Paul Raff Studio

Jury Comments: Built in the long-established Forest Hill neighbourhood of luxury homes in Toronto, the 4,000sf infill home is 30% less in size compared to typical homes of the area. An interior slate-finished wall behind the stair acts as a heat sink, and also functions as an organizing element for the beautiful interior. Sustainability features, such as the reduced footprint, use of durable materials, and careful orientation to maximize natural light, are not radical but are well considered.

Read the rest of this entry »

Big on education, networking

The Canada Green Building Council [CaGBC] held its 3rd Annual Conference at the Vancouver Convention Centre June 8-10, supported by BC Hydro’s Powersmart. With the past two years being such successful events for the industry, this year was expected to be bigger and better than ever: a goal that was met with 1,300 attendees over the two days, making this still relatively young event the largest green building conference in Canada.

Read the rest of this entry »

DA Architects + Planners, Musson Cattell Mackey Partnership,

and LMN Architects

Jury Comments: This project takes a common, large and often mundane building form that does not usually integrate well into the city and makes it fit perfectly on a very tight, water-edge site. With great skill, the building is constructed as a bridge over an existing rail line and extending over the shoreline as piles. With a huge 2.5 hectare vegetated roof, this is a building as landscape with excellent sustainability technologies that make this project a leap forward in sustainable design, and a transformative building.

Read the rest of this entry »

Acton Ostry Architects Inc.

Jury comments: The building is a stand-out as the renovation of a mundane 1960s University of British Columbia building that takes the assets of the old building and improves them. A revised colourful and vibrant glazed facade signals the rebirth life of the building, and the new five-storey construction cleverly adds an atrium that introduces more useable interior space with natural light and ventilation. The strategy to use waste steam from the district heating plant for heating and cooling is innovative.

Read the rest of this entry »

Teeple Architects Inc.

Jury Comments: The co-op housing project in Toronto puts a new face on a typically banal building form, and has a strong sense of social sustainability that relates to the needs of its residents. Its public spaces, mostly gardens, depend on the care and co-operation of the residents. Atriums and single-loaded corridors in a building of this type, scale and density are adventurous and forward-thinking. Credit goes to the client, the Toronto Housing Authority, for taking a risk. Rainscreen cladding, drain water heat recovery, and the clever use of windows, instead of more typical large expanses of glazing, are examples of how this project re-thinks the high-rise building.

Read the rest of this entry »

Acton Ostry Architects Inc.

Jury comments: The rehabilitation of existing heritage buildings is always welcomed, and the additional new multi-storey infill construction of this project happily maintains the historic Gastown facade of Vancouver. The new construction is of high quality that does not mimic but rather complements the older buildings. The small, exquisite interior spaces, only three metres wide, feel larger, and the design makes effective use of natural light and thermal mass, geoth-ermal heating, high-efficiency heat pumps, and salvaged building materials.

Read the rest of this entry »

Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg, and Smith Carter Architects

and Engineers Incorporated

Jury comments: Manitoba Hydro is to be congratulated for building such an ambitious project and locating it in a downtown area of Winnipeg that will rejuvenate that part of the city. Its 65% energy conservation is remarkable for a building of such scale, and radical by North American standards. Higher than average construction costs reflect the long-term thinking that the building will pay back through its durability, superior energy performance, and healthy working conditions for its employees in the form of daylighting, natural ventilation and pleasing interiors. The building is a game-changer that we hope other corporate clients will replicate.

Read the rest of this entry »

Diamond and Schmitt Architects

Jury Comments: The project is less a building than a landscape pavilion and garden wall that fits beautifully with the orientation of the planted vineyards. A fully-glazed wall on the east brings in natural light, and rain water storage occurs in retention ponds that are expressive and fully integrated with the building design. The building details are beautiful, the building owner is to be commended for achieving LEED Gold while also operating the only bio-dynamic vineyard in North America that also includes a wetland for waste water treatment.

Read the rest of this entry »

Hughes Condon Marler Architects

Jury comments: The project adds to an earlier built indoor pool that creates an exciting public space. It has a clarity of design concept with a joyous, animated interior in which the activities of the building users are on display. Building orientation for optimum solar conditions, natural ventilation, reduction of water use, re-use of building materials, and geothermal energy are the salient sustainability features that represent a new approach to community centre design.

Read the rest of this entry »

The fifth facade

In the world of Industrial, Commercial and Institutional [ICI] construction, the vast majority of buildings have flat roofs that are often not in view. Yet they exist in the harshest of environments - baked under blazing sun, exposed to wind, rain and snow, walked upon by various trades with little concern for the integrity of the membrane. All of this while performing arguably the most important building envelope function - protecting the interior space below by keeping the exterior elements out.

Read the rest of this entry »