In our May issue
Our May issue is a celebration of winners.
Topping the list is the RAIC’s Gold Medal recipient, Justice Murray Sinclair. His recognition marks the growing importance of dialogues around Indigenization, de-colonization, and reconciliation within Canadian architecture.
The RAIC International Prize winner, Aotearoa-based Ngā Aho, recognizes a national organization of Maori design professionals who have come together to support each other to better serve the design aspirations of Maori communities. Ngā Aho serves as an inspirational model for how Indigenous practitioners can deploy Indigenous ways of knowing and doing to affect positive change in the built and natural environment.
The RAIC’s top architectural practice this year is Dubbeldam Architecture+Design, a Toronto-based studio that blends built work, design research, and advocacy in its commitment to an improved public realm. The RAIC’s emerging practice award goes to Peter Braithwaite Studio, a practice that sees buildings as members of overarching ecological systems.
The winner of the RAIC Research & Innovation Award is Patkau Design Lab, a research and fabrication wing of Patkau Architects. Building Equality in Architecture Toronto (BEAT) cinched the RAIC’s Advocate for Architecture Award. Two RAIC Architectural Journalism and Media Awards were announced: one of which goes to The Edit, a publication by The Site magazine, and the other of which goes to architectural journalist, editor, and advocate Jim Taggart.
We also profile the 12 winning projects from this year’s National Urban Design Awards, a program jointly run by the RAIC, Canadian Institute of Planners (CIP), and Canadian Society of Landscape Architects (CSLA).
My editorial examines the characteristics of the top award programs—and of winning entries.
Our issue also includes reviews of 5468796’s recent publication platform.Middle: Housing for the 99 percent, RIBA’s 100 Women Architects: Architects in Practice, and Marieke Gruwel’s Manitoba Women in Design. We also look at photographer Steven Evans’ homage to Ontario Place. In our In Memoriam section, David Covo pays tribute to architect and educator Radoslav Zuk, who passed away earlier this year.
-Elsa Lam, editor