Canadian Architect September 2023

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CRAFT & COLLABORATION

CANADIAN ARCHITECT

SEPTEMBER 2023 03

SCOTT NORSWORTHY

4 VIEWPOINT

How a woman-led team built the Calgary Central Library on a foundation of collaborative relationships.

6 NEWS

Construction begins on SFU’s Marianne and Edward Gibson Art Museum; saving 24 Sussex Drive.

34 BACKPAGE

An annual fundraiser tours West Vancouver’s modern and contemporary homes.

10

10 ONTARIO COURT OF JUSTICE – ­ TORONTO

enzo Piano Building Workshop and NORR’s finely detailed court building balances R the weight of justice with a spirit of lightness. TEXT Joe Lobko

20 THE AGA KHAN GARDEN AND THE DIWAN

pavilion by AXIA, Arriz + Co, and Kasian completes Nelson Byrd Woltz’s masterful A design of the world’s northernmost Islamic-inspired garden. TEXT David Down

28 HISTORIANS’ LIBRARY AND RESIDENCE MICHAEL MANCHAKOWSKI

HENRY DOWLING & PAUL DOWLING

Dowling Architects designs and builds a thoughtfully crafted study for a pair of historians. TEXT Zaven Titizian

Ontario Court of Justice— Toronto, Ontario, by Renzo Piano Building Workshop and NORR Architects and Engineers. Photo by Scott Norsworthy.

COVER

V.68 N.06 THE NATIONAL REVIEW OF DESIGN AND PRACTICE / THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF THE RAIC / THE OFFICIAL

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MAGAZINE OF THE AIA CANADA SOCIETY

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VIEWPOINT Calgary’s dynamic Central Public Library resulted from a highly collaborative process between the architects, client, and contractor.

LEFT

MICHAEL GRIMM

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 09/23

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CULTIVATING CONNECTION Calgary’s Central Public Library, designed

by DIALOG with Snøhetta, is one of those special places that has been beloved by both architects and residents since the day of its opening in 2018.

Touring the building earlier this year at the RAIC Conference, I learned that the project also shares the distinction of being led by a largely female team. On the client side, this included Kate Thompson, President and CEO of the Calgary Municipal Land Corporation (CMLC) and Sarah Meilleur, CEO of the Calgary Public Library. On the design side, the project architect was DIALOG principal Janice Liebe, while Snøhetta’s lead architect was Vanessa Kassabian and its lead landscape architect was Michelle Delk. Carolyn Haddock of Colliers Project Leaders (formerly MHPM) was instrumental in the cultural makeup and direction of the project.

Unpacking what a feminist perspective brings to a project necessitates generalities, but in hearing from Thompson, Liebe, and Meilleur, who led the tour I attended, it was clear that an emphasis on relationship-building, rather than power hierarchies, contributed significantly—if also quietly—to the project’s success.

When the city first began discussing a new central library, DIALOG’s Calgary principals immediately recognized that they headed one of the few firms positioned to be the executive architect on such a project. After a careful consideration of who they would like to work with as a design architect, they reached out to Oslo-based Snøhetta to broach the idea of partnering. This was a full five years before the design competition was announced, says Liebe, who recalls fielding many calls following the competition launch from international firms expecting to find an eager partner in DIALOG, rather than a firm whose joint venture had already been long established.

The idea of nurturing strong relationships continued in a study tour that was part of the design phase. This included not only the architects and clients, but also leads from contractor Stuart Olson’s team. It was a daring

decision, says Thompson, as it meant having to justify touring a dozen people across Europe on public money—but it paid off in developing a common understanding of references shared by all key players. Some of the direct effects of this, for instance, were the shared conviction that the library would have wood ceilings throughout, and a feel for the slope and proportions of the ramps ascending through the building.

As the construction progressed, Meilleur’s focus turned to nurturing a sense of ownership for the library’s staff, who would become the building’s prime custodians and ambassadors. Weekly Friday construction site tours allowed every member of the central library’s staff to see the project taking shape. Their evident excitement, in turn, lent construction workers a sense of purpose. Says Meilleur, meeting with the librarians inspired one tradesperson to switch from telling people he was “working in construction” to saying he was “teaching kids to read.” The library’s future patrons were also invited to be part of the wind-up to opening: the furniture for the teen area, for instance, was tested and selected by adolescent volunteers.

“Everybody belongs at the Library, because the Library belongs to you,” declares the Calgary Public library’s website. That focus is evidenced in the final library: a beehive of multi-generational activity, from a play area and Lego zone my six-year-old would happily suffer a cross-country journey to visit, to jigsaw and board game areas, to a 330-seat performance hall. The building is crowned by a grand reading room, which patrons have intuitively designated as a quiet zone.

But perhaps one of the Calgary Public Library’s most unique offerings—and one that underscores the theme of connection—is its oneon-one-consultation program, which Thomp­son describes as “taking out a person,” or a chance to consult with an expert, instead of with a book.

And where to meet for that conversation? There’s a place for that at the Central Public Library.

EDITOR ELSA LAM, FRAIC ART DIRECTOR ROY GAIOT CONTRIBUTING EDITORS ANNMARIE ADAMS, FRAIC ODILE HÉNAULT DOUGLAS MACLEOD, NCARB, FRAIC ONLINE EDITOR LUCY MAZZUCCO REGIONAL CORRESPONDENTS WINNIPEG LISA LANDRUM, MAA, AIA, FRAIC VANCOUVER ADELE WEDER, HON. MRAIC SUSTAINABILITY ADVISOR ANNE LISSETT, ARCHITECT AIBC, LEED BD+C VICE PRESIDENT & SENIOR PUBLISHER STEVE WILSON 416-441-2085 x3 SWILSON@CANADIANARCHITECT.COM ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER FARIA AHMED 416-919-8338 FAHMED@CANADIANARCHITECT.COM CIRCULATION CIRCULATION@CANADIANARCHITECT.COM PRESIDENT OF IQ BUSINESS MEDIA INC. ALEX PAPANOU HEAD OFFICE 126 OLD SHEPPARD AVE, TORONTO, ON M2J 3L9 TELEPHONE 416-441-2085 WEBSITE www.canadianarchitect.com Canadian Architect is published 9 times per year by iQ Business Media Inc. The editors have made every reasonable effort to provide accurate and authoritative information, but they assume no liability for the accuracy or completeness of the text, or its fitness for any particular purpose.

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CANADIAN ARCHITECT 09/23

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NEWS

PROJECTS

Construction begins on Marianne and Edward Gibson Art Museum at Simon Fraser University

Construction has officially begun on the Marianne and Edward Gibson Art Museum, designed by Hariri Pontarini Architects and located at Simon Fraser University (SFU) in Burnaby, British Columbia.

The first purpose-built art gallery at SFU, the Marianne and Edward Gibson Art Museum draws inspiration from the university’s historic campus and strong dedication to creative experimentation.

Constructed in mass timber, the museum is a single-level structure that reaches out to its surrounding environment. A free-f lowing circulation provides points of connection between the program areas and the outdoors.

In addition to housing the university’s 5,800-piece art collection, the museum will expand SFU Galleries’ existing range of programs and create fresh opportunities for artist-led learning and interdisciplinary exploration.

