Dream Houses, Toy Homes
Through selections from the CCA’s collection of architectural toys and games, including 33 European and North American architectural toys dating from the early nineteenth century to 1995, Dream Houses, Toy Homes examines the notions of home, childhood, play, gender, and learning. The exhibition uncovers the potential of toys to embody images and ideas of domestic(...)
Dream Houses, Toy Homes
Actions:
Description:
Through selections from the CCA’s collection of architectural toys and games, including 33 European and North American architectural toys dating from the early nineteenth century to 1995, Dream Houses, Toy Homes examines the notions of home, childhood, play, gender, and learning. The exhibition uncovers the potential of toys to embody images and ideas of domestic(...)
articles
Origins of the digital
4 May 2026
Media Environments: Architecture and Communication Networks
Nathalie Bredella on architecture's first encounter with media theory
Actions:
Origins of the digital
Learning from... Nairobi
Italian documentary and architecture photographer Filippo Romano presents his ongoing study of Nairobi’s exploding slums. The city is represented through the many portraits of residents, workers and communities he captured, giving evidence of the built environment that shapes local urban cultures. The Learning From… series takes its title from Learning From Las Vegas(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theatre
9 October 2014 , 6pm
Learning from... Nairobi
Actions:
Description:
Italian documentary and architecture photographer Filippo Romano presents his ongoing study of Nairobi’s exploding slums. The city is represented through the many portraits of residents, workers and communities he captured, giving evidence of the built environment that shapes local urban cultures. The Learning From… series takes its title from Learning From Las Vegas(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theatre
Meat and dairy products are ubiquitous ingredients in the globe’s diet. However, the buildings that transform living beings into commodities are usually hidden from the public eye. The architecture of factory farming may seem anonymous and banal, and yet it is made possible by sophisticated technologies and practices of biosecurity. How was the design of intensive animal(...)
20 July 2023, 6pm to 7:30pm
Cages for non-humans: An architectural history of animal farming
Actions:
Description:
Meat and dairy products are ubiquitous ingredients in the globe’s diet. However, the buildings that transform living beings into commodities are usually hidden from the public eye. The architecture of factory farming may seem anonymous and banal, and yet it is made possible by sophisticated technologies and practices of biosecurity. How was the design of intensive animal(...)
Learning from... Athens
Konstantinos Pantazis, co-founder of Point Supreme, discusses the work of the Athens-based practice. The talk focuses on ways to challenge the current crisis condition, proactive proposals for improving the city, addressing the collective unconscious, and building without money. It presents the processes behind examples from the two opposite ends of Point Supreme’s(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theatre
7 April 2016, 6pm
Learning from... Athens
Actions:
Description:
Konstantinos Pantazis, co-founder of Point Supreme, discusses the work of the Athens-based practice. The talk focuses on ways to challenge the current crisis condition, proactive proposals for improving the city, addressing the collective unconscious, and building without money. It presents the processes behind examples from the two opposite ends of Point Supreme’s(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theatre
Members of the Montréal collective SYN-atelier d’exploration urbaine present a workshop investigating urban microclimates in downtown Montréal. Caused by particular conditions in urban construction, microclimates are environments that have surprising temperature variations — a building courtyard that is several degrees warmer than the street or a windy alley many degrees(...)
7 March 2009
Exploring Urban Microclimates
Actions:
Description:
Members of the Montréal collective SYN-atelier d’exploration urbaine present a workshop investigating urban microclimates in downtown Montréal. Caused by particular conditions in urban construction, microclimates are environments that have surprising temperature variations — a building courtyard that is several degrees warmer than the street or a windy alley many degrees(...)
Freegans
Hong Kong journalist Emily Rauhala speaks about the anticonsumerist philosophy of the “freegans” or “dumpster divers.” These individuals collect the tremendous quantities of still usable food and other goods that can be found in the trash containers of our cities, either to distribute to the needy or for their own personal use. Rauhala worked with Lorenzo Morales, a(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
8 January 2009
Freegans
Actions:
Description:
Hong Kong journalist Emily Rauhala speaks about the anticonsumerist philosophy of the “freegans” or “dumpster divers.” These individuals collect the tremendous quantities of still usable food and other goods that can be found in the trash containers of our cities, either to distribute to the needy or for their own personal use. Rauhala worked with Lorenzo Morales, a(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
Architecture, though constrained by boundaries of function and structure, is always ultimately an act of the imagination. Potential Architecture: Construction Toys from the CCA Collection explores twenty-one construction toys, made in the hundred years from 1850 to 1950, that were designed to challenge a child’s creativity. The toys illustrate how children learn to invent(...)
Octagonal gallery
4 December 1991 to 8 March 1992
Potential Architecture: Construction Toys from the CCA Collection
Actions:
Description:
Architecture, though constrained by boundaries of function and structure, is always ultimately an act of the imagination. Potential Architecture: Construction Toys from the CCA Collection explores twenty-one construction toys, made in the hundred years from 1850 to 1950, that were designed to challenge a child’s creativity. The toys illustrate how children learn to invent(...)
Octagonal gallery
articles
River as Invitation
River as Invitation
Jia Chen Mi, Marie-Ellen Houde-Hostland, and Hannah Thiessen rethink relationships with the Mitis River
Actions:
Siza Speaks
Portuguese architect and Pritzker prize-winner Álvaro Siza presents a rare lecture in North America on the design development of the Iberê Camargo Museum in Porto Alegre, a structure noted for its sculptural volumes and tight integration with a coastal escarpment. He discusses the key role of hand sketches in the design process, from massing studies to fine-tuning(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theater
26 April 2012 , 7pm
Siza Speaks
Actions:
Description:
Portuguese architect and Pritzker prize-winner Álvaro Siza presents a rare lecture in North America on the design development of the Iberê Camargo Museum in Porto Alegre, a structure noted for its sculptural volumes and tight integration with a coastal escarpment. He discusses the key role of hand sketches in the design process, from massing studies to fine-tuning(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theater