Arch2O.com

Arch2O.com - Architecture & Design Magazine
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 place of worship is located on a major suburban arterial road surrounded by a shopping mall and cul de sac?s lined with oversized single family residential mansions.
Courtesy of Shim-Sutcliffe Architects – Photographs : James Dow

This new temple building demonstrates asymmetry and counterbalance while maintaining its equilibrium much like a measured tai chi pose. The building?s south elevation is visible from the busy roadway to the south, reveals a major and minor cantilever supported on slender concrete piers. Stringent on-site parking requirements necessitated elevating the spiritual space above ground and providing surface parking below. This sacred space is supported on a two-way concrete slab integrated with seven rectangular poured in place structural concrete piers tied to a robust raft foundation. Courtesy of Shim-Sutcliffe Architects – Photographs : James Dow

The two-way bonded post tensioned concrete slab system with its 10.2m cantilever on the west hovers over the parking area which act...