Graduate & Undergraduate

Design Studio Thesis
LAN3017Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Fadi Masoud (Coordinator), Elise Shelley, Behnaz Assadi, Pete North, Alissa North, Jane Wolff, Francesco Martire, Matthew Perotto, Megan Esopenko

Rooms: 209, 230, 242, 330

Urban Design Studio Thesis
URD2015Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Michael Piper, Otto Ojo

Rooms: 315, 340

Senior Seminar in Design (Thesis)
ARC462Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Laura Miller

Room: Main Hall A

Senior Seminar in Technology (Thesis)
ARC487Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Nicholas Hoban

Rooms: Main Hall B & C

Monday, April 24 | Graduate

Architectural Design Studio: Research 2
ARC3021Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Brian Boigon, Lukas Pauer, Laura Miller, Zachary Mollica, Petros Babasikas

Rooms: 215, 230, 240, 330, Main Hall

Tuesday, April 25 | Graduate

Architectural Design Studio: Research 2
ARC3021Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Jeannie Kim, Laura Miller, Petros Babasikas, Zachary Mollica, John Shnier

Rooms: 209, 215, 230, 240, 242, 330, Main Hall, 1st Floor Hallway

Wednesday, April 26 | Graduate

Architectural Design Studio: Research 2
ARC3021Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructors: Jeannie Kim, Shane Williamson, Marc McQuade, Marina Tabassum, John Shnier

Rooms: 209, 215, 230, 240, 242, 330, Main Hall, 1st Floor Hallway

Thursday, April 27 | Graduate & Undergraduate

Thesis 2
ALA4022Y
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Mason White (Coordinator)

Rooms: 215, 240

Senior Seminar in History and Theory (Thesis)
ARC457Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Simon Rabyniuk

Room: Main Hall

Friday, April 28 | Undergraduate

Senior Seminar in History and Theory (Thesis)
ARC457Y1
9 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

Instructor: Simon Rabyniuk

Room: Main Hall

The Daniels Faculty is in the process of creating a new Academic Plan (2024-2029) to articulate our vision and define our priorities for the coming years. An integral part of this process is the consultation phase, a period for our community to share ideas and priorities regarding the future of our school. To that end, the Faculty is canvassing faculty, students, staff and alumni for their input on this important project over the coming weeks. 

There will be a number of ways for all to participate.

*For students, a dedicated Townhall will be held from noon to 2:00 p.m. on Thursday, March 30 in the Main Hall of the Daniels Building. To register to attend, click here. 

*For faculty and staff, a Townhall Workshop will take place from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Friday, March 31 in the Main Hall of the Daniels Building (a calendar invite will be issued). Those who are unable to make this in-person event may attend an Online Workshop on Tuesday, April 4 (a calendar invite will be issued).

Furthermore, all members of the Daniels Faculty community will be able to participate through: 

*A Pop-up Studio, for drop-in conversations and feedback throughout the day. It will be operating daily, from Monday, March 27 to Thursday, April 6, in the Graduate Student Lounge (DA165) off the Student Commons at 1 Spadina Crescent.

*A Digital Survey, available from Wednesday, March 29 to Monday, April 10; fill it out by clicking here. 

The ideas and input of the Daniels Faculty community are vital as we map out the future of our school, and everyone is encouraged to contribute to this important vision plan. Thank you in advance for your feedback!

Aeolian Soundscape, a large-scale interactive “harp” conceived and erected by a team from the Daniels Faculty, is among the 16 installations currently animating Toronto’s lakeside Trillium Park as part of Ontario Place’s Lumière: The Art of Light.

The wavy timber-frame structure, which takes on cool neon tones at night, was designed by John Nguyen and Nicholas Hoban, who oversee the Acoustics Research Group, Robotics Lab and Digital Fabrication Facilities at the Faculty with Brady Peters.

Nguyen, Hoban, Peters and Rahul Sehijpaul served as the installation’s project leads.

“Our exhibit,” says the team, “leverages the windy landscape of Ontario Place to create an interactive musical harp that approaches the concept of an aeolian harp from a renewed perspective through the use of a reciprocal frame structure.”

The aeolian harp—which gets its name from the Greek god of the wind, Aeolus, as only the wind can play the instrument—produces a harmonious sound similar to that of chanting. It is believed that the aeolian harp dates back at least to the sixth century BC. The earliest written reference to aeolian harps appeared in Phonurgia nova, which was published by Athanasius Kircher in 1673. By the Romantic Era, they were commonplace in households.

