STRIP MALL: Architecture in New Suburbia

Davidson Rafailidis. Free Zoning: Radical Deregulation & Material Reuse, 2014.  Animation still. Image courtesy of the architects.
Davidson Rafailidis. Central Park Plaza, 2011. Photo: Georg Rafailidis
Bindya Lad. "Network" 1:50 study model detail, 2008. Photo: Bindya Lad.
Bindya Lad. "Network" 1:50 study model detail, 2008. Photo: Bindya Lad.
Organization: 
Harbourfront Centre
Exhibition Dates: 
Sep. 26, 2014 to Dec. 28, 2014

Feauturing work by Davidson Rafailidis, Bindya Lad, and normal goods

Curated by Patrick Macaulay

Suburban areas across Canada are at once burgeoning and diversifying. New residents from around the world, constituting the bulk of the country’s population growth, are increasingly choosing to settle in suburban areas. The typical characterization of these areas as socially and culturally homogenous is no longer accurate. As the demographics have changed, so has the built form. Strip malls — once pure expressions of the suburbs’ bedrock of car culture and consumerism — have become central to many of these new communities. Language schools, places of worship and ethnocultural community centres now populate the storefront spaces. Despite this change in content, the form of the strip mall has remained relatively unchanged.

For this exhibition, we have invited two architecture firms and one design partnership to look at the strip mall and the changing dynamics of the surrounding communities and to propose new approaches and new purposes for this staid suburban built form.

Address: 
235 Queens Quay West
Toronto,, ON M5J 2G8
Canada
Posted by Mila.Volpe on September 16, 2014 - 3:28pm