2025 RAIC Gold Medal: Ethics in Action
“I think you can’t be complacent as a citizen,” says Shirley Blumberg. It’s an ethical stance that she has brought to her work on projects at all scales at KPMB, as well as to pro bono advocacy initiatives. Here’s our interview with 2025 RAIC Gold Medalist Shirley Blumberg.
Shirley Blumberg and then Governor General of Canada, David Johnston, upon receiving her Order of Canada recognition. Photo by Sgt Ronald Duchesne, Rideau Hall, OSGG
Elsa Lam: Why don’t we start with your upbringing in South Africa?
Shirley Blumberg: I was born in Cape Town, South Africa, which is stunningly beautiful. South Africa had a very robust tradition of modern architecture, courtyard houses and terraces, because of the Mediterranean climate in Cape Town. And my parents had commissioned an architect to design a home—which was completed apparently just in time for when I was born—on the mountain side, overlooking the ocean with a huge terrace with colours painted on it. And because I was a third child, they just left me out on the terrace. So my infancy was spent surrounded by colours and in the open, which was just fine with me.
EL: What did your parents do?
SB: My mom came to Cape Town as a 12-year-old, in the mid-1930s, from Belarus. My dad’s parents had immigrated from Lithuania before the first World War, but his dad had died and his mother was very poor, running a grocery store in Johannesburg.
My dad didn’t have the opportunity to go to university. He fought with the South African forces, and when the veterans got a certain sum of money, and he opened a furniture store and eventually ran a couple of furniture stores.
My dad used to make these trains out of tin cans—he drew and he was always really good with his hands. And he had a workshop at the lower level, off the garage. That was my happy place—to hang out in the workshop with my dad.
Growing up in South Africa had an indelible impact because of apartheid. It was very personal for me. Dora—who I call my African mother—came to work for my family when she was 22 and I was two. And her daughter, Wilma, was the same age as me. They lived in a little flat at the garden level. And so Wilma and I grew up playing together as kids. And I would go to my white school, she would go to her coloured school. And she came first in class, and I came first in class, and every afternoon we played together. And then Wilma started failing when we got to adolescence. And I thought, what happened there? I saw her hanging around with an older guy on the corner, and Dora sent her back to the country town they were from. She was really very smart, and she became a teacher, which is the highest thing you could do at that time within the apartheid system as a Black person. And that was so shocking to me.
I did my first year at the University of Cape Town and was very active. It was a liberal university, and we were very involved in demonstrations and marches, and running away from Afrikaners wielding cricket bats, stuff like that. There were spies at the university. You couldn’t talk freely. There was censorship—you could hear the clicking on the phones. It was very much an unjust government and a controlling state. It was very serious business to oppose the party: people were getting killed, having their arms blown off, et cetera. All the student leaders got what they call “banned,” had their passports taken away, and they were under house arrest.
That’s why I do the social justice projects and why I do the advocacy, because I think you can’t be complacent as a citizen. In South Africa, you could not be on the fence. It was so polarizing, but it also made you feel alive, too. Your life had a real sense of purpose. And Canada’s facing that, now, because things were always absolutely fine here, but it’s not anymore.
EL: Tell me about coming to Canada.
SB: We left South Africa to go to England, and it was the oil crisis. People were working four-day weeks by candlelight in London. We were there for a year, and then we emigrated to Canada. It was 1973: you had Expo 67, you had Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Canada looked like Nirvana. I absolutely did not want to go to the U.S. because I knew about the South and their racist laws.
EL: How did you decide that you wanted to be an architect?
SB: My sister encouraged me, because I really loved drawing and I loved reading. I loved English, history, math, science, geography, everything—I was one of those. And she said, it’s perfect. I knew nothing about it, but I loved it. At university, there were very few women in the class, no female professors, even here at U of T. I never dreamt it was possible to have this life.
A photo of Barton Myers’ office from 1978, including Shirley Blumberg, seated at left. Photo from KPMB Archives
EL: There were also not many female practitioners at that time.
