2023 Annual Awards Juries | Royal Architectural Institute of Canada

2023 Annual Awards Juries

 

RAIC Gold Medal, Architectural Practice Award, and Emerging Architectural Practice Award Jury

RAIC Advocate for Architecture Award, RAIC Research and Innovation Award, and the RAIC Architectural Journalism and Media Award Jury

 

RAIC Gold Medal, Architectural Practice Award, and Emerging Architectural Practice Award

Stephan Chevalier, MIRAC

Stephan Chevalier co-founded the architecture firm Chevalier Morales in 2005 with Sergio Morales. The firm has been awarded and shortlisted for over twenty national and international architectural competitions and projects. The quality of their work has been recognised by several Awards of Excellence from Canadian Architect magazine and the Grand Prix d’architecture from the Order of Architects of Quebec as well as two Governor General’s Medals in Architecture. In 2018, the firm garnered the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada’s Emerging Architectural Practice Award, and in 2022, its project Pre-Occupied Architectures was selected as one of the finalists for Canada’s official representation at the 18th Venice Biennale in Architecture. 

Chevalier is a graduate of the University of Montreal and has previously worked for Patkau Architects and Busby + Associates in Vancouver. He has been a guest teacher and critic at architecture schools in Montreal, Quebec City, Dalhousie, and Ottawa. Both Chevalier and Morales are regularly invited to lecture, exhibit, and publish their work internationally.  

Juan Du

Juan Du is Professor and Dean at the University of Toronto’s John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design.  She has practiced in the U.S., Europe and China, establishing her Hong Kong-based office, IDU_architecture, in 2006. Du has previously taught at the University of Hong Kong and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Through research and design projects, she collaborates regularly with community stakeholders to understand and improve the urban and architectural qualities of housing conditions and informal communities.  A recognized expert on China’s rapid urbanization, she has been featured by international media such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, CNN, Wired and Nature. 

Francine Houben

Francine Houben is Founding Partner and Creative Director of Mecanoo. The practice focuses on complex, multifunctional buildings and integrated urban developments which combine architecture, urban planning, landscaping, and interior design. 

Mecanoo’s work covers all sectors and scales including educational and research buildings, libraries, theatres, museums, as well as offices, hotels, leisure, residential, mixed-use, regeneration, landscape, master-planning and mobility.  

Each project individually responds to a methodical philosophy of People, Place, and Purpose: to the client’s requirements and the users’ needs; the physical and historical context; and the current and predicted potential of a building’s function. 

Bruce Kuwabara, FRAIC

Bruce Kuwabara is a Founding Partner of KPMB Architects in Toronto. He is a recipient of the RAIC Gold Medal (2006) and an invested Officer of the Order of Canada (2012) for his significant contributions to Canadian architecture. His projects have received numerous Governor General’s Medals in Architecture, including Kitchener City Hall, Canada’s National Ballet School, and the Remai Modern art gallery in Saskatoon. Internationally acclaimed projects include Manitoba Hydro Place in Winnipeg, Isttaniokaksini/Science Commons at the University of Lethbridge, the Center for Computing & Data Sciences at Boston University, the CAMH Research Centre in Toronto, and the new Art Gallery of Nova Scotia in Halifax. 

Michael Leckie, MRAIC

Michael Leckie is an architect and entrepreneur working to evolve the traditional boundaries of architectural practice as a catalyst for cultural change. Michael founded Leckie Studio Architecture + Design in 2015 as a multidisciplinary platform to craft singular, thought-provoking, and imaginative architectural work. Operating with a methodology that is rooted in architecture, Leckie Studio operates across a wide range of scale, typology, and media - including architecture, interior architecture, art installations, and product design - both locally and internationally. The work is informed by an environmental sensitivity, with an experience-based approach to program and form. Leckie Studio is committed to a rigorous process of research and discovery, with a deeply-rooted fascination with the act of making. 

