Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects

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Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects

Information

  • Completion year: 2018
  • Gross Built up Area: 14,399 sqm
  • Project Location: Ontario
  • Country: Canada
  • Lead Architects/Designer: Nader Tehrani and Katherine Faulkner, AIA, Claudina Sula, OAA
  • Design Team: NADAAA team: John Houser, Amin Tadj, Tim Wong, Alda Black, Marta Guerra, James Juricevich, Parke Macdowell, Dane Asmussen, Laura Williams, Peter Sprowls, Noora Al Musallam, Tammy Teng, Wesley Hiatt, John Mars, Mazyar Kahali, Matthew Waxman, Luisel Zayas, Adamson Associates Architects team: Jack Cusimano, Tina Leong, John McMillan, Martin Dolan, Zbigniew Jurkiewicz, Michael Lukachko, Zale Spodek, Gilles Leger, George Georges, Ke Leng Tran, Riad Djilali
  • Clients: University of Toronto
  • Engineering: Building Envelope consultant: Entuitive Corporation
  • Structural Consultants: Entuitive Corporation
  • MEP Consultants: Mechanical / Plumbing: The Mitchell Partnership Electrical / Data / AV / Lighting design: Mulvey Banani International, Inc.
  • Landscape Consultants: Public Work
  • Contractors: Eastern Construction Company Ltd
  • Project Manager: Richard Lee, Tom Beresford
  • Collaborators: Heritage Consultant: ERA Architects Acoustics: Aercoustics Engineering Ltd Civil: A. M. Candaras Associates, Inc. Hardware: Upper Canada Specialty Hardware, Ltd. Select furniture design and construction: Daniels Faculty
  • Photo Credits: Nic Lehoux
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Excerpt: Daniels Building at One Spadina, designed by NADAA + Adamson Associates Architects, embodies a holistic approach to urban design and sustainability. As the new home for the John H. Daniels Faculty of architecture, landscape, and design, its purpose is to engage students and the broader community in dialogue about the built environment. It restores the historic and forgotten building to its original grandeur while also integrating a new addition.

Project Description

[Text as submitted by architect] The Daniels Building at the University of Toronto embodies a holistic approach to urban design and sustainability. As the new home for the John H. Daniels Faculty of architecture, landscape, and design, its purpose is to engage students and the broader community in dialogue about the built environment.

Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects

At the center of one of Toronto’s few circular parcels, the project anchors the southwest corner of the University and opens the circle to the public after years of inaccessibility. It restores the historic and forgotten building to its original grandeur while also integrating a new addition. The north-south axis characterizes symbolic relationships to the City, while the east-west axis is activated by pedestrian traffic. On the western edge, a discreet arcade addresses the residential scale of the adjacent neighborhood. Meanwhile, a public plaza to the east creates a prominent relationship with the campus. The renewed site invites activity, with circulation for pedestrians and cyclists. Extensive sustainable features including a noteworthy approach to site stormwater management while simultaneously bringing a heritage building back to life.

Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© Nic Lehoux
Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© Nic Lehoux
Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© Nic Lehoux

The design of this building presented a case where problems of pedagogy come face to face with a physical environment that is inhabited and tested daily by an audience of experts, critics, teachers, practitioners, and students, the very protagonists of the medium. It is perhaps one of the few occasions where the audience is engaging with the building and its authors at a higher level, making it an added challenge –and responsibility– to speak to architectural questions with a greater degree of nuance, as such the building was designed to become a pedagogical tool, integrated into the curriculum with both sustainable/design elements and school programs on display both to students and the public.

Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© Nic Lehoux
Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© Nic Lehoux
Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© Nic Lehoux
Daniels Building at One Spadina | NADAAA + Adamson Associates Architects
© Nic Lehoux

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