New Daniels Home Will Be a Boon for the City

As architects, Jamie Goad (BArch 1981), a partner at the Distillery District, and Catharine Tanner (BArch 1981), vice-president at Lord Cultural Resources, have both been intimately connected with urban development in Toronto. Recently, they gave $25,000 to the Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design to support its relocation to a renovated and expanded facility at 1 Spadina Crescent.

Jamie: The scope and vision for the Daniels Faculty is really important to architecture, to urban design and to the City of Toronto. For example, the Global Cities Institute, which aims to improve life in cities by looking at urban issues around the world, is exactly the sort of program a school of architecture should be developing.

The faculty’s new home will also bring together under one roof the related fields of architecture, urban studies, and planning and visual studies, which makes a lot of sense. The proposed PhD program presents an opportunity to further build the school and its reputation.

All of this, including the new facility, will help attract the best and brightest faculty, students and visiting lecturers. There are so many positive attributes to what is being proposed for the expanded faculty. I’ve seen the design for the Daniels’ building and it’s going to be fantastic. Over the next few years, it will be exciting to see how all of this comes together and how it benefits the faculty, the university and the city.