Congratulations to Chi Un Lee, who received the CISC Excellence Award in Steel Design for his project, Above Sherbourne. This award is presented annually to a full-time undergraduate student enrolled in the Architecture program who has demonstrated outstanding work in the area of steel design. Selection is based on project work in a third- or fourth-year Design Studio course. This fund is made possible by a donation from the Canadian Institute of Steel Construction Education Foundation.
Above Sherbourne was completed for the 3A design studio that primarily focused on climate and housing issues in Toronto. The project uses steel as the primary structure to elevate a new layer of residential and communal spaces to densify and activate the existing neighbourhood, while preserving as much of the existing residential buildings.
The design of the project focuses on three movements: the preservation of the Victorian houses that exemplify Toronto’s early history between 1840 to 1930, the Sherbourne Lanes infill housing scheme that represents the improbable victory of a local community over a large developer in the 1970s, and a new residential layer that will revitalize the neighbourhood by creating a communal skylane above the infill housing scheme (inspired by Yona Friedman’s early architecture).
The project proposes to elevate a new addition to the existing Diamond Myers building without relying upon the existing structure. The project is heavily inspired by the works of Yona Friedman, which takes a look at the Ville Spatiale, an urbanist proposal that enables the growth of cities while restraining land use through its small building footprint (on ground). This concept mainly brushes upon the concept of mobile architecture where people gain control of the usage in the ‘floating buildings’ by either utilizing the space for living or working.