The gallery is named for Dr. Edward Gibson, who became a charter faculty member at the university in 1965 and later served as the Director of SFU Gallery from 1986 to 1997. “Dr. Gibson’s former students remember him stressing that the work of challenging accepted paradigms demands bravery, creativity, and collaboration. His convictions have fuelled our commitment to create a new kind of visual arts facility—one that manifestly reimagines what an art museum can do, and for whom it exists,” said Kimberly Phillips, SFU Galleries Director. www.sfu.ca

Adrian Stimson, MBTW Group, and LeuWebb Project’s design for the national monument to commemorate Canada’s mission in Afghanistan will be constructed at LeBreton Flats in Ottawa.

ABOVE

Design unveiled for national monument to commemorate Canada’s mission in Afghanistan

The Government of Canada has unveiled the chosen design for the national monument to commemorate Canada’s mission in Afghanistan.

The Government of Canada has selected the design by visual artist Adrian Stimson, landscape architects MBTW Group and public art coordinators LeuWebb Projects.

In 2001, Canada pledged its support to the global battle against terrorism and deployed its military forces to Afghanistan. Canada’s comprehensive involvement in Afghanistan lasted over ten years and was the country’s most intricate and fatal military mission since the Korean War. Over 40,000 Canadian soldiers and numerous civilians and government officials served in the region.

The winning design draws inspiration from the healing aspects of the Medicine Wheel and takes the shape of a circular, sacred space representing safety—a place for reflection, remembrance, and contemplation. It comprises four gateways, with the inner area serving as a sanctuary where the fallen are honoured.

The walls of three quadrants are inscribed with the year, names of those deceased while in service, and maple leaves arranged in multiple rows.

The fourth quadrant wall, facing Afghanistan, is dedicated to the fallen Afghan Allies. In the centre, four bronze flak jackets are draped over crosses, serving as utilitarian yet poignant reminders of protection. www.canada.ca

ArchitectsAlliance and Cobe to design Regent Park Building 1A

Following a qualifications-based selection (QBS) process, TCHC has chosen architectsAlliance in collaboration with Danish firm Cobe Architects to design the next building in the ongoing Regent Park revitalization project.

The 26-storey mixed-use residential building, located on Block 2 of Regent Park’s Phase 4 lands, will offer approximately 274 TCHC units, generous community spaces, and a rooftop farm. Building 1A is the first site in the last phases of the Regent Park revitalization. The design will prioritize accessibility, and will adhere to Toronto Green Standards Version 4, Tier 2, aiming to achieve a near-net-zero carbon standard. www.torontohousing.ca

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LETTER TO THE EDITOR The most important house in Canada: On 24 Sussex Drive’s merits

Completed in 1868, the Main Residence at 24 Sussex Drive (originally named Gorffwysfa, or “Place of Rest” in Welsh) holds a Federal Heritage Buildings Review Office (FHBRO) “Classified” heritage designation. Situated on 2.15 hectares of grounds overlooking the Ottawa River, it comprises 34 rooms, covering approximately 1,010 square metres, and ancillary buildings.

Built by Joseph Merrill Currier, a lumber baron and member of the 1st Dominion Parliament—and designed by his brother James Monroe Currier of Springfield, Massachusetts—the limestone-clad main building at 24 Sussex Drive was originally a Gothic Revival villa. Described at the time as “chaste and elegant,” it mimicked the newly created Parliament Buildings.

To celebrate completion, Currier and his wife Hannah (Wright) Currier threw a party for 500 guests, which included Prime Minster Sir John A. Macdonald and his wife Lady Macdonald.

In 1870, a ballroom was added to entertain visiting Prince Arthur, future Duke of Connaught. A gala ball was held on February 16th on a “very extensive scale.” Gorffwysfa was becoming the social centre of the new capital city.

Merrill died in 1884. According to the National Capital Commission (NCC), “In 1902, the property was sold (by Currier’s son) to William Cameron Edwards, another lumber manufacturer. In 1943, the Government began the process of expropriating the house, a process that lasted into 1946 due to the vigorous objections of its then owner, Senator Gordon C. Edwards. In late 1949, the Government

decided to make the house over as the residence of the Prime Minister. To render the house suitable for the Prime Minister, the architects stripped away its Victorian ornament, demolished the tower on the west front and lowered some exterior walls to regularize the massing of the house. In addition, its fenestration was completely altered, and the apparent size was about doubled, all this in the process of rendering the original house quite unrecognizable. The result suggests that the architects were attempting to create a Georgianstyle house. The new house was finished and occupied, reluctantly,

by Louis St-Laurent in 1951.”

Since then, it has hosted leaders from around the world.

It has been suggested in the past (mostly by non-experts) that the Main Residence at 24 Sussex Drive should be demolished on the basis that it lacks architectural merit, and that previous exterior alterations have destroyed its importance as a national heritage landmark.

Ottawa-based built-heritage architect Mark Brandt of Trace Architectures thinks otherwise. He notes that “24 Sussex scores extremely high on Historic/Associative value, and Contextual/ Environmental value” and is “easily identified as a designated (or designate-able) property just under this aspect alone; a long list of historic associations of national significance.”

Brandt makes the point that the Design/Physical value is more nuanced, due to changes made over the life of the property: “The property’s physical evolution since pre-contact times, and in the almost 75 years it has been Canada’s Prime Minister’s residence, is part of its fascinating, nationally significant story and part of its heritage value.”

The alterations, in fact, add to its value.

Located on one of the National Capital’s busiest tourist routes, 24 Sussex Drive is a national heritage treasure, and was designated

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NEWS

“Classified” (the highest category) by the Federal Heritage Buildings Review Office (FHBRO) in 1986. FHBRO stated, “The Prime Minister’s Residence was designated a Classified Federal Heritage Building because of its direct association with six prime ministers of Canada, its status as a nationally known landmark, and because of the impact of the house and its grounds on the character of the area.”

Key character-defining elements include “… the evolutionary nature of the property (modifications have substantially altered the original Gothic Revival design, first to a châteauesque appearance with towers, oriel windows and porte-cochère, and in 1949 to a more restrained and formal design); the present façades, relatively unadorned and tied together by the horizontal roof lines and rows of rectangular, shuttered windows; its major elevations and outstanding location; its circular drive–the site’s most significant surviving landscape feature–which connects the property to Sussex Drive; its magnificent views, further enhanced by its setting on the ceremonial route between the Governor General’s residence and Parliament Hill; its role as an important symbolic and visual landmark.”

Under the Official Residences Act, it is a statutory obligation of government to fully fund maintenance at 4 per cent of replacement value ($40 M) annually, in accordance with the Government of Canada’s Guide to the Management of Real Property. That has never happened. According to NCC, 24 Sussex has not seen significant investment in over 60 years.

The Act specifically states, “Notwithstanding anything in the Parliament of Canada Act, the lands described in Schedule I and the buildings thereon shall be maintained as a residence for the Prime Minister of Canada.”

In the unlikely event that a consensus for demolition should ever occur, it would therefore require considerably more than heritage blindness and a wrecking ball… it would require legislative change.

• Wind • Snow • Exhaust

• Odour • Noise • Particulate • Ministry Approvals • CFD Analysis

ALASDAIR MCLELLAN

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 09/23

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The Prime Minister of Canada’s Official Residence at 24 Sussex Drive was originally built in 1868, and has undergone multiple modifications since that time.

