Designlines Magazine is out with its annual "Designer of the Year" issue and this year's winner for best overall designer is Superkül -- the award-winning architecture firm behind Junction House. Pictured above are Andrea D'Elia, Meg Graham and the team. (The JH project team spends a lot of time in the boardroom that you see in this picture.)
Other winners for this year include Omar Gandhi, Paolo Ferrari, and LGA Architectural Partners. They were awarded best restaurant, best product, and best public space, respectively. If you aren't familiar with the work of these four firms, I would encourage you to check them all out. They are truly some of the best in the city. Congrats everyone.
If you'd like to buy a copy of Designlines, you can do that here. We will also make copies available at our temporary Junction House showroom, which is located at 2843 Dundas St W.
On Friday evening, here in Toronto at the Aka Khan Museum, this year’s Pritzker Architecture Prize was awarded to Indian architect, Balkrishna Doshi. He is 90 and will receive US$100,000, as well as the honor of being the first Indian to receive architecture’s Nobel Prize. This year was also the first year it was awarded in Canada.
Alex Bozikovic of the Globe and Mail sat down with Doshi while he was in Toronto. Article here. Doshi also lectured at the Daniels Faculty at the University of Toronto earlier in the week.
Some of you will probably recognize the name because of his collaborations with Le Corbusier and Louis Kahn. But as Alex quoted in his article, this year’s prize is about, “expanding the scope of architecture’s usefulness.” Doshi’s architecture is less about objects and more about the public good it creates.
For more on Doshi, check here.
On a related note, I was happy to see worlds collide in my Instagram feed this morning with this photo from the event. It’s a picture of Jeanne Gang, Meg Graham, and Andre D’Elia of Studio Gang and Superkul, respectively.
We are thrilled to be working on projects here Toronto with both firms.
Photo via The Pritzker Architecture Prize
Today I am excited to announce that we are working with superkül architects on a new mid-rise condo project here in Toronto. Details about the site and project to follow.
I am excited about this for a few reasons.
It should go without saying that I love their work. Check out Compass House, SHIFT Cottage, Harbord Towns, and Oben Flats Queen East.
You may also notice that they work at a variety of different scales and have a lot of single-family / custom home work. This was important to us because one of our goals for this project is to create really great homes within a boutique building. Emphasis on home.
The other exciting piece is that one of the founding principals of superkül – Meg Graham – was one of my professors in architecture school. So there’s a sense of coming full circle.
This matters to me because when I became a developer I told myself that I was going to be the kind of developer that gave a shit about design and actively worked to improve the built environment.
I guess what I’m saying is that there’s a feeling of continuity. I haven’t forgotten where I came from, which was the world of architecture.
Image: Blok Design