Architecture

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This is the collection for the University of Waterloo's School of Architecture.

Research outputs are organized by type (eg. Master Thesis, Article, Conference Paper).

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SWAMPY URBANISM: Make a Little Room for the Elbow River
(University of Waterloo, 2025-04-11) Wu, Leo
The City of Calgary is known for its flood issues, and the oldest flood recorded can be dated back to 1879. To reduce and potentially eliminate the inundation threats, the city has commissioned numerous dams and reservoirs to alter the hydrological cycle in exchange for security, electricity, and water supply. Thanks to the protection of these grey infrastructures, the city was able to develop and expand rapidly. However, despite the massive concrete barriers that were built to shelter the city from inundation, catastrophic events continue to occur within the city. In the case of the 2013 Calgary flood, the Bow River had reached eight times its regular flow and the Elbow River peaked at twelve times its normal flow rate. This was one of the largest floods in Canadian history which recorded four to six billion dollars of financial losses. Part of the reason for such severe overland flood damage was the increase in developments and urban growth in floodplain-designated zones during the periods when floods are managed. The infrastructural approach has become a double-edged sword that projected a false sense of security and encouraged developments adjacent to the river. With the pressing concerns of climate change and the increased frequency of floods in the past few decades, contemporary urbanism needs to find a new strategy to embrace the challenges of environmental shifts. The fundamental cause of the problem is that current Canadian societies treat water and land as separate entities, where the land dominates over water. This is reflected throughout our maps and urban design approaches where water is limited within certain boundaries. However, this narrative does not necessarily represent reality as water exists everywhere, the only difference is in quantities and forms. This limited understanding of rivers has constrained us from truly fostering a bond between nature and cities, where the current urban flood mitigation strategies attempt to shelter our societies from the forces of nature rather than adapting to the rhythm. Therefore, this thesis challenges the traditional view of water and aims to imagine a hydrological urban planning strategy that emphasizes on coexisting with water. There are two types of floods in Calgary: river floods and stormwater floods. The Room for the River is a great strategy to create space for water to overflow, which was invented by the Dutch to manage flooding. On the other hand, Sponge City from China has proven to be effective for rainwater management by creating a more permeable landscape that will temporarily absorb the overflow and release it slowly over time. In addition to these landscape flood mitigation strategies, the core focus of this thesis centers on the Landscape of Retreat Theory—voluntarily vacating flood-prone areas— which addresses the root causes of vulnerability. Given the current circumstances, where both flood exposure and the costs of insurance are increasing, retreating from the floodplain provides long-term economic, environmental and social benefits. As a result, this thesis will explore the creation of a more resilient urban terrain in Calgary by examining all the listed strategies. Additionally, local landscape projects by the O2 Planning + Design Firm will be referenced to ensure the design outcome of this thesis aligns with local contexts. By adopting the Retreat approach, the thesis will culminate into a proposal for urban strategies that integrate the exemplary practices provided, ultimately strengthening flood resiliency by adapting to the rhythm of the Elbow River in Calgary.
MATERIAL WORKS: Optimizing Material Circularity through Reversing Architecture
(University of Waterloo, 2025-04-09) Hur, Yoon
“Material Works” posits the largest abandoned industrial landscape in the Niagara region — the former General Motors Plant site — as a key infrastructure to circulate the existing building stocks for city scale reuse in St. Catharines, Ontario. The city’s building permits issued in 2023-2024 were analyzed to examine buildings registered for demolition and to build a database of materials to be reused if deconstructed. This initial study informed the design of the facility, in its scale, aesthetics and programmatic organization. The half-demolished GM structure, with a former building footprint of 38,000m2, is transformed to a circularity hub to address the city’s potential reusable building material stock. The architecture provides spaces for people to train in deconstruction, salvaged materials to be processed for resale, and designers to demonstrate their potential for architectural re-application. With circulation of materials as the central motif, agencies essential in facilitating circular activities are imagined to co-exist in one physical site to develop approaches to create more sustainable, closed-loop metabolic systems of materials. The building industry constitutes nearly a quarter of the global waste stream, and with Ontario’s landfills projected to reach capacity by 2032, the movement and uncertain destination of materials remain critical environmental concerns. In the quest for a sustainable architectural future, where construction’s inherent destructiveness contrasts with the demand for densification, focus shifts toward assessing the residual value of existing urban building stocks within the Anthropogenic landscape. This paradigm shift from the current linear to a circular construction model protects the architectural heritage of our urban fabric from rapid erasure while optimizing resource efficiency. This thesis explores design interventions and industry practices that replace the 21st century’s planned-obsolescence-thinking with reuse, contributing to the discourse of material circularity to address the environmental and cultural resiliency in architecture.