To create Aeolian Soundscape, the Daniels Faculty team employed a lamella structure—a spatial system consisting of segments called lamellae. “By arranging members in a grid pattern,” the members note, “long freeform spans can be achieved from relatively short members, and complex forms from geometrically simple components. This approach is extremely economical as it contains many uniform elements, leading to a structure that is less wasteful and easily assembled.”

In addition, a number of lamellae members were painted with UV paint and adorned with fluorescent nylon strings, then outfitted with black LED lighting “to accentuate the nighttime experience.”

Visitors of all ages, the team members say, “can engage with our installation from a visual perspective,” taking in the “technical expertise in geometrical fabrication [on display],” as well as one in which the “auditory senses are activated through winds and breezes that highlight the local soundscape of Ontario Place.”

The fabrication and assembly team for Aeolian Soundscape included Nermine Hassanin, Cameron Manore, Renee Powell-Hines, Meera Thomas, Liam Cassano, Selina Al Madanat, Elham Khataei, Zhenxiao Yang, Zachary Mollica and Paul Kozak.

The project was supported by the Daniels Faculty and by the Mass Timber Institute at the University of Toronto.

Formerly the Winter Light Exhibition, Lumière: The Art of Light runs until May 7. Newly relocated to Trillium Park at Ontario Place, the free outdoor light exhibition is open seven days a week, from dusk to 11:00 p.m., with a bonfire on Fridays and Saturdays.

Watch a video about the installation’s fabrication and installation below:

Photos and video by Liam Cassano of 6IX Films

This winter has seen a bumper crop of awards go to Daniels Faculty instructors in Landscape Architecture and Forestry.

In February, Assistant Professor Fadi Masoud was named the recipient of the 2023 CELA Excellence in Design Studio Teaching Award—Junior Level. The highly competitive award is conferred annually by the Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture, the premier international organization for educators in the field. Assistant Professor Masoud, whose research and design work engages the landscape as an operational force in shaping urbanism, also directs the Faculty’s Centre for Landscape Research.

“Masoud’s professional achievements are extensive, and he brings a wealth of knowledge to the students he teaches,” one of the CELA jury members wrote. “His strengths include [the] incorporation of salient global social and environmental challenges to studios; transdisciplinary…program-based studio projects; diverse methods and tools used for problem-solving; and a high number of student awards and publications.”

On March 17, Masoud will be on hand at CELA’s 2023 Annual Conference in San Antonio, Texas to officially accept the award. A week later, he will also be in Pittsburgh to take part in a Carnegie Mellon University symposium entitled Architecture’s Ecological Restructuring, which invites six leading academics and practitioners to speculate on the ongoing reimagination of the discipline as it pertains to the natural world.

In other awards news, Associate Professor Liat Margolis, who directs the Faculty’s Green Roof Innovation Testing Laboratory (gritlab) and formerly oversaw the Master of Landscape Architecture program, has been awarded a Minister’s Award of Excellence by the Government of Ontario.

Launched in 2020 to recognize postsecondary leaders who worked to address and mitigate the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in the province, the Minister’s Awards now celebrate the positive impact of leading and emerging educators, researchers and changemakers in five categories.

Associate Professor Margolis was cited in the category of Equality of Opportunity, which recognizes “faculty and staff who have excelled at creating opportunities in postsecondary education for marginalized and underrepresented groups.”

In particular, she was singled out for her “tireless work” supporting “Indigenous and racialized youth” at the Faculty.

The awards, which attracted more than 500 nominations from across the province, were handed out by Jill Dunlop, Ontario’s Minister of Colleges and Universities, at a ceremony in Toronto on February 6.

Lastly, Md Abdul Halim, a postdoctoral fellow at Forestry since 2019, has been awarded the 2022 Eric and Wendy Schmidt AI in Science Postdoctoral Fellowship.

Co-led by the University of Toronto’s Data Sciences Institute, the fellowship is part of a larger initiative launched by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and his journalist-activist wife Wendy to accelerate scientific research through the application of artificial intelligence.

Halim, who acquired his Bachelor of Science and Master of Science degrees from the Department of Forestry and Environmental Science at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology in Bangladesh, earned his PhD in biometeorology at U of T three years ago.

Currently, his research examines the energy balance of green roofs and greenhouse gas fluxes from green roof substrates.

The Schmidt Fellowship, which kicks off this month, will provide Halim with research funding for up to two years, plus the opportunity to participate in funded travel and training activities.