ABOVE

In a 2015 statement, the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada

(RAIC) said, “In terms of sustainability, the history of the house, and its status as a federal heritage building, the RAIC recognizes that the

first choice would be to rehabilitate the building if feasible.”

Then RAIC vice-president Allan Teramura of Ottawa-based architects Watson MacEwen Teramura added: “Rehabilitation of a 19thcentury deteriorated building into a more comfortable, efficient, safe and welcoming building is well within the realm of possibility with thoughtful design led by architects.”

According to the NCC “Official Residences of Canada - 2021 Asset Portfolio Condition Report,” the Main Residence at 24 Sussex Drive carries a Facility Condition Index (FCI) of 0.91 (DFRP R ating = Critical) and is considered a very high priority building, with an API score of 97. Given its current condition and API, a major rehabilitation of the Main Residence is recommended.

The 2022 NCC report Revitalizing the Residence of the Prime Minister of Canada recommended “recapitalization and redesign of the existing building at 24 Sussex Drive.”

Vacant since 2015—when newly elected Prime Minister Justin Trudeau decided not to occupy the official residence in order to allow NCC access for repairs—Joseph Currier’s “place of rest” is currently a construction site, as asbestos and other hazardous materials are removed under a $4.8 M contract with PWGSC. On May 29th, then Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) Minister Helena Jaczek announced that a plan for the future of 24 Sussex would be delivered “by fall.” In the recent cabinet shuffle, Jean-Yves Duclos has replaced Jaczek as minister.

Hopefully, Duclos will honour his predecessor’s commitment to Canadians. It’s past due. 24 Sussex deserves a future… on its merits.

-Ken Grafton

519.787. 2910 spollock@theakston.com www.theakston.com

CA Sep 23.indd 8

WHAT’S NEW WAF launches digital Roy Sellors exhibition

The Winnipeg Architecture Foundation (WAF) has launched the online digital exhibit Roy Sellors, Modernism, and Building Religious Spaces in Postwar Manitoba, curated by Catherine Acebo.

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ROY SELLORS FONDS, WINNIPEG ARCHITECTURE FOUNDATION

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Located at 1629 Pembina Highway in Winnipeg, Roy Sellors’ 1958 St. Vital Roman Catholic Church embodies the architect’s interest in experimenting with traditional forms.

ABOVE

The focus lies on Roy Sellors’ church designs, delving into the dynamic connection between evolving liturgical practices and modernist architecture during the mid-twentieth century.

Roy Sellors, a distinguished architect and esteemed professor at the University of Manitoba’s Faculty of Architecture, played a pivotal role in shaping Winnipeg’s architectural panorama. Beyond creating an impressive portfolio encompassing residential homes and institutional structures, he also contributed significantly to the emergence of modernist ecclesiastical architecture that epitomized mid-twentieth-century liturgical concepts.

Sellors is known for his work on Our Lady of Victory Memorial Parish, St. Vital Roman Catholic Parish Church, Cornerstone Baptist Church (formerly Beulah Baptist Church and Oakview First Baptist Church), St. Joseph the Worker Church, St. Bernadette Parish Centre and Our Lady of Perpetual Help Roman Catholic Church.

All architectural drawings featured in the exhibit have been procured from WAF ’s Roy Sellors fonds. winnipegarchitecture.ca

MEMORANDA Canadian Architect Awards

The deadline for entering this year’s Canadian Architect Awards of Excellence for projects in progress is Monday, September 11, 2023. This year’s program also includes the 6th annual Canadian Architect Photo Awards of Excellence.

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OAA calls for presenters

The Ontario Association of Architects (OAA) is calling for presenters for its conference, titled “Housing: Pushing the Envelope,” to be held in Niagara Falls in May 2024. The deadline for submissions is October 10, 2023. www.oaa.on.ca

For the latest news, visit www.canadianarchitect.com/news and sign up for our weekly

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COURT IS OPEN THE DESIGN FOR A 63-COURTROOM COMPLEX IN DOWNTOWN TORONTO BALANCES THE WEIGHT OF JUSTICE WITH A SPIRIT OF LIGHTNESS.

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Ontario Court of Justice – Toronto, Toronto, Ontario Renzo Piano Building Workshop and NORR Architects and Engineers TEXT Joe Lobko PHOTOS Scott Norsworthy PROJECT

ARCHITECTS

Designing spaces for justice requires balancing potentially divergent objectives. Creating a space of dignity and authority must be considered equally with the values of openness, transparency and accessibility. A court’s architecture must have a certain gravitas that encourages respect and confidence in process and outcomes, while embodying a spirit of lightness aligned with the “open court principle” which underpins a just and democratic society.

The recently opened Ontario Court of Justice for Toronto sets a new high bar in achieving that balance. A subtle and finely crafted building, it seamlessly fits within the historic civic context of its site. At the same time, it’s a big and complex building, which brings together all Ontario Court of Justice criminal court operations for Canada’s largest city.

As a whole, it provides the range of welcoming, beautiful and practical spaces necessary to support the effective, secure operation of an open and transparent justice system.

Traditionally, courthouses in North America and Europe have been monumental structures, with neoclassical references used to embody the authority of the place and of the institution it represents. That approach is seen in the existing judicial precinct of Toronto, which comprises the mid-19th-century Osgoode Hall (John Ewart and W.W. Baldwin Architects) and the mid-20th-century Ontario Superior Court of Justice building campus (Ronald A. Dick Architect).

The site for the new court building is to the north of these buildings, bordering Viljo Revell’s Toronto City Hall and Nathan Phillips Square.

Given the overall scale of the ambition and public expense involved— the project budget was just under $1 billion—a public/private partnership, or P3 development process, was initiated by Infrastructure Ontario (IO) to deliver this much-needed new facility.

IO had collaborated with City of Toronto Urban Design staff to develop a demonstration plan, intended to inform competition proponents of

OPPOSITE The new court building’s façade system includes partially reflective glass panels backed with corrugated metal pans, allowing the building to maintain a uniform appearance as well as a 40:60 glazing ratio. ABOVE A 20-metre-high lobby is visually contiguous with an extensive outdoor plaza, and offers views towards Nathan Phillips Square and Toronto’s historic judicial precinct buildings.

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the limits of the built form envelope that would be acceptable, given the regulated view sheds to Toronto City Hall. Provincial staff, together with significant input from Ontario judges and justices of the peace, developed a detailed program of requirements, describing the need for the 72,000-square-metre building to provide 63 new courtrooms and 10 additional conference settlement rooms. The spaces would need to address the needs of Indigenous persons—who are egregiously overrepresented in the criminal justice system—and those impacted by addictions and mental illness. The design also necessitated distinct vertical circulation systems for three separate user groups: the general public, the accused and the judiciary.

Sensing an opportunity, NORR Architects Principal Silvio Baldassara together with EllisDon Senior VP David Klassen—both with extensive previous experience at delivering court facilities and P3 projects in Ontario—reached out to the Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW), based in Genoa and Paris, to suggest a collaboration.

The RPBW studio had recently completed the much-admired Paris Courthouse, their firm’s first experience with this building type, and were intrigued by the possibility of building upon that work to develop their first project in Canada. As with all P 3 submissions,

the collaboration involved substantial risk—but, in this case, the partnership would turn out to be very effective.