An Architecture of Happiness: Home in Harry Potter
(University of Waterloo, 2025-04-08) de Jeu, Claire
This thesis seeks to explore the architectural value of fantasy spaces, their ability to create home places for their audience, and the design insights they offer to the discipline of architecture. Any home, whether imagined or physical, exists to evoke emotional comfort, human connection, and positive experiences, ideas which are central to the larger field of architecture and design. Fantasy worlds have often been overlooked by architectural scholars, despite that storyworlds have always created home refuges for their audience: freeing stifled imaginations, touching hearts and minds with deep emotion, and providing relief from real-world conflicts, agitation or boredom. This thesis begins to bridge the gap between architecture and fantasy worlds by evaluating the architectural setting in Harry Potter as a legitimate home place, one which can bring real emotional and psychological benefits to its dwellers. By investigating the use of narrative emotions and the imaginary construction of settings, the world of Harry Potter can reveal new design perspectives which evolve and broaden the potential of real-world architecture and home design.
The Voice that Travels from Vessels to Other Worlds: Extracting Narratives from the Cave of the Sibyl
(University of Waterloo, 2025-04-02) Drmac, Vanessa; Haldenby, Eric; Bissett, Tara
From caves, leaves, dust, to ampullae, the Sibyl of Cumae’s voice has travelled far from vessels and into other story-worlds in various material forms. While practicing as a female prophet in classical antiquity, her origin possesses no definite beginning but only allusions to an incomplete identity and liminal persona. The Sibyl of Cumae’s uncertain characteristics have rendered her an ideal figure for speculative interpretation over time, particularly through stories. Based on Vergil’s famous account in the Aeneid, the Sibyl of Cumae was imagined to be dispersing prophecies from inside a subterranean architecture: a cave in the ancient city of Cumae, Italy. With increasing interpretations of the Sibyl dealt through time, writers from the past have provided her material presence while oncoming generations continue to mold it to create something new amongst her absence. This thesis will critically examine the evolution of the Sibyl of Cumae’s character in a selection of seven texts from two separate timelines. Reading Vergil’s Aeneid, Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Petronius’s Satyricon, Mary Shelley’s The Last Man, Gerard Manley Hopkins’s Spelt from Sibyl’s Leaves, T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land, and Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, I find varied interpretations of this Sibyl united by a shared theme of isolation. Isolation, or the condition of separateness, becomes a motif to study in this thesis through form, material, emotion, and narrative. I unravel varied meanings and representations of isolation in the selected texts by examining the qualities of objects and architecture that have been associated with the Sibyl of Cumae in them including the cave, dust, ampulla, leaves, cage, and jar. I distinguish the qualities of decay, silence, and visibility from these objects and study their prominence across settings, characters and objects in the selected texts. This leads me to recognize how the Sibyl of Cumae has adapted into something beyond a corporeal presence by proxy of material entities of the physical world.
From For To With: Towards an Allographic Approach in Architecture
(University of Waterloo, 2025-02-13) Fournier, Marc-; Bissett, Tara
Although transformations to buildings are inevitable, architecture often aims to achieve idealized, finalized artifacts that refute the passage of time. This professional bias towards temporality – or the problem of permanence – creates and perpetuates non-reciprocal relationships between architects, users, and the built environment that often results in the exploitation and alienation of the people the discipline attempts to serve. By examining architecture's failure to account for diverse temporalities, this research sheds light on the ways in which architects overlook their potential to cultivate meaningful social interactions with the built environment. The architect’s role, therefore, needs to be redefined as a translator of collective desires and needs, as a designer of structures that promote agency and empower individuals to engage with their environments. This paradigm shift implies an inquiry into the architect’s conventional design apparatus and the expansion of its scope to include tools that embrace temporality and contingency as key variables. The thesis proposes a shift in focus from the production of artifacts to the design of architectural scores inspired by allographic arts. Allographic thinking shifts the emphasis from end product to process; forcing a renegotiation of author-designer / performer-user relationships, focusing on affordances and obstacles, favoring user agency, and embracing contingency. The context of the Habitations Jeanne-Mance, a post-war social housing in Montréal, acts as a case study for an exploration of the disciplinary problems of permanence, alienation, and non-reciprocity, as well as the testing ground for a speculative design intervention that integrates allographic thinking into architecture to create a system that promotes user participation, indeterminacy, and reciprocal relationships between residents and their built environment.
