Amin Taha (centre) of GROUPWORK with collaborators Pierre Bidaud of The Stonemasonry Company (left) and Steve Webb of Webb Yates Engineers (right).

Architect, educator, and GROUPWORK chairperson Amin Taha joins Daniels as the 2026/27 Frank Gehry International Visiting Chair in Architectural Design, bringing an internationally recognized practice and a commitment to socially and environmentally responsible design. 

Founded in 2000 through transformative donor support and named in honour of renowned Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry (1929-2025; Hon. LLD 1998), Daniels will mark 25 years of bringing leading architects to U of T next year.

Educated at the University of Edinburgh under professors Isi Metzstein and Fiona McLachlan, Taha began his career working with leading architectural practices Rick Mather Architects and ZHA (Zaha Hadid) before establishing his own studio a decade later. 

His professional work is informed by a longstanding interest in architecture's social and environmental responsibilities, themes that continue to shape both his practice and teaching. Through GROUPWORK's employee-owned structure, architects, landscape architects and engineers work as equal partners, advancing new approaches to conservation, ethical design and low-carbon construction. The studio has been shortlisted three times for the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) Stirling Prize, the UK's highest architectural honour, and has gained international recognition for projects that challenge conventional approaches to construction, conservation and sustainability. 

Alongside his professional practice, Taha has built a distinguished academic career. He currently teaches at the Royal College of Art in London and has held visiting appointments at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design (GSD) and University College London (UCL). In 2025/26, he served as the Norman R. Foster Visiting Professor of Architectural Design at the Yale School of Architecture. Taha also acts as a trustee of the Sir John Soane's Museum, chair of its annual Soane Medal and sits on sustainable development advisory boards of two property funds.

Across his teaching and research, Taha encourages students to challenge conventional architectural paradigms by fostering an understanding of traditional building techniques and their relevance to modern sustainable design. He is known for inspiring a generation of architects through his critically engaged teaching style, which emphasizes the importance of understanding architecture as a cultural and social act, which aligns with his professional ethos, advocating for architecture that is sustainable, authentic and deeply connected to its context. At Daniels, he will co-teach the Option Studio, Stone, Timber and the Carbon-Negative Building. 

photo below by David Lee / University of Toronto

A leading voice in advancing low-carbon building technologies

GROUPWORK has received support from government and industry-backed research initiatives to develop practical alternatives to carbon-intensive construction methods, with several forthcoming publications focused on stone, timber and other low-carbon structural systems. 

Reflecting these interests, Taha is part of the curatorial team for The New Stone Age: Towards an Ethical Architecture, alongside Steve Webb of Webb Yates Engineers and Pierre Bidaud of The Stonemasonry Company. The exhibition, held at Daniels from January to April 2026, showcased the strength and versatility of stone and its potential as a defining building material of the 21st century. A major exterior installation for this exhibit, The Long Reach: Carbon Balance (2026), is now on view until spring 2027. 

Join Taha and fellow curators Webb and Bidaud for a special lunchtime talk:

Wednesday, October 21
1:00 to 2:00 p.m. 
Daniels Building, 1 Spadina Crescent (south side)
Paul Oberman Belvedere

Register

Supplied photo on home page by Sven Arnstein