archiTEXT newsletter

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He ARCHi e iAN VOLUME ONE

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NOVEMBER 2010

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PAGE 5 INTRODUCTION PAGE 6 PRINCIPAL’S OFFICE

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PAGE 9

CREATIVE SPACE

MANIFESTO TO THE BOARDROOM

PAGE 10 COMIC! PAGE 12 ARCHITECTURE & PRODUCTIVITY PAGE 14 AMBASSADOR’S NOTES PAGE 16 LANDSCAPE & THE CITY PAGE 18 ARCHITEXT AMBASSADOR PAGE 20

CROSSWORD!


CONTRIBUTORS // Zara Ebrahim / Sherry Lin / Keegan Thierran / Itay Joshua / Jackie Beale / Jaclyn Kaloczi / Sherry Yang / Rebecca Lemire / Sugra Panvelwala / Marc Hardiejowski / Leeor Wild VISIT // www.architextinc.com FOLLOW // www.twitter.com/architext LIKE // us on Facebook CONTACT // info@architextinc.com

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IN

RO By Sherry Lin, Creative Director

We are delighted to introduce our inaugural issue of the archiTEXTian. As many of you already know, this year has been about a lot of change. Out staff has quintupled, we have moved into our very own studio location and we are embarking so many exciting projects that I get dizzy just thinking about them. Many of you often write to us, asking for updates on our work and ourselves, so we thought it was high time a newsletter came into fruition. For this first edition, we wanted to take the opportunity to introduce ourselves, all 11 of us. We are a pretty great team, if I do say so myself. So, sit back with your coffee (or tea or wine or beer or ...). I leave you with this thought:

FROM SMALL BEGINNINGS COME GREAT THINGS Get to know us and happy reading.

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PRiNCiPAL’S

OFFICE

By Zahra Ebrahim, Principal / Partner

Over the past four and some years, we have had some pretty awesome adventures and experiments. Members of the archiTEXT team past and present can tell you that few things can prepare you for the journey you embark on the first time you put a Sharpie Poster Paint marker to a piece of drywall to write about llamas. You’re never the same. We’re excited to welcome you to the inner workings of our creative process. Most of you who follow our work are closely attuned to the type of projects we initiate and seek out, but to truly understand our culture, our process, and the qualities that makes someone an archiTEXTian, you’re going to want to read this newsletter. The Principal’s Office will be a particularly unique insight into the series of technicolour conversations, experiments, debates, drawing, and thoughts that take daydreams from the studio and turn them into active, exciting projects. So, I’d like to formally welcome you into our home ­­– I’d also like to warn you that it can sometimes get messy – but that’s when things tend to get good.

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C’MON iN THE ARCHITEXTIAN

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NOV 2010



CREATIV

SPACE Our previous studio was the size of a walk-in closet. At any moment you could find 4 - 12 archiTEXT-ers huddled elbow to elbow around laptops at ONE table. While you are likely to witness a similar scene in the new studio, it is not because we don’t have the space. With a reading area, multiple workstations, and a kitchen, the studio is multi-functional. However, any creative mind needs a creative space – that space has become our boardroom. We envisioned the boardroom as a space for our fellow archiTEXT-ers to draw, design and produce. Currently, it looks similar to a woodshop with a variety of projects underway. Watch it transform, again!

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SPACE

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CREATIVE

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By Keegan Thierran, Strategic Director


MANIFESTO

TO THE

BOARD

ROOM

By Jackie Beale + Jaclyn Kaloczi, Intersection Curators


COMiC! If Corbusier were alive today, what would he say about Architext?

houses may be machines for living, but this studio is a machine for...

... helping the community ...

DAVID’S TEA FINANCIAL REPORT

when archiTEXT arrived in neighbourhood

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By Sherry Yang, Intern

guys, this is how you microwave peeps

HMMM.....

... and architectural education.

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A

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ARCHITECTURE PRODUCTiViTY By Rebecca Lemire, Intern