The Architecture of Grief: Representing the Evolution of Shia Mourning Spaces and Contributions to Islamic Architecture
(University of Waterloo, 2025-02-13) Rizvi, Inam Zehra; Van Pelt, Robert Jan
In Shia Islam, commemorative mourning rituals for the martyrdom of Imam Hussain, the grandson of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, at the Battle of Karbala in 680 CE, have undergone a process of evolution over the past 1,400 years. In documenting the evolution of the typology of the Shia Mosque, we find that its programs are directly related to the mourning rituals and symbolic icons that they house. This evolution is marked by the migration of material and visual forms to new lands, and its resultant replications vary in their scale and in their accuracy, often interacting and absorbing the cultural underpinnings of the region it occupies. This process reflects the spatiotemporal re-imagining of the phenomenology of “parallel pilgrimages” that captivates generations of Muslims. This thesis aims to explore these practices by focusing on ritual architectural events such as craft-making, mosaic arts, processions, and the creation of replica shrines. With the aim to demystify the current Shia practices and their distinctions from universal mosque spaces, a design approach focused on religious and cultural contributions on this form of collective grief and remembrance can have an opportunity to provide a space for clarity and education for what is a heavily stigmatized practice.
Gentle Densification: Strategies for Integrating Low-Rise, Medium-Density Housing into Toronto’s Yellowbelt Neighbourhoods
(University of Waterloo, 2025-02-12) Mok, Lauren; Rynnimeri, Val
This thesis explores how alternative housing typologies can serve as viable solutions to increase development in low-rise neighbourhoods. Toronto’s current zoning only permits limited forms of densification in single-family areas, such as laneway suites, garden suites, and multiplexes up to four units, which is insufficient to address the city’s growing housing demand. The limited scope and complexity of these densification efforts highlight the need for more ambitious reforms that streamline processes, reduce costs, and promote a wider range of higher-density housing types. Gentle densification can be implemented in Toronto neighbourhoods in the form of low-rise, medium-density typologies such as multiplexes up to eight units, laneway or garden apartments and townhouses, and mixed-use apartments to increase housing options while making use of existing infrastructure. These new typologies provide suggestions for unintrusive densification by adding multi-unit buildings to single-family properties while utilizing laneways and yard space, reducing the need for the deconstruction of existing houses. The incorporation of additional public, community, and retail programs in neighbourhoods is also proposed. To allow for increased densification in single-family areas, new changes must be put forward for the zoning bylaws to enable more efficient typologies of medium-density housing and expand housing stock in neighbourhoods. This thesis focuses specifically on integrating gentle densification into the three neighbourhoods of East Willowdale, Leaside, and North Riverdale, chosen to encompass diversity in terms of existing housing types, property sizes, and household statistics. Feasibility, costs, and development scenarios for low-rise, medium-density housing are also investigated.
A Stay in the Interchange: Regenerative Cohousing in the Greater Toronto Area
(University of Waterloo, 2025-02-11) Rosel, Carlo Adrian Flores; Rynnimeri, Val
Satellite cities built around the 1960s across the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) represent the modernist belief in comprehensive architecture. The suburban arrangement of apartment towers, single-family bungalows, and warehouses – that once provided Toronto’s workforce population local access to affordable housing and stable employment – must now adapt to an ever expanding live-work pattern of a global city. Building on Koolhaas and Aureli’s theory of architectural congestion, the thesis reframes Toronto’s infill development of dense suburban homes not simply as isolated objects of market urbanism but more importantly as new pieces towards the possible intensification of pre-existing community relations, towards socioeconomic solidarity. The thesis proposes a cohousing model to be situated alongside the many underused suburban malls within the GTA, using the sites’ potential as borderland between residential neighbourhoods and employment lands to rebuild new pathways for meaningful socioeconomic interaction. The design thesis relies on a two-part research process of 1) documenting the past – through census data, Google Maps Street View images, and a collection of journal photos that captures everyday suburban social life and 2) reimagining the future – through diagram analysis of analogous projects of urban morphology (Chapter 2) and building typology (Chapter 3) that captures the potential of urban redevelopment to preserve and/or heighten workforce population’s perception of community belonging. The contemporary issue of constant migration-and-outmigration in the GTA due in part to housing unaffordability is tackled in the thesis through cohousing homeownership, with the understanding that a singular architectural response to the concept of housing security – between home and migration, between permanence and transformation – is no final answer. But a key part in the on-going self-discovery of why we continuously decide to stay living-and-working within a specific community, to continuously participate in the political life of our chosen city, and on how the spirit of a comprehensive architecture can evolve in mediating this inner social desire.
