Every two years, the prestigious Governor General?s Medals in Architecture recognize and celebrate outstanding design in recently built projects by Canadian architects. The competition, established by the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada in collaboration with the Canada Council for the Arts, continues a tradition initiated by the Massey Medals in 1950. Here are this year?s winners.
 
SFU STADIUM
ARCHITECT Perkins&Will
LOCATION Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia
The jewel of the new stadium at Simon Fraser University is a mass timber canopy that seemingly floats above the central seating area. Photo by Andrew Latreille
Erickson Massey?s original masterplan for SFU?s Burnaby campus included concrete bleachers in front of the Lorne Davies Complex (LDC)?housing gyms, a fitness centre, and a pool?to provide seating for sporting and cultural events. Deemed too expensive at the time, the seating was never constructed, and the campus has lacked this critical community-building space.  In 2012, the Simon Fraser Student Society passed a vote to collect an annual levy from students to fund the construction of new student facilities, including a stadium. The resulting design takes inspiration from the terraced planes of the original masterplan, and maintains the LDC?s key experiential element of uninterrupted views to the south from its pool deck. The stadium is conceived as a minimal intervention synchronized to the structural rhythm of the LDC, and to...