In May of this year, we moved into a beautiful new studio space in a converted factory on Spadina Avenue. As I’ve always had a personal interest in the intersection of Architecture + Mood, I began to think about another intersection: “Architecture + Productivity” i.e. how do our architectural surrounding affect the way we work? Recently, there have been some interesting studies on this topic, such as Mohammad Bubekri’s Daylighting, Architecture and Health: Building Design Strategies, and the productivity research conducted by Stephanie Teasley and Associates at the University of Michigan. Boubreki sites the example of the Lockheed Corporation, a company that moved 2700 employees into a building which emphasized the use of daylight over artificial light. As a result, productivity increased by 15% and employees were absent from work 15% fewer days per year. While Stephanie Teasley’s study found that workers in open offices with central work tables were twice as productive as those who worked in private rooms or cubicles. Furthermore, it has been proven that fresh air (as opposed to circulated central air) reduces stress, increases learning abilities, and strengthens the immune system. So while we may be complaining about the lack of AC at the studio, the most important thing is that we have a great big window to open up (an option not available to the majority of high-rise office dwellers). We also have plenty of natural light and a centralized workstation! Looks like we’ve hit the jackpot with the new space. Stay tuned for much more on this topic in my upcoming online exhibit “Spacing Out: Architecture + Workplace Productivity.”

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A

MBASSADOR’S NOTES By Itay Joshua, Intern

The archiTEXT Ambassador Program showcases achievements by like-minded individuals and organizations. Do you love to think about architecture and design? Do you lay awake at night with a mind overloaded with projects and ideas for the community? Are you passionate about creating accessibility in the world of architecture and design? Do you have an intersection with “Architecture + (Politics / Economics / Environment / Fashion / Food / Pop Culture / Art / etc.)? Do you have a project that embodies these ideas and principles? We love what you do, and we want the world to know it too! Part II of the program will incorporate mini hybrid projects between archiTEXT and the ambassador of the month. The projects will express the culture and work of archiTEXT in combination with out ambassador’s work. We are really excited to start collaborating with all the amazing organizations that are doing amazing things in and around Toronto!

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LAND SCAPE THE CITY


By Sugra Panvelwala, Intern Dear Readers: In this introductory newsletter, I, a recent archiTEXTian, would like to steer you towards a concept that has become quite dear to me over the course of the past few years: Landscape. It is an idea that is multifaceted since it refers to a composite of various aspects of the site, like the cultural, ecological, urban, and physical. The study and design of these aspects has been classified as landscape architecture. Landscape architecture, I believe, allows you to inculcate a macro and micro scale perspective of the surroundings. It encourages you to explore the relationship of the micro to the macro, and think about how we, infrastructure, and the natural environment interact with eachother. This is the promise that landscape architecture holds in today’s day and age. On this note, I would like you to take a moment and think about what landscape (architecture) means to you. How would you decribe or represent it? Does Toronto serve as a favourable sourse for its discussion and study? It would be great to know your thoughts and ideas on it. Please send them over to sugra@architextinc.com. Let’s get this conversation going!

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archiTEXTA Andrew Maynard is a young Australian architect that has established himself as a socially and environmentally responsible architect. He is part of the next generation of young designers that are redefining creativity within the field. His work is colorful, smart, fun, and fresh. “I try to be an architectural polemicist,” he says, but he is also simply a talented architect doing what he loves and paying the bills and the same time. Isn’t that the dream? After a childhood fascination with Lego, becoming an architect seamed to be the only logical career choice for Maynard. Most of his work is around Melbourne but sometimes he will take on a project elsewhere in the world. He says his favorite project is CV08, a suburb-eating robot that eats up cookie cutter homes and compacts them into recyclable compacted heaps that get fired off to waiting recycling plants! Maynard started AMA (Andrew Maynard Architects) in his 20’s out of a desire to control his own destiny and for a shot at freedom. Why do we love him? Because he has single handedly shattered the stereotype of the worrisome architect grad sending off hundreds of e-mails and resumes in the hopes that some firm will hire them. He is a reminder that dreams do come true and that anything is possible! Want to know more of Andrew? Check out www.maynardarchitects.com

MBASSADOR


TAMBASSADOR

archiTEX

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CROSS WORD ACROSS 2 International language that is shared and appreciated by all archiTEXTers 5 An audible expression or appearance of happiness 7 Set of shared attitudes/values/goals/practices characterized by a group/organization/institution 8 What you can hear at any given time playing in the archiTEXT studio 10 Constantly in flux/changing/flexible/adaptable 14 Capacity to endure 16 Ability to generate innovative ideas and manifest them into reality 17 Complementary colour to red

DOWN 1 (Partial) reason for relocating the archiTEXT studio from the Design Exchange to Queen & Spadina 3 Based on or characterized by good judgement or sound thinking 4 The art and science of designing and erecting building and other physical structures 6 The planning that lays the basis for the making of every object and system 9 A change in the though process for doing something 11 Opposite of the archiTEXT studio in the summer 12 archiTEXTers bouncing around in the studio create this 15 Process by which forms perceived in the mind are perceived and manipulated

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