RPBW ’s reputation is founded on a sublime understanding of economy of means, a rich legacy of experience of how to build well, and a desire to exact every ounce of possible value from each element of the design on behalf of their clients. This was combined with NORR’s long history of experience in understanding and delivering upon the needs of space for justice in Canada. The team also included the Indigenous perspective of Two Row Architect, who brought an enhanced respect for the fundamental aspects of nature and personal experience to this very urban project. Rounding out the team was EllisDon, extensively experienced as creative builders known for successfully realizing design visions.

While large Canadian firms are by now well used to the onerous process of putting together a P3 submission, RPBW brought a fresh energy to the process. They approached the project as they would a European design competition, beginning from a perspective of first principles. They invested heavily in the process itself: their submission to the P3 competition included a 1:10-scale floorplan that covered the stage, on which were placed fully modelled 1:10 corner details.

A wood ceiling and furnishings soften the appearance and experience of the security screening area. OPPOSITE TOP A lightly suspended stair sits in front of historical photos and images representing the people that historically inhabited the court’s site. OPPOSITE BOTTOM The elevator core is clad in deep yellow quartz panels, creating a central point of orientation throughout the main public levels of the building.

ABOVE

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As part of the research prior to securing the commission, RPBW also developed full-scale test samples of a wall system of silver-grey corrugated metal pans behind partially reflective glass, which became a key component in the realized proposal. This bespoke, but economical, approach to exterior cladding provides the perception at first glance of a fully glazed structure, while in fact delivering a high-performance envelope with a ratio of 40% transparent glazing. “It’s a very, very big building, and one of the problems we had was that scale,” explains RPBW principal Amaury Greig. “We realized that if the building appeared opaque, it would be overwhelming. Because of the exterior skin, it appears a lot lighter than it actually is.” The resulting system provides an apparently endless range of light effects and dynamism to the façade, changing the character of the building over the course of a day and the seasons of the year.

The approach to exterior glazing exemplifies this team’s shared attitude towards building and design. As Two Row Architect Principal Brian Porter recalls, “Early on as a team, we spoke a lot about craftsmanship and a tactile architecture. We talked about beadwork—taking materials that are cheap and abundant, but that can gain value by the way in which they are arranged and put together.”

The team’s overall design didn’t strictly replicate the demonstration plan provided by IO. Instead, it is smaller at the base, eliminating a separate one-storey security screening volume that was part of the test fit by bringing it into the main volume. Conversely, it also includes a larger typical footprint of 4,000 square metres. This resulted in a lower overall building height, intended to provide a respectful backdrop to the historic adjacent Toronto City Hall, while also delivering a more economical project overall.

The plan is organized around two shifted rectangles, reducing the visual impact of the building’s overall scale to the south and east.

The interior corner of the resultant L-shaped form is defined by a vertical mast, aligned with the portico of Osgoode Hall and the northern terminus of York Street. Seen from the south, the slender mast quietly marks this building’s place within the historic urban fabric and civic precinct. The ground plane is organized to maximize the provision of new public space: a generous forecourt provides a transition from the northwest entrance to Nathan Phillips Square and is visually continuous with the court’s glass-enclosed lobby.

The lobby is, in itself, a remarkable feat for a justice building. Openness and transparency are worthy aspirations for our court facilities,

A typical courtroom is furnished with bespoke beechwood benches and light-coloured walls, intended to convey dignity and calm.

Precise planning is evident in the hallways, where one-metre-wide white quartz wall panels are set within beechwood frames.

The panels were designed as a modern, modular response to the client’s requirement for stone cladding throughout the building’s public spaces.

ABOVE The translucent back wall of courtrooms borrows daylight from the judges’ recess spaces lining the building’s perimeter.

OPPOSITE TOP

OPPOSITE BOTTOM

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but difficult to deliver upon, given the increased focus upon security with this building type. “Some of our experience gained in Paris was useful in order to develop the technical solution that allows us to have that much transparency, while maintaining all the security and safety objectives that a site of this importance should have,” says Greig.

The 20-metre-tall, 20-metre-wide public atrium is defined by a cable tension glass wall system that appears to effortlessly f loat in space, a testament to the impressive design and technical skill of this team.

Aluminum extrusions were designed to be as slim as possible, adding to the effect. The result is an airy, bright, and beautiful new city room that provides orientation and welcome to visitors. Within the lobby, elegantly suspended stairs offer access to the lower podium levels of the building, where the larger courtrooms are concentrated.

Creating spacious areas with a calm atmosphere was crucial for the design team. “We understood that this was a facility that shouldn’t be intimidating, that wasn’t a place that people were afraid to go—people are already anxious enough when they go to a courthouse,” says Greig.

“We needed to maintain a very clear and strong idea of dignity, both for the theatrics of the administration of justice, and also dignity for the people who have to go and face these very difficult life situations.”

Fostering this sense of dignity was, for Greig, “a driving force for every decision in this project.” This extended from increasing the size of the front plaza, to providing intuitive, straightforward orientation on courtroom floors. On each upper floor, an elevator core and L-shaped hallway are strategically positioned to provide visitors with views to the exterior to aid in orientation, while infusing these spaces with natural light. One-metre-wide white quartz wall panels are carefully detailed within steamed beech frames—an exercise of exceptional rigour in both design and construction—imparting a welcoming feeling throughout.

An enhanced level of accessibility was also achieved, through strategies including the provision of an innovative tactile floor treatment at every courtroom entry point. (Serendipitously, lights above the tactile floor sections give them a sparkling, shimmering presence.) The paletoned colour palette is effective in reinforcing a sense of neutrality for this place of adjudication—an important consideration for our increasingly diverse society. Inside the courtrooms, the same palette is present, with an increased presence of wood surfaces. This imparts a warmer sense of enclosure to these internally focused spaces.

One of the building’s most special features is out of sight to visitors.

The design brief asked for each judge’s office to be provided with a window.

OPPOSITE TOP A wood-lined round room is part of a ground floor area dedicated for use by Indigenous community members. OPPOSITE BOTTOM A courtroom designed for Indigenous justice processes brings participants together around a circular table. ABOVE LEFT Minimalist fittings enhance the lightness and transparency of the main lobby. ABOVE RIGHT The corrugated metal pans integral to the façade are revealed in a corner detail.

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In response, the architects suggested the incorporation of a two-level landscaped internal courtyard at the top of the building, not anticipated in the client’s program or budget. This relatively simple value-added landscaped space provides judges with what is essentially a secure place for reflection. It’s a form of cloister invaluable to those working here each day and charged with making difficult decisions about other people’s lives.

“In terms of architecture, there are a lot of things we can’t resolve, but there are things we can take a pretty good crack at improving—and one of those is the working conditions for the people who work in this building,” says Greig. “The idea is that we can improve the working conditions, and that this can have a knock-on effect to improving the administration of justice itself, and therefore the experience of people with the justice system.”

Toronto has received the gift of a dignified new civic building of great lightness and depth of character, carefully shaped to respectfully fit within this historic civic precinct and thoughtfully organized to support the increasingly complex and evolving demands of a contemporary justice system for many years to come. It’s a testament to what was clearly an extraordinary collective team effort, combining inspiring design/build leadership with the thoughtful support and decision-making of the provincial client group and city approval authorities.

