BRIGITTE SHIM
FRAIC, CM, RCA, Hon. FAIA, OAA, EASLA
Founding Partner, Shim-Sutcliffe Architects
Brigitte Shim was born in Kingston, Jamaica and lives in Toronto, Canada which is her home. She studied architecture and environmental studies at the University of Waterloo, Canada. In 1994, Shim and her partner A. Howard Sutcliffe founded Shim-Sutcliffe Architects in Toronto, Canada. Their design practice explores the integration and interrelated scales of architecture, landscape, furniture and fittings. Shim-Sutcliffe have realized built work in Canada, the United States, Europe and Asia focusing on place-making.
To date, Shim and Sutcliffe have received sixteen Governor General’s Medals for Architecture from the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC) along with many other professional accolades for their built work. In January 2013, Brigitte Shim and her partner A. Howard Sutcliffe were both awarded the Order of Canada, “for their contributions as architects designing sophisticated structures that represent the best of Canadian design to the world.” In 2021, the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada awarded Brigitte Shim and A. Howard Sutcliffe, the RAIC Gold Medal for their “tireless commitment to advocacy, teaching and mentoring along with their commitment to craft, tectonics, site and ecology in their built work and its lasting impact on Canadian architecture.”
Professor Brigitte Shim is a faculty member at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design at the University of Toronto. Brigitte Shim is the 2022, Norman Foster Visiting Professor at Yale University’s School of Architecture and has been a visiting chair and lecturer at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL), The Cooper Union’s Chanin School of Architecture, The University of Auckland, and others. She has served on numerous international, national and local design juries as an unwavering advocate for design excellence. She is a member of Building Equity in Toronto (BEAT) Advisory Committee, a member of Waterfront Toronto’s Design Review and aboard member of the Toronto Arts Foundation.
FRAIC, CM, RCA, Hon. FAIA, OAA, EASLA
Founding Partner, Shim-Sutcliffe Architects
Brigitte Shim was born in Kingston, Jamaica and lives in Toronto, Canada which is her home. She studied architecture and environmental studies at the University of Waterloo, Canada. In 1994, Shim and her partner A. Howard Sutcliffe founded Shim-Sutcliffe Architects in Toronto, Canada. Their design practice explores the integration and interrelated scales of architecture, landscape, furniture and fittings. Shim-Sutcliffe have realized built work in Canada, the United States, Europe and Asia focusing on place-making.
To date, Shim and Sutcliffe have received sixteen Governor General’s Medals for Architecture from the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC) along with many other professional accolades for their built work. In January 2013, Brigitte Shim and her partner A. Howard Sutcliffe were both awarded the Order of Canada, “for their contributions as architects designing sophisticated structures that represent the best of Canadian design to the world.” In 2021, the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada awarded Brigitte Shim and A. Howard Sutcliffe, the RAIC Gold Medal for their “tireless commitment to advocacy, teaching and mentoring along with their commitment to craft, tectonics, site and ecology in their built work and its lasting impact on Canadian architecture.”
Professor Brigitte Shim is a faculty member at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design at the University of Toronto. Brigitte Shim is the 2022, Norman Foster Visiting Professor at Yale University’s School of Architecture and has been a visiting chair and lecturer at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL), The Cooper Union’s Chanin School of Architecture, The University of Auckland, and others. She has served on numerous international, national and local design juries as an unwavering advocate for design excellence. She is a member of Building Equity in Toronto (BEAT) Advisory Committee, a member of Waterfront Toronto’s Design Review and aboard member of the Toronto Arts Foundation.
Project Spotlight
WONG DAI SIN TEMPLE
The Wong Dai Sin Temple is a modern sacred space that houses a dynamic Taoist community committed to their inner spiritual development through the ancient physical practice of tai chi. The Fung Loy Kok Institute of Taoism needed a new spiritual home in suburban Toronto that had to reflect not only the heart and soul of their religious beliefs but also the modern contemporary world of their congregants.
This new temple building demonstrates asymmetry and counterbalance while maintaining its equilibrium much like a measured tai chi pose. The building’s south elevation reveals a major and minor cantilever supported on slender concrete piers. The exterior facades are clad in shaped weathering steel vertical fins to control views from the inside looking out.
Inside the Wong Dai Sin Temple, large circular motorized skylights are linked to large red light monitors which defines the natural light entering the space and also provides supports for large rings of incense used for Taoist chanting and prayer ceremonies. These glowing red lanterns of varying diameters create a cosmic ceiling plan and provide ethereal natural light which co-mingles with burning incense creating a spiritual space linking sky and ground and connecting our interior self with the external world beyond.
Within the prayer hall is the most introverted space in the Wong Dai Sin Temple which is its memorial hall, a contemplative space where ancestors are honoured. Bamboo memorial plaques line this internal wooden room providing a place for private contemplation.
This space is inextricably tied to other ancient Wong Dai Sin Temples in other parts of the world through its manipulation and amplification of natural light, its instrumental use of colour and its commitment to a carefully composed and tactile material palette. The daily worship of one of the world’s ancient religion of Taoism is embedded in the fabric of this modern sacred space.
WONG DAI SIN TEMPLE
The Wong Dai Sin Temple is a modern sacred space that houses a dynamic Taoist community committed to their inner spiritual development through the ancient physical practice of tai chi. The Fung Loy Kok Institute of Taoism needed a new spiritual home in suburban Toronto that had to reflect not only the heart and soul of their religious beliefs but also the modern contemporary world of their congregants.
This new temple building demonstrates asymmetry and counterbalance while maintaining its equilibrium much like a measured tai chi pose. The building’s south elevation reveals a major and minor cantilever supported on slender concrete piers. The exterior facades are clad in shaped weathering steel vertical fins to control views from the inside looking out.
Inside the Wong Dai Sin Temple, large circular motorized skylights are linked to large red light monitors which defines the natural light entering the space and also provides supports for large rings of incense used for Taoist chanting and prayer ceremonies. These glowing red lanterns of varying diameters create a cosmic ceiling plan and provide ethereal natural light which co-mingles with burning incense creating a spiritual space linking sky and ground and connecting our interior self with the external world beyond.
Within the prayer hall is the most introverted space in the Wong Dai Sin Temple which is its memorial hall, a contemplative space where ancestors are honoured. Bamboo memorial plaques line this internal wooden room providing a place for private contemplation.
This space is inextricably tied to other ancient Wong Dai Sin Temples in other parts of the world through its manipulation and amplification of natural light, its instrumental use of colour and its commitment to a carefully composed and tactile material palette. The daily worship of one of the world’s ancient religion of Taoism is embedded in the fabric of this modern sacred space.
