Archinect - News

Diamond Schmitt/LemayMichaud to design 'generational' campus expansion at McGill University

2023-11-30T13:25:00-05:00

Diamond Schmitt Architects has designed a new campus expansion plan for McGill University in unison with LemayMichaud that will help advance the study of earth systems and environmental health while restoring several historic buildings and the university’s connection to Mount Royal Park.

One of Canada’s premiere research institutions is about to undergo a transformation of “generational importance,” according to the firms. Their New Vic plan calls for the reuse of three extant Scottish baronial structures at the Royal Victoria Hospital complex and construction of a new 350,000-square-foot facility for teaching and research.

A forecourt to Frederick Law Olmsted's 1893 park design will also be re-established through the design. Costs for the project are stated at $870 million CAD ($640 million USD).

Rendering by Diamond Schmitt

“We are inspired with urgency to design a center devoted to the most critical issue of our time: healing the planet,” Donald Schmitt, Principal at the new join...

Moshe Safdie on making the iconic spaces that have defined his career

2022-09-27T09:00:00-04:00

On the heels of Safdie’s massive donation to his alma mater McGill University, the 84-year-old architect sat down with CNN in Singapore to dissect his career and discuss his new memoir If Walls Could Speak out next week from Grove Atlantic.

The creator of the iconic Marina Bay Sands (which is about to begin work on a $1.35 billion expansion he says will not include an extension of its famous skybridge) touched briefly on impressive recent designs around Asia, including the Jewel Changi Airport, Habitat Qinhuangdao, and Raffles City Chongqing before veering off into an assessment of the region’s labor markets. He then reasserted the idealism that helped define his career and lamented the contemporary faddish use of biophilia — an element critical to the philosophies that are inherent in his garden-lined residential designs.

“There's a cynicism about so many architects...

Moshe Safdie donates entire archive to McGill University

2022-08-23T14:42:00-04:00

The professional archive of renowned Israeli-Canadian architect Moshe Safdie will now be housed at his alma mater McGill University, the school announced today.

The Habitat 67 designer will also donate his restored private apartment in the famed modular housing complex, along with the undergraduate thesis titled “A Case for City Living” that led to its inception as part of the Expo 67 exhibition in Montreal 55 years ago.

The apartment (which was not previously managed by the university) and thesis are just two of the more than 100,000 total pieces included in the donation. McGill says the archive “represents one of the most extensive and thorough individual collections of architectural documentation in Canada” and that it expects the gift to provide “an abundance of opportunity for exploration” to the university and design-minded community writ large.

Special announcement ceremony of Moshe Safdie's archive donation at McGill University. Video via McGill University on YouTube.

At th...

Urban street-network sprawl is trending globally, new study finds

2020-02-11T15:10:00-05:00

Satellite images dating back to 1975 allow researchers to map how millions of cul-de-sacs and dead-ends have proliferated in street networks worldwide. [...] A new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences charts a worrying global shift towards more-sprawling and less-hooked-up street networks over time.

The study's authors, Christopher Barrington-Leigh at McGill University and Adam Millard-Ball at UC Santa Cruz, were able to identify the global trend toward urban street-network sprawl by analyzing high-resolution data from OpenStreetMap and satellite imagery of urbanization since 1975 and then measuring the "street-network disconnectedness index (SNDi), based on every mapped node and edge in the world."

The documented global drop in street connectivity due to the proliferation of urban and suburban developments that feature cul-de-sacs, dead-ends, and gated communities should require a "rapid policy response, including regulation and pricing tools," the study suggests, "to avoid further costly lock-in during this current, final phase of the urbanization process."

The researchers write that their street-network measure can predict future climate, energy, health, and social outcomes related to urban form.

Get Lectured: McGill University, Fall '15

2015-10-20T12:53:00-04:00

Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Fall 2015

Archinect's Get Lectured is ready for another school year. Get Lectured is an ongoing series where we feature a school's lecture series—and their snazzy posters—for the current term. Check back frequently to keep track of any upcoming lectures you don't want to miss.

The next featured poster comes from the McGill University, School of Architecture.

Want to share your school's lecture series? Send us your school's lecture series poster and details to connect@archinect.com.

Listed below are upcoming events. Lectures begin at 6 p.m. in Room G-10, MacDonald-Harrington Building

Oct 26
Chris Lasch / Aranda\Lasch - New York, Tucson

Nov 2
Li Xiaodong / Li Xiaodong Atelier - Beijing

Nov 23
Rebuilding the Plateau
Marc-André Carignan (moderator)
Tom Balaban
Lisa-Marie Fortin
Stéphane Rasselet

For more, visit mcgill.ca/architecture.

Check out previous posters on the Get Lectured Pinterest page!

Get Lectured: McGill University, Winter '15

2015-01-29T12:52:00-05:00

Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Winter-Spring 2015

Archinect's Get Lectured is back in session! Get Lectured is an ongoing series where we feature a school's lecture series—and their snazzy posters—for the current term. Check back frequently to keep track of any upcoming lectures you don't want to miss.

The next featured poster comes from the McGill University School of Architecture in Montreal, Canada.

Want to share your school's lecture series? Send us your school's lecture series poster and details to connect@archinect.com.