The Daniels Faculty is honouring Black History and Black Futures Month with a series of initiatives and events aimed at uplifting the ongoing movement for racial justice and celebrating the achievements and contributions of Black individuals. This year’s theme in Canada is “Ours to Tell,” emphasizing the importance of sharing stories of success, sacrifice and triumph in the Black community to inspire a more equitable society. 

As noted in the University Commitment in the Scarborough Charter, the work of Black flourishing and thriving should “be informed, shaped and co-created by communities” to be effective. The Daniels Faculty is committed to this principle, starting with the Designing Black Spaces with Community Accountability event on February 1, featuring Tura Cousins Wilson of SOCA, Jessica Kirk of the Wildseed Centre for Art and Activism, and Jessica Hines of Black Urbanism Toronto. The event will focus on accountability in design and Black community engagement. 

Other events in the series include the student-led Black Flourishing through Design gathering — part of the Daniels Faculty mentorship program Building Black Success through Design — on February 15. This event will provide young and upcoming designers with feedback on their projects and opportunities for dialogue on themes such as community, Black spaces and Black excellence. The design work is rooted in the shaping of the built environment, and the reviewers will include the Faculty’s Otto Ojo, Joshua Kirk, Bomani Khemet and Camille Michelle. It is bring coordinated by Jewel Amoah and Clara James. Stay tuned for further details. 

Toward the end of the month, the Community for Belonging Reading Group: Black Futures will take place on February 28, bringing together faculty, staff and students from Daniels and across the University of Toronto to discuss works by authors Sekou Cooke and Tina M. Campt. 

The month-long celebration concludes with the Blackness in Architectural Pedagogy and Practice workshop on March 1, aimed at designers and educators. 

For more information on Black History and Black Futures Month events at the Daniels Faculty, visit the events page here. Updates will be provided regularly. 

Community for Belonging, a new reading initiative “intended to raise awareness of the broad spectrum of identities within the Daniels Faculty community and provide a platform for engagement, interaction and discussion,” officially launches this week.

Over the coming calendar year, at least four individual Community for Belonging Reading Groups will meet to discuss titles that represent non-traditional and underrepresented perspectives in written work about architecture, design and the built and natural worlds.  

The first two meetings will take place during the Winter semester (on February 28 and March 28), with two more planned for the Fall term. There may also be a fifth meeting in June, depending on community interest. 

During each of the meetings, which are open only to faculty, staff, students and alumni from the Daniels Faculty and U of T communities, two titles will be discussed. 

While each of the texts on the reading list will be by, about or for communities that have been historically underrepresented in architecture, design, visual studies and forestry, they are not intended to reflect definitive resources on including or expanding voice. Rather, the titles chosen are meant to serve as springboards for intentional conversations about inclusion and belonging.  

Those who have signed up for the meetings will be asked to come prepared to discuss at least one of the two texts proposed for that meeting. Participants will be given a hard copy of the designated book(s) in advance, with digital versions provided if the hard copies run out.  

The four meetings scheduled will be held in person in the Reading Room of the Eberhard Zeidler Library, which will be transformed into a conversation space for the events. 

The two titles selected for the February 28 meeting — the theme of which is Black Futures Month — are Sekou Cooke’s 2021 anti-elitism manifesto Hip-Hop Architecture and Tina M. Campt’s survey from the same year of Black contemporary artists, A Black Gaze: Artists Changing How We See.

The theme of the March 28 discussion, meanwhile, is International Women’s Month and Transgender Identities; the titles selected for that meeting are Lucas Crawford’s Transgender Architectonics: The Shape of Change in Modernist Space (2020) and Jan Cigliano Hartman’s The Women Who Changed Architecture (2022).

Each of these two meetings will take place between 7:00 and 8:30 p.m. Members of the Daniels Faculty community who have neither ordered nor read the selected books may also attend the discussions.

The Community for Belonging reading-group project, which is being supported by Manulife and TD Insurance, will culminate on International Human Rights Day in December, reflecting its goals of building community, raising awareness of human rights, and celebrating identity. The University of Toronto has long-standing affinity relationships with Manulife and TD Insurance. These partnerships allow the University to provide beneficial, value-added financial and insurance products to alumni and students. See all affinity products.

To sign up for the first group discussion on February 28, click here.

Please refer any questions to:

Jewel Amoah
Assistant Dean, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion
jewel.amoah@daniels.utoronto.ca

Cathryn Copper
Head Librarian
cathryn.copper@daniels.utoronto.ca.

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

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

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

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

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