Green Phoenix project

What: Parkdale United Church - Parkdale Place and Shalom house renovations and addition
Where: 1339 and 1355 King Street West (Parkdale), Toronto, ON

In January 2005 the Parkdale United Church Foundation (PUCF) had their build committee put together a design charrette that ran 2 1/2 days and was sponsored by CMHC.

It was a highlight for me to be asked to be a facilitator for the Blue team. This is a really interesting project about a housing project with a fabulous list of participants.

I was reminded how amazing the experience was when I recently was asked to come and make a presentation to the architectural technology students taking a Sustainable Design course (the course I developed and usually teach) at Sheridan College about the IDP process and the Green Phoenix project charrette. Putting together the slide show was a great way to review the great people involved, gave me a chance to read the final report (posted on their web site) as well as see where the project is today.

I also contacted the church to find out how the documentary they were filming is coming. Looks like they were initially waiting to publish when the entire project was done but I asked if they could put something together on just the charrette not only for this course but because I think lots of schools would be interested in screening something like this AND because I think the industry as a whole is scrambling to learn how to hold and run charrettes. They thought they might be able to get something together from the 70+ hours of footage in maybe a month. Let's hope so!