Raymond Moriyama
Architect
(1929 – 2023) was an architect who designed some of Canada’s most iconic buildings and helped cultivate Canadian architectural identity. Among notable buildings he designed was the original Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre(JCCC), Toronto Reference Library, Bata Shoe Museum, Canadian War Museum, and the Ontario Science Centre. Though Canadian born, in his youth, Moriyama and his family were interned in Slocan, BC as prisoners during the Allied war with Axis powers. This experience informed Moriyama’s life and design philosophy and his architecture. Since internment, Moriyama grew to become Canada’s pre-eminent architect.
Anson Finlay
Architect
was a graduate of bachelor of science from University of Saskatchewan, subsequently graduated in architecture from the University of British Columbia. Finlay joined Moriyama & Teshima in 1966 after being inspired by Moriyama’s golf course design buildings and the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre. Finlay subsequently designed the growing offices of M&T at 32 Davenport Road as one of his first projects there, ‘Building A’, the entrance building of the OSC and Science Centre North in Sudbury, Ontario.
John Snell
Architect
graduated from the school of architecture, University of Toronto, as well as Regent Street Polytechnic of London, England, where he worked a few years, helping construct notable buildings there. Snell was inspired by JCCC design and decided Moriyama was the person he wanted to work for and was duly hired in 1966 and became the firm principal in 1969. Snell was in charge of construction management for the OSC and OSC North, Sudbury. Among Snell’s specialties was crafting the pre-cast concrete for both Science Centre’s, of a surpassing quality to last centuries.
Don Cooper
Artist
was one of the first employees at M&T, back when Moriyama’s practice was a humble office in a bungalow on Toronto’s then-hipster Yorkville district. One of the first projects Cooper collaborated with Moriyama on was the Civic Garden Centre. Largely self-taught, Cooper’s only formal training as artist was life drawing classes taught by John Gould. Not exactly a ‘hired employee’ at first, Cooper was around, ‘ad hoc’ to work on projects as needed while honing his craft as an artist. He would later be officially hired when the OSC was commissioned.
Marco Polo
Professor of Architecture
Marco Polo is professor of architecture at Metropolitan University ( now Ryerson ) and has deep knowledge of Canadian and international architecture. Polo presides and lectured at the 50th anniversary symposium for the Ontario Science Centre, bringing context on how and why the OSC was built.
Michael McClelland
Architect, principal, scholar
Michael McClelland is an oft awarded and much celebrated Toronto-based Canadian heritage architect, meaning he is tasked with preserving key aging landmark architecture as principal of his firm, ERA architects. Among buildings restored or repurposed for modern use include the Brickworks, Union Station, and the Distillery District. McClelland is also editor of Concrete Toronto, a compendium of Toronto’s concrete-based modernist architecture