Assembling Memories: A Concept of the Architectural Worldmaking of Memories in the Metaverse
(University of Waterloo, 2025-01-22) Han, Kunheng; Beesley, Philip
This thesis explores the relationship between architecture and memory by investigating the use of immersive virtual environments (Metaverse), for recording and sharing memories by transforming personal experiences into collective architectural elements. Utilizing geolocation and augmented reality (AR) technologies, individuals document their memories of urban spaces through TikTok, which are then analyzed to extract significant characteristics to be transformed into architectural components. These digital representations are aggregated into a virtual collective memory world. Taking Japanese Village Plaza in Little Tokyo, Los Angeles as a testing ground, this thesis proposes a design concept for an architectural memory assembly interface within the Metaverse. Through virtual overlays, users engage with these spaces, creating a more immersive, dynamic, and collaborative memory experience compared to traditional preservation methods. The thesis outlines a framework for utilizing these technologies to develop a shared, evolving memory world, where users co-create spatial experiences that merge personal and collective memories in the Metaverse.
What Comes of Viscous Wood: Designing Space with Living Architecture
(University of Waterloo, 2025-01-06) Zhang, Yi Chen; Haldenby, Eric
What if buildings are grown in the future? In an urban scape of materially static architecture, unsustainable construction methods, and generic spaces designed for speed and scalability, there is incentive to find affinity with nature. One instance is through investigations of biophilic built-up environments. This thesis introduces novel construction methods and alternative spatial typologies as opportunities in architectural design, particularly, the role of living trees as a functional building. Architecture often places trees amongst buildings, as found in green roofs and living walls, or buildings amongst trees, such as tree-houses or cabins. However, there are very limited examples that propose trees as buildings. Although practiced by the ancients, few have investigated living trees as structural and aesthetic systems for building architecture. The research is only exposed through limited international designers, academics, gardeners, and artists. The purpose of this study expands upon existing knowledge in hybrid structural systems in architectural design by contextualizing baubotanik (hybrid construction with living trees and artificial structures) and arbortecture (general practice of shaping trees to create spatial context) methods in southwest Ontario, Canada while synthesizing bonsai (East Asian practice of miniaturizing trees) and arborsculpture (living-tree art) techniques. This thesis outlines general knowledge, influences, and history of tree-shaping. Subsequently, a series of small-scale experiments are designed to demonstrate the potential of shaping, structure, and inosculation qualities in trees as spatial form applications using bonsai techniques. The experiments are conducted using native willow cuttings found in southern Ontario to emulate full-scale structures. Informed from the findings, the thesis illustrates fragments of a possible future to provoke imagination, where living tree structures become plausible spaces. The hope of this study is to contribute more speculations on the potential of living-tree architecture and to build upon further development in the field of research pertaining to hybrid systems construction, sustainability, and to generate architectural discourse. As space-makers in a world facing rapid growth and sustainability challenges, what if we become space-growers instead? Let’s go outside and plant some buildings.
