2008 OAA Awards

Located at the heart of John Andrews' brutalist 1960s Scarborough Campus, The Academic Resource Centre provides a town square aesthetic in contrast to the serpentine hill-town forms of the original complex, straddling the valley edge. Taking its inspiration from the Great Mosque of Córdoba, the Centre combines intimate and grand spaces to create a democratic complex that allows free access to information. Juror Ian Chodikof called the new learning forum "spatially rich and interesting."

Bloorview creates a quiet patient- and family-centred health care healing facility, integrated with the community and the environment. Building upon a shared belief in the benefits that a well-designed healing environment can provide, Bloorview embodies a sense of warmth and welcoming for the people it serves. The massing of the building grows from a positive and healthy relationship to the spectacular ravine site. The seamless incorporation of art, sustainability and a non-institutional architectural language weave through the program elements.

This striking and versatile sports facility provides a popular focus for community activity in multi-ethnic Brampton. To satisfy a growing population and shifting demographic mix, the facility is purpose-built for indoor soccer, but adaptable to other indoor sports including hockey and is sized and scaled to operate with four independent programs running concurrently, in addition to on-going community functions. Inside and outside, the building forms and spaces create a dynamic presence on a site bordered by fast-moving traffic. Juror Ian Chodikoff called it "high-speed architecture".

One of this country's most inspiring architectural spaces, the Library of Parliament, was in desperate need of some basic repairs, as well as essential technical upgrading. The difficult task has been accomplished with consummate skill. In the process, significant and critical failures were corrected, nine metres of rock excavation was miraculously executed beneath the existing foundations, and the historical structure was reinvested with its original High Victorian Gothic authenticity and sparkle. The jury praised the architects' ingenuity and depth of research.

Taking a prototype — the laneway house — that has produced some of Toronto's most distinctive residential architecture, Studio Junction has created a warm and unique domestic environment. The Courtyard House revives an ancient form of residential architecture and cloaks it in a contemporary North American form. Without the constraints that might accompany traditional street orientation, the design is generated by an emphasis on the views and activities of the interior courtyards. Juror Christina Zeidler remarked "They've solved some of our general household dilemmas with very innovative — not traditionally Western —solutions."

As the architects' brief points out, "an academic library is at the centre of student life". Accordingly, the new Learning Centre at U of T's Mississauga campus creates both a campus gateway, and a collection of public spaces to accommodate study and student interaction. Inspired by the austere silent gliding motion of the steel storage units used to house the Library's permanent collection, the Library takes the form of a puzzle-box — a shifting enigmatic enclosure designed to simultaneously protect and reveal a treasure within.

In Hespeler, a historic mill town now part of Cambridge, a precious building has been enclosed and extended by a transparent high-tech jewel case. The contemporary patterned-glass building envelope forms a woven texture around the building, generating varying degrees of transparency that respond to interior activities and views. The design pays homage to both the community's historic textile past and its current technological-industry base, while simultaneously showcasing the historic Carnegie Library.
Said Ian Chodikoff "It's a well-executed project by a very good designer."

In a secular University with a diverse student population, such as the U of T, the creation of a religious space provides both challenge and opportunity. After 13 years of deliberation, the Multi-faith Centre emerged as a solution to the growing diversity and interest in the intersection of faith, spirituality and university life. Carved from an existing interior space, this light-filled sanctuary offers a place of worship for the extremely diverse religious communities of Canada's largest university. The architectural expression of light — spiritually and metaphysically common to all faiths — is the central feature of the space.

Something of a contemporary novelty, the Museum of Inuit Art is a small, understated, specialized museum space. Inserted into a busy downtown retail mall, it creates an isolated cultural experience that presents its displays in a quiet contemplative way. The interior of the museum has been designed to remove visitors from the commercial clutter of the adjacent downtown shopping arcade and transport them to a more rarefied environment for viewing art — a neutral white shell evoking the iconic landscape forms of the arctic ice.

Through an unusual and unexpected use of forms and materials, the Peel Regional Cancer Centre provides a welcoming, and spiritual healing environment. Stylized trees, made from 500 sustainable-harvested, glue-laminated Douglas fir members, form a sheltering grove — the wood structure cost less than steel and provides superior aesthetic returns. Emphasis has been placed on the creation of a visible civic identity: the atrium serves as a social hub — a centrepiece for patients, family and the community. The result is tangible evidence of a genuine concern for community-focused care.

The RAWC provides a broad range of facilities for students, faculty and the larger community. As a focus and destination for students, graduates, faculty, staff and community members, it raises awareness of programs, encourages participation for all, and integrates wellness into daily life. By creating spaces that are more inclusive and flexible — and that minister to different levels of comfort and privacy — the building accommodates a diversified multi-cultural population. Juror Hilary Smyth commented: "I thought it was an inspiring place to be. It doesn't feel as cold and hard as so many athletic centres do."

Nestled into a clearing in a remnant woodlot in suburban Scarborough, the Chinese Baptist church reflects both a worldliness and a spiritual seclusion. Interiors and exteriors present striking compositions whose forms directly reflect the Baptist liturgical vision: horizontal roofs and views of the woodlot characterize the fellowship of the community wing, while the soaring vertical forms of the sanctuary, combined with natural light from above, emphasize the vertical relationship between people and God.

Connecting and extending the existing buildings, the Centre for Horticulture generates a new profile for Toronto's venerable Edwards Gardens. While creating a new "front door" to the facility, the Centre remains deferential to the gardens and the existing structures by Raymond Moriyama and Jerome Markson. The design stresses integration: new buildings with existing buildings, and structures with gardens. It also promotes an integrated approach to issues of sustainability, including a slopping green roof, sun-shades and heat-reducing fritted glass.

Queen Street West, Toronto's “design culture corridor” is the home of a luminous new addition — a retail environment that is also a social space. The new Umbra Concept store creates an iconic approach to urban retail architecture through an adaptive reuse of an existing steel-frame building. Fitted out with a new, more environmentally efficient envelope, the building has also been restructured to provide a retail environment filled with natural light. Juror Christina Zeidler commented: The project enlivens that whole space in the city. I think good design is good business.

The adaptive reuse of a historic silk mill in Cambridge has created a vibrant hub on the banks of the Grand River. Select interventions have been employed to maximize impact and performance, focused on a new three-storey atrium and porous spaces that animate the interior and infuse it with sunlight and constant views of the river, the town and things being made. Jury Chair Shirley Blumberg remarked: "This is a great project, done on an absolute shoestring; it works like a bandit and, not only that, it's revitalization of an urban centre. I think we should applaud such projects."