Court is now open and accessible to all.

Architect Joe Lobko is based in Toronto.

ABOVE The building’s mast aligns with the front portico of Osgoode Hall, subtly integrating the new Ontario Court of Justice into the city’s judicial precinct.

CLIENT INFRASTRUCTURE ONTARIO AND MINISTRY OF ATTORNEY GENERAL | ARCHITECT TEAM RPBW—DESIGN TEAM, 2016-17—A. BELVEDERE (PARTNER-IN-CHARGE), A. GREIG, A. KARCHER, A. LANDEIRO, B. PLATTNER (PARTNER), N. AUREAU, D. FRANCESCHIN, S. GEORGE, J. IRACE, A. NIZZA AND L.ANTONIO, G. DE JUAN, A. BAGATELLA, D. TSAGKAROPOULOS (CGI), O. AUBERT, C. COLSON, Y. KYRKOS (MODELS). DESIGN DEVELOPMENT, 2017-23—DESIGN TEAM: A. BELVEDERE, A. CHAAYA, A. GREIG (PARTNERS AND ASSOCIATE IN CHARGE), F. HEBEL, A. LANDEIRO, W. SCHESKE WITH T. OHIRA, M. PIMMEL, D. RAT, I. SOTO, J. VELLA AND T. BORGES, A. BAGATELLA, D. TSAGKAROPOULOS (CGI), O. AUBERT, C. COLSON, Y. KYRKOS (MODELS). NORR—DESIGN TEAM, 2016-17—S. BALDASSARA FRAIC (EXECUTIVE IN CHARGE), D. CLUSIAU FRAIC (DESIGN PRINICIPAL), D. GUTIERREZ, J. KUMMER, A. LABRIOLA, J. MORO MRAIC, M. SAMSAN, J. SUMAGUE, R. YOUNG. DESIGN DEVELOPMENT, 2017-23—S. BALDASSARA FRAIC (EXECUTIVE IN CHARGE), D. CLUSIAU FRAIC (DESIGN PRINICIPAL), D. SQUIRES (PROJECT MANAGER), T. DAY, D. DE BENEDETTI, J. KUMMER, L. BOULATOVA, A. GHOSH, H. HASHEMIKASHANI, D. HILEMAN, B. KUSHNIR MRAIC, A. LABRIOLA, C. STUMPF, S. UBALDINO, M. ABOU CHACRA, F. ABUFARHA, A. BOLOURIAN KASHY, D. CAREY, J. FRACKOWIAK, M. GUALTIERI, G. HAIST, K. MACDONALD, N. MCGOEY, B. MEE, G. MOMENZADEH, D. POIDA, G. WEBSTER, A. WU. | STRUCTURAL STEPHENSON ENGINEERING LTD. | MECHANICAL THE HIDI GROUP | ELECTRICAL MBII | LANDSCAPE VERTECHS DESIGN INC. | INTERIORS RPBW AND NORR | CONTRACTOR ELLISDON DESIGN BUILD INC. | FAÇADE KNIPPERS HELBIG | ELEVATORS HH | CIVIL/SITE WALTERFEDY | ENERGY/SUSTAINABILITY MORRISON HERSHFIELD MICROCLIMATE THEAKSTON ENVIRONMENTAL | ACOUSTICS VALCOUSTICS | TRAFFIC TRANPLAN ASSOCIATES | BLAST AND THREAT RISK THORNTON TOMASETTI | GEOTECH AMEC FOSTER WHEELER | HERITAGE +VG ARCHITECTS | INDIGENOUS CONSULTANT TWO ROW ARCHITECT CODE MUNIAK ENTERPRISES | SIGNAGE/WAYFINDING FRONTIER | A/V SIGHT N SOUND DESIGN INC. | ENVELOPE BVDA GROUP LTD. | PDC KMA AND MSA | AREA 72,000 M2 | BUDGET $956.4 M (CONSTRUCTION VALUE: $505 M) | COMPLETION JANUARY 2023 ENERGY USE INTENSITY (PROJECTED) 99.17 KWH/M2/YEAR

CORPORATE WORKPLACE? NO, IT’S YOUR LOCKER ROOM. ASI just gave the locker room a makeover—you can too. To explore the standard for basis of design in locker rooms, visit asi-storage.com/workplace

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RECALLING PARADISE A JEWEL-LIKE PAVILION COMPLETES THE WORLD’S NORTHERNMOST ISLAMIC-INSPIRED GARDEN.

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JEFF WALLACE

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The Aga Khan Garden and The Diwan, University of Alberta Botanic Garden, Devon, Alberta LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTS (AGA KHAN GARDEN) Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects ARCHITECTS (DIWAN) AXIA Design Associates (Design Architects), Arriz + Co. (Architectural & Interior Design), and Kasian Architecture, Interior Design, and Planning (Executive Architects) TEXT David Down PROJECT

Carved out of a boggy Alberta forest outside the rural town of Devon, south of Edmonton, the Aga Khan Garden with its new pavilion, known as The Diwan, is a design revelation of exceptional grace, tranquility, spirituality and precision of execution. Masterfully balancing cultural and historical references with local topography, climate, vegetation and materials, both the garden and the building sit perfectly composed in their unexpected context. Together, they comprise the world’s northernmost Islamic-inspired garden, rooted in an ancient and distant culture, yet completely connected to their Canadian home.

Located within The University of Alberta Botanic Garden, the 4.8-hectare Aga Khan Garden was gifted to the University of Alberta in 2018 by His Highness the Aga Khan. The gift nods to Canada’s historic welcoming of Ismaili Muslims in 1972, and is part of the work of the Aga Khan Trust for Culture, which has created and restored

important gardens around the world, including Aga Khan Park in Toronto. The Aga Khan himself speaks of gardens as a central element in Muslim culture—places where human creativity and divine majesty are fused, and our responsibility to nature and stewardship of the natural world are put into action.

Thomas Woltz, whose Charlottesville, Virginia firm Nelson Byrd Woltz (NBW) is among North America’s foremost landscape practices, recalls the design of the Aga Khan Garden as one of the most intellectually and emotionally rewarding journeys of his professional career.

The commission began with an invitation from the Aga Khan Trust for Culture to submit a narrative describing NBW ’s proposed design approach. Deeply involved in all his projects, His Highness the Aga Khan insists that design must grow from dialogue, and the process built around a relationship. Nine months later, NBW was summoned to Toronto, where His Highness himself posed the life-altering question: “How can 1,800 years of Islamic culture and landscape tradition be made relevant to the 21st century?”

The NBW team was then given a full year to research the project, including travelling to the great Islamic gardens of Cairo, Jaipur, Delhi, and many more. In a moment of revelation outside Jaipur, Woltz envisaged the whole continuum of garden design stretching back to traditional methods of controlling and using water, right up to current issues of flood control, food insecurity and climate extremes. The task was not just

Water—a symbol of life and divine generosity—is used throughout the Islamic-inspired Aga Khan Garden in Devon, Alberta, taking the form of active fountains and calm pools. ABOVE The foursquare chahar bagh, the main space of the garden, is a deeply spiritual form rooted in ancient agricultural traditions.

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to create a pleasure garden, he realized, but to reflect a history of the stewardship of productive landscapes. This approach could connect ancient practices, teachings and poetry with 21st-century life and issues in a way that both those of the Ismaili faith and all Canadians could understand.