Janna Levitt, FRAIC

Janna Levitt co-founded LGA Architectural Partners (formerly Levitt Goodman Architects). She believes buildings can serve as a connector between culture and people. Her projects often involve implementing transformative cultural and environmental agendas, developed with a diverse group of collaborators. As Partner in Charge, she has led projects throughout Ontario including Laurentian University McEwen School of Architecture, the University of Waterloo School of Architecture, the MabelleArts Park Pavilion, and a timber Visitors Centre pavilion for Promontory Park. Janna also leads the research projects in which the firm is involved. She has been an Adjunct Professor at the University of Waterloo, University of Toronto and Dalhousie, Schools of Architecture, and lectures widely on architecture and the arts. She is also an active jury member and panellist on architectural and urban design issues across the country, and from 2011 to 2015 served on the Canada Council Venice Biennale Advisory Committee. Janna is currently on the Waterfront Toronto Design Review Panel. 

RAIC Advocate for Architecture Award, RAIC Research and Innovation Award, and the RAIC Architectural Journalism and Media Award

Brent Bellamy, FRAIC

Brent Bellamy is an Architect and Creative Director at Number TEN Architectural Group in Winnipeg, Manitoba. He has demonstrated through his professional work and community leadership a personal commitment to the principles of sustainability and equitable city-building.  

Brent is the Chairperson of CentreVenture Development Corporation, an arms length agency of the City of Winnipeg that provides leadership in downtown planning and development. In 2019, Brent was presented with the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada’s Advocate for Architecture Award, recognizing his community leadership and advocacy through teaching, public speaking, and writing, including a regular column in the Winnipeg Free Press. 

 

Charles-Mathieu Brunelle

Charles-Mathieu Brunelle is an assistant city manager with the Ville de Montréal. After two years as acting manager in charge of quality of life (Qualité de vie), he is now responsible for the city's participation in the upcoming United Nations COP15 conference (Montreal - December 2022). From 2008 to 2020, he was at the helm of Space for Life/Espace pour la vie, Canada's largest natural science museum complex, where he oversaw an ambitious $200 million development plan. Prior to this, he was the executive director and founding member of the TOHU (Cité des arts du cirque), and a director at the Compagnie Marie Chouinard dance company and the Cinémathèque québécoise film conservatory. 

 

Michael Green, FRAIC

Michael Green is an architect, speaker, and author known for using design to create projects that push the boundaries of sustainability, technology, and construction to benefit both people and planet. A leader in wood innovation, he has completed some of the most significant timber buildings in the world and has been recognized with over forty international awards for design excellence. An avid traveler and adventurer, Michael has explored remote regions of every continent, and these journeys through nature are what inspire his work. 

Jenn McArthur

Jenn McArthur is an Associate Professor in the Department of Architectural Science at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU; formerly Ryerson University), where she leads the Smart Building Research Group. Her research focuses on building performance improvement through Smart and Ongoing Commissioning (SOCx), Smart Campus Integration, FM-enabled BIM, and workplace design to improve productivity and health. To give back to the community, Jenn serves on the Regional Advisory Board of the Canada Green Building Council, the Existing Building Commissioning Working Group for the Government of Canada, and recently contributed to the City of Toronto's 2050 Net-Zero strategy for existing buildings. 

Shallyn Murray, MRAIC

Shallyn Murray is an architect and co‐founder of Nine Yard Studio – an architecture firm that focuses on many facets of design including architecture, product design and custom art installations. Her firm was the recipient of the 2018 RAIC Urban Design Award, a Designing Canada Award for residential architecture in 2020 and most recently the 2020 RAIC Emerging Practice Award. 

Shallyn was the lead architect on the new Charlottetown Library and is currently designing multiple social housing projects. Her work for the Urban Beehive Project and contribution to Art in the Open and Fusion Charlottetown movements are only a few of many community initiatives. Shallyn recently served as executive member of Building Equality in Architecture for PEI and is on the planning board for the City of Charlottetown. 

Betsy Williamson, FRAIC

Betsy Williamson is the Principal of Williamson Williamson, an office committed to using both built and unbuilt work as vehicles to explore diverse research and design agendas. Her work ranges from objects and installations to master plans and buildings, with a portfolio that includes numerous houses, commercial projects, and institutional work. 

Her office’s work has been published widely and has received numerous awards over the years.  Notable practice-based recognition includes the Professional Prix de Rome for Architecture from the Canada Council of the Arts, the Emerging Architectural Practice Award from the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, and the Young Architects Prize and the Emerging Voices Award from the Architecture League of New York.