Architecture school closer to reality

BY HEIDI ULRICHSEN

If all goes well, Greater Sudbury’s architecture school could open in 2009.

Blaine Nicholls, a retired architect, is the chair of the Northern Ontario School of Architecture steering committee that is attempting to set up the first new architecture school in Canada in 35 years.

He said he hopes to see a day soon when there are 400 Laurentian University architecture students working towards bachelor’s and master’s degrees.

Two weeks ago, Nicholls’ group received a $40,000 grant from the Greater Sudbury Development Corporation to do the second phase of a feasibility study.

The steering committee is also seeking funding for the feasibility study from FedNor and the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation. Once the feasibility study is complete, more funding would be needed to secure a location and hire faculty.

“What this funding is going to do is provide part of the salary of a project manager who we’re in the process of hiring,” he said.

“That project manager will have two mandates: to work with the committee to prepare and complete phase two of the feasibility study report. We’re aiming for that to be complete by March or April. The second responsibility will be to take over the ongoing project development strategy.”

Guy Labine, chair of the development corporation, said the board decided to support the feasibility study because it’s an important project for the community.

“We’ve got a group of individuals who have formed a committee to explore the viability, feasibility and start-up of a school of architecture,” he said.

 This project has the potential to be a significant economic development initiative for the city.”

Nicholls said the architecture school will be likely located in downtown Sudbury instead of on Laurentian’s campus so students could draw inspiration from an urban setting.

The students’ projects will be good for the downtown area, he said.

The School of Architecture at the University of Waterloo is located in Cambridge (downtown Galt).

“It was a tremendous success. The community of Cambridge realized early on the impact that kind of school would have.”

The architecture school will also have a positive impact on all of Northern Ontario, he said.

As with the Northern Ontario School of Medicine, partnerships will be formed with communities across the north so students will have an opportunity to do co-op placements outside of Sudbury.

There’s certainly a demand for a new architecture school, said Nicholls. There are only 10 architecture programs in the country, and some have 1,500 applications for 70 spots.

The Northern Ontario School of Architecture would also create partnerships with other educational institutions and other organizations to make its programming unique.

Nicholls sees potential in working with Cambrian College, which is building a Sustainable Energy Centre, where students will learn how to construct green residential and small commercial buildings, and industry will conduct research.

Both Cambrian College and Collège Boréal have 3D animation programs. This type of technology is used in architectural work, he said.

Sudbury Secondary School has a fine arts program, and may feed students into the architecture school, said Nicholls.
One of the objectives of an architecture school for Northern Ontario would be to increase the proportion of architects in the population, said Nicholls. The economy stands to benefit from more architects, he said.

“If you look at the forestry industry in Northern Ontario, we are cutting trees and selling logs, and one adds value to that industry by sawing it into two-by-fours,” Nicholls said.

“You look at Scandanavian countries where they overlay that activity with a fair amount of design and creativity. You have things like IKEA coming out where you’re adding a lot of value to a particular industry by adding design capacity.”

An architecture school would also greatly contribute to Northern Ontario’s cultural community, he said.

“Bringing a school to Northern Ontario brings an injection of  very creative and bright young people and faculty to the north. The kind of projects that a school of architecture undertakes just as a part of their regular curriculum connects really well with a community.”