Looking for the first time at our Alberta landscapes, Woltz saw the petroleum industry moving vast landscapes, which subsequently required rejuvenation. The Aga Khan garden could be part of that regeneration, by cultivating and supplying seed for the now-rare Indigenous plantings required in landscape restoration. This brought a productive element to the garden—and, in the distribution of the seeds, a poetic metaphor for the radiating influence of the Ismaili Muslim faith.

For visitors, the journey through the garden begins at a low, perfectly polished and incised limestone entrance wall—a first clue to the quality of materials and fineness of detail to be found throughout. Beyond, a steel grate pathway floats above the forest understory, just as the paths through traditional Islamic gardens are raised above adjacent plantings.

The pathway provides a quiet, calming forest walk that encourages a receptive state of mind while also building anticipation. The visitor is rewarded with the woodland bagh, persian for garden: an elliptical polished granite pool of perfectly still water that silently mirrors the sky, while recalling the shapes of canoes and Inuit carvings. By this time, we know we are in a landscape unlike any other.

The path then leads upward to the majestic talar, or entry porch, with its imposing Portuguese limestone columns slung with bright

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orange sails, recalling both nomadic tents and the permanence of ancient desert palaces. At the centre of the talar, a low cubic polished granite fountain, carved with Islamic geometries, is the symbolic source of the garden’s waterworks. From this dramatic point, the entirety of the plan is laid out before us: from the symmetrical chahar bagh, or foursquare garden, to the calla pond and bustan, or orchard, beyond.

The main space of the garden is the chahar bagh, a deeply spiritual form rooted in ancient agricultural traditions. Its quadripartite pattern of raised granite pathways represents the order of the universe, and frames beds filled with a clever combination of Indigenous plantings and annually changing plants that recall warmer climes, such as artichokes. NBW worked with the University of Alberta’s skilled team of horticulturalists to build a successful palette of locally hardy plants which subtly reference the ancient world, while tantalizing all of the senses with colour, texture and scent.

The garden design is woven throughout with contemporary details that link us to ancient traditions. The designers carefully studied geometries based on the numbers four and eight, representative of paradise, and created new interpretations. These patterns are rendered with exceptional precision in high-performance concrete balustrades and granite paving, and engraved into granite walls and steel screens. Every motif feels authentic to the Islamic garden tradition—but is in fact original to NBW. As a final touch, His Highness insisted that the Garden must include touches of whimsy. To achieve this, the team commissioned to-scale

The design of all garden elements, including the fountains and paving, are based on careful studies of traditional Islamic symbols and patterns. ABOVE LEFT Punctuating a forest walk at the entry to the garden, the woodland bagh centres on an elliptical polished granite pool of still water that mirrors the sky above.

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bronzes of local fauna—frogs, lizards, and various types of fish—which particularly delight younger visitors.

The recently opened Diwan sits at the terminus of the east-west axis of the chahar bagh. Designed by Toronto architect Taymoore Balbaa of Axia Design Associates together with Arriz + Co. and Kasian Architecture, the pavilion was always envisioned as part of the completed garden. The placement of the pavilion is critical to the garden’s axial plan, and it provides a space for year-round programming to engage the broader community.

The pavilion’s design team was chosen through an international RFP process managed by the University of Alberta. Balbaa, who led the design, grew up in Egypt and the Middle East, and studied the Islamic architectural traditions of Sub-Saharan Arfrica as part of his Prix de Rome research. As a result, he brought to the project a deep understanding of Islamic architecture and the integration of its decorative arts and building craft traditions.

Balbaa found inspiration in the pavilion’s site—between the symmetrical garden and the forest beyond. In his view, this provided an opportunity to blur the boundary between the formal and the wild, between ancient notions of paradise and the untouched Alberta forest.

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The completed building bridges the two realms by bringing them into and through the building, creating a sense of being between—and within—both conditions at once.

In both plan and section, the building responds seemingly effortlessly to the geometric power of the garden and the implied need for symmetry, while satisfying the demands of an asymmetrical program. Balbaa says that the intent was to achieve a “balanced asymmetry.” The strong horizontality of a generously cantilevered entry façade firmly roots the building, strongly terminating the axial vista, while deferring to the garden. The pavilion sits naturally and lightly at the edge of the forest, while matching the solidity and permanence of the garden.

The cladding responds to the motifs and materiality of the garden.

Above a limestone base, mashrabiya-patterned metal panels are set into a rainscreen of crisp extruded porcelain panels. Both budget and weight precluded the use of the garden’s Algonquin limestone throughout, but the resulting effect is still seamlessly complementary.

The building’s simple program—an event space for up to 220 guests, with associated service functions—is appropriately and masterfully elevated through the strategic use of good materials and elegant details.

In the lobby, a custom ceramic tile “carpet” and integrated donor wall

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MICHAEL MANCHAKOWSKI

MICHAEL MANCHAKOWSKI

The Diwan’s design vocabulary and material palette is closely tied in with the Aga Khan Garden, creating a seamless integration between the pavilion and its surrounding environment.

ABOVE RIGHT The Diwan’s entry canopy is marked by ornate metal screens, an interpretation of traditional mashrabiya, which filter sunlight and cast patterned shadows.

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Large windows in the central event space underscore axial relationships and indoor-outdoor connections with the surrounding garden. Engraved geometric patterns, rendered in sunflower yellow, adorn a ceiling feature. RIGHT In the Diwan’s entry foyer, a mosaic tile floor is inspired by geometric patterns used in the garden, providing a sense of continuity from outside to inside.

reflect traditional geometries. In the main space, which feels more outdoors than indoors, one set of windows pulls striking axial garden views into the room, while other openings frame the quiet backdrop of the forest. Overhead, a hovering black frame centres and defines the room, while hinting at traditional ceiling forms.

Bespoke touches include custom-patterned wall coverings whose motif, like that of the mashrabiya screens, recalls Alberta’s provincial flower, the wild rose. On the upper level, a roof terrace is lit at night like a golden lantern, providing additional event space with a sweeping view of the garden. The result is a building, inside and out, which feels simultaneously connected to the richness and formality of ancient design traditions, and to the contemporary preference for the simple zen of clean finishes against unspoiled nature.

It is rare in landscape architecture and architecture to find a successful fusion of the formal and informal, the natural and the ordered. Equally rare are contemporary interpretations of traditional forms which do not cross the line into kitsch. The Aga Khan Garden and the Diwan achieve the balance beautifully, with designs that are rooted in ancient heritage while feeling completely comfortable in the contemporary Canadian landscape. The result is a wonderful gift indeed—a place that embodies the Aga Khan’s goals of dissolving barriers, encouraging broader understanding, and bringing cultures together.

Architect David Down is the City of Calgary’s Chief Urban Designer.