SB: There were only about five women in my class when I graduated. And then Barton Myers was great, because it was like the youth investment program. Barton is such a great architect, and he would spend a lot of time mentoring us, and he threw us into the deep end. It was a small office, and we did everything. So we were very fortunate that way—we learned so much. And then it was like the coach leaving the team. He went to L.A. and he tried to convince some of the associates to go with him, and none of us wanted to go. At that time, we were playing in an architectural baseball league. We called ourselves the L.A. Dodgers. He was not amused. So one day, it was Barton Myers Associates. The next day it was Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg, and we started with 16 people. It was kind of amazing.
EL: Tell me about the structure of the firm and how that’s evolved.
SB: We looked and tried to find some kind of model. We were coming from the Barton model—the white male practitioner, very high at the top and very hierarchical. And there was the model of the husband-and-wife practice, of course, but we weren’t that. We truly believed we were better together than as individuals, and we wanted to work in a collaborative way. And we were very proud of being Canadian, and we wanted to stay in Toronto and do great architecture from here. The previous generation was not as collegial as we thought was appropriate, so we wanted to change that as well. And we wanted to raise the culture of architecture in Toronto, and across Canada, if we could.
Canada, when I came in the seventies, it was so aspirational. In the early eighties we felt that there was a lot that was really positive about the country, about how diverse it was.
Led by Shirley Blumberg and Bruce Kuwabara, King James Place in Toronto is an early adaptive reuse project that won the firm a 1992 Governor General’s Award of Merit in Architecture. Photo courtesy KPMB
In the beginning, I worked quite a lot with Bruce. But the wonderful thing about architecture—it is a very long apprenticeship, but eventually you find your own voice. There’s enough elasticity in our firm for each of us to flourish. While Marianne and I have different focuses, the three of us absolutely share the same values.
We were very clear: no bread-and-butter work. Every project counts. Every seven years, we would say what we wanted to achieve in the next seven years. We said we wanted to do institutional work, academic work. We wanted to work in the States. And it worked.
We also realized very early on, we’re not for everybody, so we stopped competing with firms who would lower their fees, or do work that was just not great quality. We tried to position ourselves in the world of architecture at a certain level. And if you think of that, you go there.
As partners, we are a bit like siblings, but we’re very complimentary to each other. We all have different skills and talents, but we’re all very much focused in the same direction, which doesn’t mean we don’t disagree. I think one of the reasons we’ve been partners for so long is we are perfectly comfortable arguing with each other, but then we always talk things through. We’ve never voted on a decision. We’ve always talked it through, and I think that’s really healthy.
Shirley Blumberg leads an engagement session with stakeholders from Princeton University. Photo courtesy KPMB
EL: Can you give me an example?
SB: Years and years ago, we got an invitation from Monsanto to compete for designing some kind of office building for them. We all used to meet on a Monday morning, and everyone was so excited. And I said, whoa, there’s no way we’re going to work for a company like that. I feel if we don’t hold to our values, then all the work we’ve done falls apart.
EL: Sometimes, your advocacy work also affects the project work your firm could potentially get, like with the Monument to the Victims
of Communism in Ottawa.
SB: Yes, I was on the jury. It turned out the site was right in the judicial precinct—it was the remaining open site right next to the Supreme Court. When I realized what exactly was going on—it was highly politicized—it was so appalling that I resigned from the jury, and contacted [Ottawa architect] Barry Padolsky, who arranged for me to speak to a reporter from the Ottawa Citizen.
I told Marianne and Bruce, look, I have to do this. This is outrageous. We’ll never get work from the Harper government, but we shouldn’t work for them anyway. They said, okay, there she goes again. We eventually won, and got a court injunction to prevent the monument from being built.
EL: Speaking of advocacy, tell me about the foundation of BEAT (Building Equality in Architecture Toronto).