Let it Flood: Rethinking Flood Resilience for Indigenous Homes and Heritage
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-19) Goel, Vani; English, Elizabeth
Indigenous communities are not just the inhabitants of the land they live on, they are its stewards, storytellers and souls. Their homes, often passed down from one generation to another, hold the stories of their ancestors, struggles, and the rituals that define their sense of place. Yet, time and again, these communities are forced to evacuate due to flooding, temporarily uprooted from the lands they call home. Throughout Canada’s colonial history, numerous Indigenous communities have been displaced onto remote, flood-prone land increasing their vulnerability to floods. The impact of these repeated displacements ripple through the communities, disrupting cultural heritage, age-old traditions, and the sacred connection between land, water and people. This creates a profound sense of loss—both tangible and intangible. Many communities have felt the impacts that some residents were never able to return home, faced with the difficult decision to abandon their multigenerational homes. With floods growing in frequency and intensity, the urgency to address the impacts of climate change is more pressing than ever. Beyond the cultural, social and mental toll, the economic burden of rebuilding is staggering, with billions spent on recovery and reconstruction. Communities without access to substantial resources for protective measures often bear the brunt of the impact. But while the physical structure of a home can be rebuilt, can one really rebuild and recover a sense of belonging? This thesis advocates for amphibious architecture as a resilience-in-place approach—a way for Indigenous communities to remain safe on their land, even when floods come. Unlike relocation, which severs the deep bonds between people and place, amphibious architecture allows homes to rise with the water and settle back once it recedes, offering the possibility of living in harmony with natural cycles, rather than in fear of them. By exploring how this architectural form can be applied across Canada and incorporated into policies and regulations, I argue for a future where Indigenous communities need not choose between safety and staying on their homeland. This work is about more than protecting homes from floods; it is about safeguarding the cultural continuity and the deep connection to land that relocation threatens to erase. Ultimately, it raises the question of how architecture can protect and preserve the sacred bonds between land, water, and people, fostering a more resilient and equitable tomorrow.
An Architecture for Social Participation
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-19) Zheng, Ling, Yi; van Pelt, Robert Jan
A large and growing number of Canadian seniors are socially isolated. People’s appetite for group activities remains unfulfilled due to a lack of convenient and compelling opportunity. Introducing small-scale, locally relevant gathering places within existing neighbourhoods would support seniors aging in place and contribute toward an age-friendly community. Research into Ray Oldenburg’s concept of third place informs the creation of a best practices guide for the design of local destinations for social participation. The guide is then referenced for my design proposal of a gathering place in my Toronto neighbourhood.
Echoes of Exploitation: Tracing the Impact of Racial Capitalism in Birmingham’s Titusville Neighbourhood
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-18) Brown, Brianna Nicole St Clair; Blackwell, Adrian
This thesis examines the exclusionary planning practices that shaped the urban fabric of the United States through segregation, focusing on the Titusville neighbourhood of Birmingham, Alabama, as an illustrative example. The work highlights how cycles of capitalist oppression adapt and persist, perpetuating socioeconomic disparities among African American residents in pursuit of excess wealth. It investigates how exploitative mechanisms – such as organized abandonment, predatory inclusion, and organized violence – are reiterated and reinforced by municipal and federal policies, continuously restructuring regimes of accumulation to enshrine inequality. Through this theoretical framework, the research examines the history of Birmingham from its incorporation during the 19th century to its current state in the 21st century. The transformative theory of reparative planning provides parameters for dismantling exploitative capitalist structures. While the city’s efforts through the Titusville Community Framework Plan are a start, a lack of accountability and implementation has shifted the burden onto nonprofit community groups in the area. Insights gathered from interviews with leaders of two contrasting nonprofit organizations, the Titusville Development Corporation and the Dynamite Hill-Smithfield Community Land Trust, highlight the need for a multi-faceted approach to reparative planning. In the pursuit of anti-racist futures, combining pragmatic and transformative strategies is essential for dismantling the legacy of exclusionary planning. This study seeks to uncover the historical and ongoing impacts of these oppressive structures and advocate for reparative planning that genuinely addresses the needs of the Titusville community and, consequently, the larger American context.
Nurturing Ease: A Holistic Design Approach for Hospices in Ontario
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-18) Pereira, Olivia; Haldenby, Eric
We all encounter death in life. For those facing terminal illness, having agency to prepare for the end-of-life or the loss of a loved one is a deeply personal and profound experience. Hospice aims to provide a comforting and peaceful environment for individuals and their loved ones during this final phase of life, an alternative to the home or hospital. This thesis focuses on establishing a holistic approach to hospice design, building upon existing compassionate architecture and evidence-based practices to prioritize human experience and create opportunities for meaningful moments of connection - with oneself, loved ones, and community. This thesis integrates literature reviews, case studies, and fieldwork conducted in the Region of Waterloo to inform the architectural brief and kit of parts that shape the design proposal. Literature reviews on biophilic design and evidence-based design considerations for care environments, and case studies of hospice and adjacent residential-healthcare typologies in an international context serve as a basis for approaching hospice design. This is further contextualized to Ontario through an architectural catalogue of hospices across the province and fieldwork insights from care providers and staff of hospices in the Region of Waterloo, offering perspectives beyond what is prescribed in the current design standards informing hospice design in the province. Ultimately, this thesis seeks to define a holistic design approach for hospice residences in Ontario, one that prioritizes human experience and contributes to the growing body of international research on hospice architecture. Through this, it establishes a practical design guide that enriches the spatial requirements for future hospices in the province, fostering environments where the final moments of life are supported with sensitivity and compassion.