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MICHAEL MANCHAKOWSKI

ABOVE

THE AGA KHAN GARDEN | CLIENT AGA KHAN TRUST FOR CULTURE | LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT TEAM THOMAS WOLTZ, BRECK GASTINGER, NATHAN FOLEY, SANDRA NAM CIOFFI, JEN TROMPETTER, ALISHA SAVAGE, SIOBHAN BROOKS, FRASER STUART, KARI ROYNESDAL | ARCHITECT DIALOG DESIGN | CIVIL ISL ENGINEERING AND LAND SERVICES | FOUNTAIN CMS COLLABORATIVE INC. | IRRIGATION ION IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT INC. | DESIGN ENGINEER FTL DESIGN ENGINEERING STUDIO | ENVIRONMENTAL SPENCER | AREA 10 ACRES | BUDGET $763 K | COMPLETION 2018 THE DIWAN | CLIENT UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA | ARCHITECT TEAM AXIA—TAYMOORE BALBAA, CHRIS WONG, MICHAEL GOOD, LEISDANIA REYNOSO, JUSTINE HOUSELEY. ARRIZ + CO.—ARRIZ HASSAM; JASON LUE CHOY. KASIAN—AZIZ BOOTWALA; EMME KANJI; CHAD KERN. | MECHANICAL/ ELECTRICAL WILLIAMS ENGINEERING, EDMONTON (CHAD MUSSELWHITE, ALEXEY KALININ) | STRUCTURAL RJC, TORONTO (JOHN KOOYMANS, MATT DEEGAN) | CONTRACTOR CLARK BUILDERS | BUILDING AREA 695 M2 | SITE AREA 725 M2 | PROJECT BUDGET $5.5 M | COMPLETION SEPT 2022

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BOOKS AS BUILDING STONES A SIMPLE BUILDING, A COMPLEX CLIENT, AND A DEEPLY MEANINGFUL LIBRARY

Historians’ Library and Residence, Cambridge, Ontario Dowling Architects TEXT Zaven Titizian PHOTOS Henry Dowling & Paul Dowling PROJECT

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“During the construction of the library, I often felt like a medieval bishop,” joked Robert Jan van Pelt—an architectural historian and tenured professor at the University of Waterloo’s School of Architecture. “I had sold the last of my religious treasures, all for the cathedral envisioned by my master builder, Paul, in whom I had absolute faith.”

Architect Paul Dowling laughed when I told him that. He had spent the last five years designing and building a private library and residence extension for Robert Jan and fellow historian Miriam Greenbaum. Paul was more humble when describing the project, which for him is “a simple building to house a complex client—and a deeply meaningful library.”

A Simple Building and a Complex Client The design of the detached, backyard library began, like most projects do, with a simple list of requirements. It should safely enclose the his-

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The rectangular volume of the library sits in the compact backyard behind architectural historian Robert Jan Van Pelt and historian Miriam Greenbaum’s home, a 160-year-old bungalow in Cambridge, Ontario. ABOVE The library includes floor-to-ceiling bookshelves along the south wall, along with a built-in desk adjacent to the north-facing horizontal slot window.

OPPOSITE

torians’ collection—a sober fonds focused on Holocaust history, concentration camps, and military barracks. It should have a space for Miriam and Robert Jan to work, with accessible storage for ongoing research and oversized folios. Finally, it should include a small washroom, and a sofa for the occasional overnight guest.

In addition to these programmatic requirements, there were other, less tangible requests that arose from conversations between Paul and the historians. Sometimes this came in the form of a literary excerpt— for instance, a description of the snug, seafaring cabin of Dr. Clawbonny from Jules Verne’s The Adventures of Captain Hatteras—or a personal memory, like of the German bunkers Robert Jan played in as a child.

These musings inspired, rather than prescribed, what would become characteristic elements of the library such as its deep wall section, horizontal slot window, and shell-like enclosure.

Paul worked extensively with physical models to conceptualize the contemporary design within the compact yard of the historians’ existing single-storey home—a white stucco residence which has stood in the historic community of Galt in Cambridge, Ontario, since the 1860s.

The bungalow was originally built as a domicile for the farmhand who

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tended the properties of a large hilltop residence nearby. Paul sought to honour the patinaed quality of the existing site by choosing materials and finishes intended to age over time and weather alongside the home.

Paul saw working in model form as an important first step in the project’s realization, with a clear progression of tactile design development that continued through fabrication drawings and mockups towards a building which is comprehensive in its approach to details, materials, and site context.

While some designers might pass off work to a contractor once the initial design is complete, for Paul, this is when “most of the invention begins—and it’s too interesting not to be involved in that part of the work.” For the past 30 years, Paul and his partner, Catherine Dowling, have used their home and studio as a testing ground for architectural experiments. By combining their self-build experience with knowledge of construction management from past projects, they created a company called BUILD to act as the design–builder for the library. Paul said that the project size and client–architect relationship was perfectly aligned for them to take on this role. It allowed them to do the majority of concrete, framing, roofing, and millwork construction themselves, and facilitated

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in situ design decisions while working alongside skilled tradespeople for the excavation, electrical, plumbing, HVAC, and steel fabrication.

The library itself is a simple rectangular volume located along the long edge of the deep, narrow yard. A corrugated metal roof folds around a white-oak-batten-clad frame and cantilevers out over the fenestrated ends. Site-cast concrete foundations are revealed across the hillside site and extend into patios below the exterior overhangs. The primary entry is partially sunk below grade to mediate the sloping site.

Central to the project is a large slot window running more than half the length of the building, looking out over a wild, rocky garden and stealing views and speckled shade from the neighbouring trees.

Partway through the construction, Robert Jan and Miriam decided that they would leave their home in Toronto and settle permanently in their Galt residence. They expanded Paul’s scope to include an extension to their home, adding a washroom with a shower, stair access to the basement utilities, and relocating the front entrance to a red cedar volume at the side of the house. The library was temporarily put on hold, but the newly enclosed space became Paul’s workshop during the pandemic.

From this library-turned-workshop, Paul could mock up one-to-one details in situ as the finishing touches were being made to the library. Paul sketched plans for the residence extension on the stud framing of the library for his clients. He remembers holding up full-scale mockups of the

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library’s custom wood mullions, giving Robert Jan and Miriam a sense of how materials would react to the lighting on site. “I think it is the experimentation involved in the making that appeals to us so strongly,” Paul explained. “Being influenced by both materials and workmanship, to discover how we can achieve architectural ideas of form and experience. It’s difficult to achieve that working only on paper or the computer screen.”

Entering into the finished library is like stepping into a Willem van Haecht painting: it feels both intimate and infinite. Books pulled flush with the built-in millwork shelves look like masonry blocks stacked from f loor to ceiling, holding up a slatted wood soffit. The warm, unfinished Douglas fir bookshelves flank either side of a single, uninterrupted axis that runs from one end of the library to the other. The space is furnished by a patchwork of rugs and Dutch armchairs laid out over the polished concrete floor. Carved into the poché of bookshelves is an interior niche divided by a structural board-form concrete wall which separates a daybed from a massive black walnut desktop, set perfectly flush with the central slot window.

Exemplifying the kind of thoughtful diligence that went into each detail of the construction is the bespoke shutter system for the slot window. Paul recalls that “the glazing was much too large for any kind of traditional folding shutter, but sliding, overhead panels could be recessed into [the] thick wall section.” Since the shutter needed

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to be as light as possible, it was built like a hollow core door, using lightweight interior framing, 1/4” Douglas fir plywood skins, and a bottom edge reinforced with aluminum plate to provide lateral stiffness.