SB: It’s always bothered me that there’s so few women in architecture: we were 50% in the schools at that point, back in 2015, and much lower in the profession. So I started talking to the young women in the office. Then I reached out to Betsy Williamson and said, I think we need to do something. I’d gotten the right person. So we started with doing a seminar with visits to offices in the afternoon—and it just grew like Topsy.
I remember the second year of BEAT, all of a sudden it was embraced. The Dean at U of T was talking about women in architecture. And then someone—I had no idea who she was—stood up and spoke about BEAT. And I thought, there you go. That is perfect. I don’t even know who this person is, and she’s talking about this organization. It was so embraced by young people. It was fantastic. And then of course, it spread to other chapters across the country, and you guys are keeping it going.
EL: We’re trying to carry the flame. [Lam is Vice Chair of the BEAT Advisory Board.]
SB: It’s awesome. We wanted it to be relevant to each generation. The rule was “no whining.” Instead, we would do things that would be instrumental in changing things. And it seemed to give students and young women such confidence and networking. We women don’t network. We’re too busy, right? I just hope it stays that kind of grassroots volunteer group, being relevant to the issues we’re facing.
Two Row Architect and KPMB, with Shirley Blumberg’s leadership, partnered with Fort Severn First Nation—Ontario’s northernmost community—to design a concept for durable, sustainable, and culturally appropriate housing as part of the National Research Council of Canada’s “Path to Healthy Homes” program. Rendering by Two Row Architect and KPMB
EL: You’ve also done research on building for Indigenous communities in the North.
SB: Canada seemed like the anti-South Africa, until I learned about the Indigenous situation. And that was shocking to me—the first time the conditions of living in the North hit the newspapers. Just before that, I had learned that after the Second World War, when the Afrikaner government set up the apartheid system, they came to Canada: a model was the Indian reservation system in Canada. Doesn’t that chill the blood? That really got my attention.
I started reading up and I was just appalled that this could happen in a country like Canada. So I reached out to [Indigenous architect] Brian Porter, and I said, as a leading practice, KPMB needs to try and do something to improve the situation with the skills that we have. Brian was very open to doing research together. I said to my lovely partners, Marianne and Bruce, I’m doing this research, and of course it’s pro bono. This was way before the overwhelming interest in the Canadian North.
I also got Transsolar involved, because the technical conditions of the North are so challenging, and Alex Lukachko from RDH for building envelope, Dave Bowick for structure. And I was even speaking to Morten Schmidt from shl about Greenland. That research went on for about three years. And then this opportunity came up: the NRC [National Research Council] asked David Fortin to organize Indigenous architects to design housing for different regions. Brian and I saw that as an opportunity to do something with our research.
We were assigned Fort Severn, which is the northernmost community in Ontario. The chief, Paul Burke, said they needed a duplex unit, which consisted of a family unit and a single unit, which could be for an elder or a couple‚ or a single man. So that’s what we designed. The community had skills for light wood trade, and they have large stands of tamarack. So the idea was they would use the local materials and try and set up a way to manufacture this.
The houses are where the people have parties, they’re social centres. Quite often people will sleep over if it’s late into the night. There’s a loft that would be flexible and the kids could play there, you could work, have additional bedrooms if you need.
The connection to the land was so important. We designed completely in accordance with natural forces and Indigenous ways of knowing. For example, all the bedrooms are on the north side, all the living rooms on the south where the sun is during the day. We designed it so that the west winds would scour where the entrances were and keep the snowdrifts from building up. And conversely, in the summer when you’ve got all these bloody mosquitoes, you want the breeze to come through. The section was really tough to figure out, and this is where a lot of the hard research happened from our wonderful engineers to prevent humidity build-up, and mould and so on.
Led by Shirley Blumberg, 150 Dan Leckie Way was planned and designed to fill a need for family-centred affordable rental housing in the rapidly developing Railway Lands West precinct of Toronto. Photo by Tom Arban
EL: I’d like to circle back to your core project work at KPMB. When I look at the firm’s project list, it’s not completely obvious who would take on which projects—for instance, there’s some housing projects that each partner is doing, and academic work, and institutional work. You’ve done a lot of the Princeton work, but it’s not like you do all of the university work in the office.
