ADNETH MARIE KAZE
Showcase on Church Street-Design Development




This project represents a proposal for a small gallery along Church Street, Toronto, located adjacent to Court square. The client for this project is Sarah Hall and the Gallery is fo¬cused on her work, stained glass and glass technology. Glass is the central component of the gallery. For the design of it, I decided to explore the properties of glass and play with contrasting elements of it. For instance, glass is a hard material, it has a great impact on resistance against an applied load. At the same time, it is a brittle material as it breaks immediately when subjected to load. In this case, the contrast of strength and fragility came out as an interesting aspect to play with in regard to the design of the building.

To represent this, I used a strong and robust material like concrete and glass, stacking them on top of one and another in such way that it creates a sense of imbalance, reinforcing the perceived fragility of glass.

Continuing with this idea of fragility and strength can possi­bly lead to breakage and shatter. As seen in the diagram here, I was inspired by the fragility and breakage of glass to design the space. It is reflected through sharp corners, anglers and straight lines.