Dynamic Offices: Workplace Design For Individual Autonomy
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-18) Lee, Ernest; Przybylski, Maya
The hybrid work model, whereby workers divider their time between working remotely and in the office, has become more prevalent through recent years, largely accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. In contrast to the conventional way of working where all employees come into the office everyday, employees have more flexibility in their schedule on how, when, and where they want to work enabling them to optimize their productivity. Reducing the number of staff in the office when implementing the hybrid office approach can result in under-utilized spaces as the office infrastructure remains designed to accommodate a larger workforce. As a result, there is an opportunity for businesses to work in a smaller office footprint, reducing the number of supporting spaces and enabling them to be repurposed for highly collaborative program. Furthermore, a hot desk system—where employees share and use any available workstation—can be implemented to optimize space utilization. However, the implementation of hot desks leads to a disconnect between the user and the workspace. Staff members will not arrive to the office to use the same personal desk every time. The lack of consistency requires employees to adapt to spaces that are available on a given day. As the space is shared, occupants lose control of their environment and become unable to customize it according to their preferences. This thesis explores how a shared workplace can be designed to make use of the efficiencies of the hot desk model as implemented in response to a hybrid work environment while allowing the space to feel personal and familiar by leveraging qualities from design that is both flexible and adaptable. The exploration is carried out through design exercises exploring three scales of intervention. An existing building is selected and reimagined to accommodate multiple tenants operating on hybrid schedules with attention to space optimization and shared programming. At the intermediate scale, a modular system-based approach to floorplan layouts is introduced, allowing the space to be reconfigured while maintaining design cohesion and accommodate constant changes occurring within an organization. At the smallest scale, a workstation with automated reconfigurable elements is designed to provide familiarity and personalization within a hot desk system approach. These interventions are unified through a carefully balanced integration of technology that enhances user experience while providing valuable insight into how the space is performing. These interventions extend beyond the scope of efficiency; it improves the experience of those working in the space which leads to enhanced productivity, collaboration, and a stimulating working environment.
Niagara Escarpment II : Exploring Soleri's Arcology
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-17) El-Naggar, Maryam; Rynnimeri, Val
This thesis explores the ecological potential of an Arcology within a utopic and visionary context. Niagara Escarpment II is an adaptation of Paolo Soleri’s Arcology with an Italian hill town aesthetic, using today’s technological systems with an intent to integrate ecology and urban settlements in Niagara Falls to resolve environmental concerns. This is a rejection of the current technologically driven “Green Skyscrapers” and “Eco Towers” and proposes an alternative with an ecological inclination. The exploration of integrating ecological processes back into urban processes is historically a heavily researched theme but rarely discussed within the context of an Arcology. A close examination of Paolo Soleri’s Arcology, engineered systems of megastructures, examination of indigenous architecture of the Mat Buildings, and analysis of the System’s thinking details a niche for this iteration of the Arcology. This thesis has a pragmatic approach to ecological processes and explores what architectural features work for ecology and what do not. The thesis hypothesizes that a successful Arcology must be designed on a massive scale to integrate fauna, flora, farming, living systems, aquifers, and aquaponics systems into urban settlements to improve air cycles and water cycles within the structure of the Arcology. The goal is to offer a design methodology that shows visible ecological and urban systems on multi-scales through sections within the Arcology. This is achieved by analyzing the design process into Structural organization, Human, and Ecological Processes, and integrating key interactions within the Heat, Water, Waste, and Energy System models integrated within the Arcology. The intention is to provide ecosystem services to the social system by integrating networks with low-tech biological metabolisms. The systems focus on resolving non-linear, dynamic, and cyclic within the structure. The Niagara Escarpment II is designed for 11‘000 visitors, 11’000 residents where each resident will have approximately, 2 trees, 37 plants, 56 plants for food, and Plants that recycle wastewater to deliver a water cycle of 3-5 days, depending on water use. Arcology is not only developed to improve the quality of life for individuals within but intends to increase the Niagara Escarpment’s expansion and increase naturalization of the city of Niagara Falls along the peripheries by up to 17%. The Arcology in turn must be a massive structure, with substantial carbon-embodied structural systems to hold these systems. The proposal of this Arcology involves an interdisciplinary team to govern these systems within the lifetime of this Arcology and phasing for 16 years from start to finish. This research offers a deep dive into ecological and social integration and systems analysis within a large-scale Arcology framework.