SB: No. And that was another important point—that we wouldn’t be pigeonholed. We’ve always worked collectively. As we’ve grown larger, now we have Phyllis [Crawford], who is the managing partner, and more organization, because we have to be more efficient. But it also kept us on our toes, that healthy tension. We didn’t want to be slotted into “I do hospitals and you do theatres” or any of that. I’ve done a lot of galleries. So has Bruce. I’ve also done social housing, and now Marianne has done housing with Kindred Works.
EL: In additional to the social justice work, tell me about other moments that have felt to you like pivotal moments in the practice, or for your role within it.
The Lawrence Heights multi-unit, mixed market and social housing residential development, designed by Shirley Blumberg, comprises two large mixed-use sites that are located on either side of the Allen Expressway and the University subway line at Yorkdale Station in Toronto. The pair of medium-rise developments is sited strategically to form a distinctive gateway to the renewed neighbourhood. Photo by Michael Muraz
SB: I’m very interested in the urbanization of the suburbs. When we did Lawrence Heights, it was very suburban with just drive-through roads, townhouses, towers, and things like that. What we decided was the opportunity—and TCH [Toronto Community Housing] and Context, who was the developer, were totally on board with this—was that we would use this project to change the secondary plan. That was a huge amount of work, but we did manage to completely change it and create this intimate mews aligned with roads, as well as linear parks, pathways and more intimate public spaces, and linked, connected landscape space. So you can actually walk to the mall and the shops and so on.
The idea of the intensification of the suburbs is about giving people choice. If you only have single-family homes, where are people going to go when they’re retired and the children have left? Where are young people going to live if they want to stay in the neighbourhood?
That kind of work is very interesting, because it doesn’t matter if you live in the suburbs or in a city in an urban situation—everyone wants connectivity. Everyone wants denser, walkable, safe communities. And that’s what Lawrence Heights is trying to do.
Ponderosa Commons at UBC, a project led by Shirley Blumberg of KPMB with hcma architecture + design. Photo by Martin Tessler
I’m the loaves and fishes person. I love tight budgets. It makes you really think. I loved working at UBC, doing the student housing, Ponderosa Commons [in joint venture with hcma architecture + design], for an absolute pittance. There was no money. Actually pulling that off was great—working almost like a master builder with the construction manager. We met with every trade to figure out how we could design to afford this. And that was a revelation. At the time, academic was $400 per square foot, and housing was $250 [per square foot]. Our budget for phase one was $210 [per square foot] and phase two was $185 [per square foot]. We had the art school in phase one, and half the education department in phase two, and we did it. So that was very interesting. That was like a “Horton Hears a Who” moment for me, just working with contractors. Why wouldn’t you? And then you learn from them. You want to do precast? Do three stories high; repeat, repeat, repeat. You want to use wood? Don’t sand the wood, just do roughsawn. That saves a little bit. So all of that, we did.
The Fort York Public Library was another one. The librarians were amazing. That was during the time of [then Toronto Mayor] Rob Ford. Remember when the Ford brothers said there are more libraries than Tim Horton’s in Toronto, and that’s a bad thing? That was only $5 million. We knew we couldn’t go above, because otherwise it would be cancelled by the mayor. I actually love that—with very few resources, to be able to do stuff that has such an impact.