Lectures take place on Mondays at 6 p.m. in Room G10 of the Macdonald-Harrington Building, unless noted. Listed below are upcoming lectures only.

Feb 17
Tatiana Bilbao / Tatiana Bilbao S.C.

Feb 23
Manon Asselin, Randy Cohen, Dan Hanganu: The New Architecture of Montreal Libraries
Moderated by Guy Berthiaume

Mar 9
Sylvia Smith / FXFOWLE Architects

Mar 23
Bruce Kuwabara / KPMB Architects

Mar 30
David Newton / McGill University School of Architecture

For furthe...

2014 RAMSA Travel Fellowship awarded to McGill University grad student

2014-04-29T21:09:00-04:00

Robert A.M. Stern Architects recently announced Anna Antropova, a master's degree candidate at the McGill University School of Architecture, as the recipient of the 2014 RAMSA Travel Fellowship. The $10,000 fellowship will fund Antropova's trip to Japan, where she will study ancient wood joinery techniques. Her research focuses on the potential transformation and reintroduction of applying ancient timber techniques to modern construction.

"'This elegant and efficient mode of construction could meaningfully inform our western building industry, an industry addicted to toxic adhesives and an indiscriminate application of metal fasteners. Wood stands to be for our generation what steel and concrete were for the previous two or three, and Japanese joinery offers us a sustainable mode of assembly for a sustainable material with far less embodied energy.' Ms. Antropova aims to reintroduce these techniques, ultimately uniting 'old and new, east and west, tradition and modernity.'”

Antropova was selected from a field of 20 applicants preselected by their educational institutions.

This year's jury consisted of RAMSA partners Melissa DelVecchio, Dan Lobitz, and Grant F. Marani. Margaret Marsh facilitated the discussion and process.

For more details, head over to Bustler.

Get Lectured: McGill University, Winter '14

2014-03-12T12:49:00-04:00

Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Winter/Spring 2014

Archinect's Get Lectured is up and running again for the Winter/Spring '14 term! As a refresher from our Fall 2013 guide, every week we'll feature a school's lecture series—and their snazzy posters—for the current season. If you're not doing so already, be sure to keep track of any upcoming lectures you don't want to miss.

Today's poster comes from the McGill University, School of Architecture in Montreal, Canada. Don't miss out on the last few lectures this season!

Want to share your school's lecture series? Send us your school's lecture series poster and details to connect@archinect.com.

Listed below are upcoming lectures only. Unless noted, Events will take place Mondays at 6:00 pm in Room G10 of the Macdonald-Harrington Building.

MARCH

March 17
Paul Kassabian / Engineer - Simpson Gumpertz & Heger, Boston; Lecturer - Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, MIT
"Design (R)evolution: New Approaches to Structural ...

Get Lectured: McGill University Fall '13

2013-10-23T17:25:00-04:00

Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Fall 2013

Here on Archinect we recently launched "Get Lectured", where we'll feature a school's lecture series--along with their snazzy posters--for the current season. Check back regularly to stay up-to-date and mark your calendars for any upcoming lectures you don't want to miss.

It's time to change things up a little here in GL. For starters, our first international school is McGill University School of Architecture in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Since 2001, the McGill School of Architecture has featured several notable names--and a colorful collection of posters -- in their seasonal lecture series. A few recent lecturers include Bjarke Ingels of BIG; ARUP Principal David Scott; Shigeru Ban; Jeanne Gang; Luc Courchesne of METALAB, and UPenn Emeritus Professor of Urbanism Witold Rybczynski. Another regular feature to take note of is their lunchtime Brown Bag ASA-sponsored lecture series.

Select lectures are also available as podcasts.

Wa...

McGill University School of Architecture Cyclical Unit Review

2011-10-05T10:25:52-04:00

The new directors of the school, [AA, DC, MB said (on record and in a recording) that the university was a corporation and their first interest was not education. If education is a business, shouldn’t we know what we are paying for?

This document is a copy of the cyclical unit review performed by the University for the SoA in spring of this year. The result of the review may or may not have been the forced resignation of Professor Michael Jemtrud - an visionary individual who was making important and progressive changes within the curriculum of the school. Given that this is such a positive assessement of Jemtrud and his work over the last four years, it begs the question - who were the individuals who had lost faith in his leadership abilities? was this perhaps more because they were threatened by his agenda? and where does the school go from here given that the new director has yet to make a public presentation of her particular vision for the school ?

Alleged Forced Resignation at McGill University Stirs Backlash from Students

2011-06-24T12:37:28-04:00

Word has been spreading since yesterday about the resignation of Michael Jemtrud, Director of McGill's School of Architecture. Archinect has just been anonymously informed, however, that "a very reliable senior faculty source within the school" has confirmed that the resignation was forced and that Jemtrud is not allowed to talk about it.

The message we received follows:

On Thursday, June 23, 2011, Michael Jemtrud was forced to resign from his position as Director of McGill University School of Architecture. Jemtrud was hired four years ago with a mandate to integrate current technologies into the professional programs, to reinvigorate critical discussion and research about their use, and to foster a clearer organizational structure and closer collaborations within the school's many professional and post-professional programs. Jemtrud approached the job with a distinct vision and direction, and an ability to move quickly while continuing to foster the school's longstanding str...