Food as Care Infrastructure: A Framework for Alternative Food Networks in the Neighbourhood of Jane and Finch, Toronto
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-17) Hanna, Simone Samy Helmy; Fortin, David
This thesis examines the conventional food system and its relationship to urban issues, including food insecurity and climate change. The conventional food system is embedded in a centralized global market that commodifies food, relying on the excessive extraction of natural resources, fossil fuel use, genetic modification, chemical-intensive production, exploitation of cheap labour, and destruction of natural habitats. This system was conceived in the Industrial Age when food landscapes in cities diminished in the wake of industrial agriculture. This marked the beginning of the urban-rural dichotomy, where food production was attributed as a rural issue and not an urban one, severing the relationship between urban consumers and their food. Issues of pollution, poverty and malnutrition were prevalent in that period, leading social activists and visionaries to reimagine city landscapes with more equitable food landscapes. As such, this thesis explores the diverse spatial potential of existing (sub)urban landscapes to address challenges exacerbated by the conventional food system on its consumers and the climate. This is demonstrated through research on the implementation of municipal food policies and various scales of food infrastructure, which have the potential to address the gaps left by the conventional food system. This research is emphasized through a conceptual design proposal in the Black Creek neighbourhood in Jane-Finch, Toronto, which suffers from unprecedented levels of food insecurity. The design illustrates the potential for alternative food networks at the neighbourhood scale, featuring a Community Food Centre and farm at its heart to foster a more sustainable and resilient local food system focused on consumer well-being and environmental health.
Burning Up: Fire Safety Barriers to Low Embodied Carbon Housing in the NBCC
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-12) Perry, Maxwell; Straube, John; Sheppard, Lola
The National Building Code of Canada (NBCC) emerged in response to, and developed from, catastrophic conflagrations throughout history which demanded the need for consistent construction and fire safety standards for buildings across the country. While fire safety remains an essential consideration in the development of Canadian society, many Code requirements inadvertently prescribe construction with high embodied carbon – emissions arising from the production, maintenance, and disposal of building materials – failing to recognize climate change as an existential threat. This thesis identifies, quantifies, and proposes alternatives to fire safety regulations within Part 3 of the NBCC that impede the design of low embodied carbon housing, particularly in missing middle and mid-rise typologies. While removing these regulatory barriers will not directly reduce embodied carbon, it enables future construction to have lower embodied carbon emissions which is critical to addressing Canada’s ongoing climate and housing crises. Significant emissions reductions must occur in order to keep global temperatures from rising above +2°C and avoid climate catastrophe. Embodied carbon contributes approximately 13% of Canadian emissions and is essential to address, especially as operational carbon decreases with decarbonized energy and greater insulation. Missing middle and mid-rise housing offer the opportunity to provide low embodied carbon housing, however current NBCC regulations inhibit these benefits by prescribing urban, formal, and material requirements that are more restrictive than necessary. The contemporary version of the NBCC is the result of continuous incremental development which reflects historical perspectives, scientific research, shifting social values, and arbitrary adjustments that can trace its roots back to the London fire of 1087. Construction materials, fire detection and suppression, and occupant behaviour have shifted significantly since the underlying structure of the building code was written. This work analyzes the Code as not only a technical document, but also as a historical and political artifact, emphasizing the importance of reconsidering regulatory assumptions in light of current fire safety and climate goals. Critically, the Code must explicitly include embodied carbon as one of its objectives. Part 3 of the NBCC, which governs fire protection, accessibility, and safety, holds the potential to significantly reduce embodied carbon both through the amelioration of its explicit barriers, and through its influence on holistic design decisions. Seven barriers to low carbon housing at the urban, building, and material scale are identified through literature and expert interviews. Furter, their impact on fire safety and embodied carbon is analyzed, resulting in proposed changes which range from specific Code amendments to broad directions for future development. The findings demonstrate that there are significant opportunities to align NBCC regulations with low embodied carbon goals without compromising fire safety. While the list of barriers investigated is inexhaustive, the breadth serves to illustrate the persistent manner that the Code specifies high embodied carbon while defining which changes are most impactful in emissions reduction. They provide starting points for more focused research and offer a framework through which to critically evaluate the Code. The work encourages architects and associated professionals to view the NBCC as a malleable document and advocates for greater involvement in future editions. Further, this thesis makes a unique contribution by identifying the relationship between fire safety and embodied carbon and by addressing their potential interactions through quantifiable metrics.