The shutter design is based on traditional counterweighted sash windows, though the main challenge came from its long horizontal proportions. Threaded rods extend down into the panel framing and connect to stainless steel aircraft cables, which run over ball bearing pulleys to a bundle of steel reinforcing rods. Racking is prevented by spring-loaded wheels that run in tracks along each vertical edge. “[The shutter] was particularly satisfying to see in place, as the design evolved over a long period of time, and I kept coming back to it over the course of the project,” says Paul.

The building’s enclosure is also particularly clever. Based on Passivhaus standards, Paul included insulation in the framing layer and a robust smart vapour control membrane, which protects against condensation, allows drying of the assembly, and provides a very airtight enclosure.

Similarly, the heated concrete slab rests on a thick layer of EPS foam insulation to allow a continuous thermal break at walls, roof and floor.

The bookcases comprising the long south wall are hung from the service framing, which in turn rests on the floating slab. “Minimal thermal bridges occur where wood beams supporting the upper bookcases connect to primary structure at the east and west walls,” Paul explains,

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Corrugated metal roofing folds over the sides of the building, adding a contrasting texture to the cast-in-place concrete foundation wall.

The library’s lowered entrance is glimpsed from the side yard of the property.

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“and insulated foundations for the concrete and wood interior shear walls project through the concrete slab.” Temperature, fresh air, and humidity are controlled to residential standards with a heated f loor, energy recovery ventilator, and cooling unit.

There is a simplicity to the building that only comes from a patient, uncompromising attention to each detail—all in service of a greater whole—without ever losing sight of the complexities that make the project so meaningful.

A Deeply Meaningful Library Paul and Robert Jan both teach at the University of Waterloo’s School of Architecture, which is only a ten minute walk from the library. From its inception, the library and residence were intended to extend themselves, at times, to the school, its students, and visiting scholars. Prior to the library’s design, Paul had helped set up a design-build program for the university. For the library’s construction, Paul hired several undergraduate students who were involved in the design–build program, and mentored them through various phases in the project.

The consensus that emerged when I spoke to some of these students was that they learned more from their time under Paul—helping pour foundations and set concrete, framing and enclosing the library, and crafting millwork details—than they had at any other point in their academic career. The experience had a profound impact on the

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students, many of whom have gone on to become successful advocates for the importance of designing through craft.

Robert Jan and Miriam hope that the library can continue to be a teaching moment for young prospective architects at the university. It is one of only a few examples of exemplary contemporary design in Galt, and a demonstrably successful precedent for a process that we rarely see in Canada: the architect working as a craftsperson. Paul’s slow and exacting process is an important counterpoint to the aggressive, rapid development that otherwise surrounds the library. After the time I have spent with Paul and this project, I can’t help but return to what Robert Jan said when we first met. Maybe there is some truth in that joke. Maybe the role of master builder hasn’t been completely lost to history.

Zaven Titizian is an architectural designer, writer, and researcher based in Tiohti:áke (Montréal), Canada. His M.Arch thesis at the University of Waterloo was supervised

by Robert Jan van Pelt.

CLIENT ROBERT JAN VAN PELT AND MIRIAM GREENBAUM | ARCHITECT TEAM PAUL DOWLING, CATH-

ERINE DOWLING, HENRY DOWLING | STRUCTURAL BLACKWELL | CONTRACTOR BUILD (PAUL DOWLING) | STUDENTS MARK CLUBINE, JOSHUA GIOVINAZZO, MAGNUS GLENNIE, JOSHUA MACDONALD, SARAH MASON, ETHAN PADDOCK, SALMAN RAUF, YANNIK SIGOUIN, CONRAD SPECKERT, JONATHAN SUBENDRAN, LEVI VAN WEERDEN, COLIN WILLIAMS | AREA 43 M2 (LIBRARY); 27 M2 (NEW ADDITION TO RESIDENCE) | BUDGET WITHHELD | COMPLETION DECEMBER 2021

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BACKPAGE

HADANI DITMARS

CANADIAN ARCHITECT 09/23

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WEST COAST MODERN HOME TOUR TEXT

Hadani Ditmars

A FUNDRAISER SURVEYS MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY HOMES IN WEST VANCOUVER. For architecture aficionados, a highlight of each summer is the West Vancouver Art Museum’s annual West Coast Modern Home Tour. For this frequent attendee, the 2023 tour was haunted by the ghost of Arthur Müdry’s late great Beaton house—a 1965 paean to Pacific forest that met an untimely end when it was sold and demolished in 2018. When the Beaton house was part of the tour, Müdry told me in a subsequent interview: “Nature is sacrosanct… One of the sins of our time is that when we find beauty in nature, we never know how to live with it in the right relationship.”

Müdry’s belief in the sanctity of nature resonates in his 1989 Chun House, on this year’s tour. Like its predecessor, this gem was inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright, as well as by Müdry’s fascination with gothic architecture.

Surely one of the other architectural sins of our time is the price-per-square-footagedriven disappearance of mid-century modern classics. The preservation of our modernist heritage is one of the annual tour’s noble aims.

But it also appeals to a certain generational looky-loo longing from those of us on the wrong side of real estate history, to see what

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Highlights of the 2023 edition of the tour included, from left to right, the ItzingerMeuldyk house (Wolfgang Gerson, 1967; renovated by Wexler Design, 2012), McGee House (Donald Manning, 1955; renovated by Georg Koslowski, 1978 and Architecture Building Culture, 2022); and Sewell’s Landing boathouse (Paul Merrick, 2022).

LEFT TO RIGHT

once-middle-class homes sited in majestic wilderness actually looked like.

The fundraiser is part of a West Coast Modern Week that includes lectures and events, and is presented by British Pacific Properties, a developer involved with West Vancouver since 1931. Preternaturally nostalgic, the tour celebrates an architectural moment before the city of West Vancouver’s demographic sea change, and is as much a festival of old guard culture as it is a preservationist cause.

And yet, as one wanders through the vaulted ceilings, natural light, and stunning views from every angle of the Chun home, it’s easy to imagine these homes that seem to levitate off the gorgeous landscape as the cathedrals of our time.

This is perhaps most literally true of Paul Merrick’s boathouse on this year’s agenda, which he designed as an extension of the luxury Sewell’s Landing apartments in Horseshoe Bay. Merrick says the arcing structure was inspired by Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia.

But it’s the sacredness of both nature and the single-family home that pervades the tour.

Wolfgang Gerson’s 1967 Itzinger-Meuldyk house in Caulfeild—down the hill from an

of-the-era Erickson and perched on a steep, forested site—honours its mid-century roots even as it transcends them. It was opened up to the spectacular view of Howe Sound by architect and owner Jason Wexler and his wife when they removed a brick fireplace in the living room, bringing the outdoors in.

Rather than a sense of exposure to the elements, Donald Manning’s 1955 post-and-beam house in the British Properties, elegantly renovated by Georg Koslowski in 1978 and by ABC last year, feels like a sleek sanctuary cocooned by forest.

The owners of the 1957 Ron Thom Carmichael house have replaced a wall in the dining area with foldable glass panels to reveal an ocean view, and moved the original door to create a light-filled hallway. The respectful updates still allow the hexagonal plan to express a sense of tightly choreographed domesticity. The perfectly sited home has the magical effect of bringing the geometry inside the visitor, as they tour this mid-century looking glass, gazing out across the harbour at the downtown micro-lofts they call home.

Hadani Ditmars is a journalist, author, and photographer.

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