The Harrison McCain Pavilion is a small addition that completes the expansion of Fredericton’s Beaverbrook Art Gallery. The pavilion is a multi-functional space—open to all, free of charge—accommodating art exhibitions, gallery and community events, a café and fireplace seating area, reception/ticketing, and a shop. Photo by doublespace photography
At Beaverbrook, the chair of the board rang me up and said, do we want to do this tiny little project, and there really is no budget? Are you interested? I said, yes, absolutely. I knew the Beaverbrook because I’d been there quite a while before, and I was blown away by their collection. And Fredericton is remarkable because it is the provincial capital, and they have such a rich heritage of civic and residential buildings that are pretty well untouched. So I based it very much on that, and also the curve of the road and the river. They loved the idea, and we built it. It’s amazing. It’s really created a wonderful social hub in the city and the social centre. It was published in South America, North America, the U.K. and Europe, including in Domus— which thrilled me because all my architectural life, Domus is so extraordinary—this tiny project.
I asked a young guy from the Architects’ Newspaper, why is there so much interest in the States in this? And he said, we have nothing like this, and we need it: this kind of small space, you don’t have to pay, it’s open to the public for the good of the community.
One of my favourite quotes is from Thoreau: “to affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of the arts.” Isn’t that beautiful?
EL: It is.
SB: The other big shift for us is the climate crisis. We started KPMB Lab quite a while ago. When our Lab director Geoff Turnbull left, and I bumped into Alex Lukachko, he became our new Lab director. He wanted to coach architects how to up their game, to make every project count in terms of mitigating the climate emergency. We’ve really focused, and the Lab is embedded in all our projects—we take this very seriously. We do a lot of research with other firms, and agencies, and universities and so on. But it’s not an academic thing—everything’s actionable in our work. We’re trying to persuade all our clients to optimize or to minimize carbon.
KPMB Architects, led by Shirley Blumberg, and Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker Architecture won the international design competition for a new building for the Montreal Holocaust Museum. Rendering by Studio Sang
EL: Would you like to say a few words about the Montreal Holocaust Museum?
SB: The Montreal Holocaust Museum is the most personal of my projects, because it’s my history. We won the international competition working with Daoust Lestage Lizotte Stecker. The wonderful thing was you don’t just sit down and start sketching a Holocaust museum.
It was 77 years after the end of World War II. Most Holocaust museums try to replicate Auschwitz, but how can you possibly represent the Holocaust? It was just so overwhelming and so horrific.
What do you do now? Because now we’re, again, in a time of great uncertainty. I called up almost immediately [Holocaust expert and architectural historian] Robert Jan van Pelt, and he said, “you do know, Shirley, that you cannot represent the Holocaust in architecture?” And I said, “I’m so glad you said that, because I think that’s absolutely hubris to imagine that you ever could.”
And so it’s a totally new paradigm. The content, all the really horrific stories, all of that is in the exhibitions. The building is very much rooted in Montreal—in the morphology, the structure of the city—with light shafts that mark the lot lines and local materials: Quebec stone, white oak from Quebec. The building offers respite as you move through. And as you circulate through the public spaces, you see the seasons changing, and have access to natural light. That’s been very exciting and an incredible experience for me. I’ve always wanted to do a spiritual project. It’s the closest I’ve come to that.
EL: Do you have any final thoughts?
SB: I think it’s an extraordinary time for architects. We have never been as relevant. We can actually be truly instrumental with climate change, resource depletion, equity. So I think it’s a very exciting time for architecture in a very bleak moment. It becomes more important than ever. Gone is deconstructivism, gone is postmodernism—imagine, things have meaning! And that’s in the end what you’re looking for, right? Meaning in your work and in architecture.
The question always is, in the end: what can architects do for society? Each generation of architects should respond to their times—that’s what we do. We work in a synthetic way using design thinking—taking two opposing ideas and reconciling them so it becomes a third thing. It’s a pretty interesting way of working, and we need that.
In architecture it takes forever to find your own voice. It’s such a long apprenticeship. That’s why they say it’s an old person’s profession. Architecture keeps you humble if you’re doing it properly, I think—because it’s always challenging.
As appeared in the 2025 RAIC Gold Medal issue of Canadian Architect magazine (May 2025)
The post 2025 RAIC Gold Medal: Ethics in Action appeared first on Canadian Architect.
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