Revitalizing Montreal’s Industrial Fabric: A Case Study of the Pointe-du-Moulin and the Farine Five Roses Flour Mill.
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-12) Baudoux, Anthea Loane Hinanui; Andrighetti, Rick
This thesis explores the revitalization of Montreal's industrial fabric by examining the unique site of Pointe-du-Moulin and its famous "Farine Five Roses" flour mill. This pier is known for being home to numerous flour mills, key structures that have influenced architects around the world with their monumental scale and simple forms. Flour mills played an essential role in shaping North America's urban fabric, communities and society. However, these landmark structures have disappeared from the cities' landscape, leaving only a few flour mills remaining in Canada. Most of these mills have been demolished, abandoned or relocated as cities expand into their industrial zones. These areas, often considered to be neglected and not accessible to the public, seem to be an ideal option for new residential development. This is especially apparent in Montreal, where Pointe-du-Moulin is now at the heart of a new urban redevelopment called "Bridge-Bonaventure". This development will lead to the demolition of numerous industrial buildings, giving little space and attention to the renowned Farine Five Roses flour mill. This thesis emphasizes the importance of flour mills in North America and proposes an urban design strategy that integrates and creates a public identity around the Farine Five Roses flour mill in Montreal. This thesis aims to preserve this industrial site's unique character and create a development unique to Montreal. The preservation of this flour mill will demonstrate that this industry can coexist with residential housing while enriching life on the pier and creating a common identity. This approach will revive these structures' historical and cultural values while meeting the city's future needs.
It's Not a Room, It's The Home I'll Never Have
(University of Waterloo, 2024-12-11) Kaczmarczyk, Magdalena; Bissett, Tara
Humanity and architecture have been in a long dialogue with Utopia. Since Thomas More’s publication in the 1500s, the term of “Utopia” has been adopted by architects, artists, and intellectuals alike, using it as either a point of contentious discussion, or as something to strive for. Within architecture, the application of utopia has been vast, from Boullée and Ledoux to the speculative architectures of Cedric Price and Superstudio in the 60s–70s. These utopias, despite the variances of design outcomes, all share a common denominator: the intent to design the ideal. Using the architectural utopia as a framework, It’s Not a Room, It’s The Home I’ll Never Have is a theoretical research and speculative design thesis that investigates the condition of Canada’s housing crisis, entitled The City of Rooms. In the thesis, the role of critical utopias within architecture is explored through generative artificial intelligence (genAI) as a proxy for neoliberalist design and decision making. The work questions the self-iterative neoliberal trends, and envisions an optimizational utopia in which minimum dwelling units are the ideal response to the question of the housing crisis through a set of speculative images located in Toronto. If the goal of the critical utopia is to examine how we live, then the current housing crisis that many major Canadian cities are facing can serve as an urgent case for such analysis; the alienating real-estate development, privatization, and profit optimization has continuously resulted in smaller and smaller living space and exacerbates the existing housing crisis. This problem stems from a set of neoliberalist policy changes in the 80s, where the Canadian government loosened tenancy protections, eliminated funding for affordable housing, and deregulated the financial sector. Lacking specific regulation to prevent this, the problem has evolved into a self-iterative system that propagates to this day. Ultimately, the key impact of this research is to reveal and critically analyze the neoliberal techniques employed in the housing market in Toronto, while showcasing the beneficial use-case of speculative design when bringing the ideology to its logical, utopian conclusion.

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