McGill University School of Architecture graduate Elizabeth Paden has won the Canada Council for the Arts’ Prix de Rome in Architecture for Emerging Practitioners. She will study the impact that large-scale public buildings can have on territorial boundaries within geopolitical regions.
This $34,000 Prix de Rome is awarded to a recent graduate of one of Canada’s ten accredited schools of architecture who demonstrates outstanding potential. The prize winner is given the opportunity to visit significant architectural sites abroad, and to intern at an architecture firm of international stature.

Over the next year, Paden will travel to three regions that offer insight into the humanity of architecture, including The Ghetto (suburbs of Paris), The Colony (boundary between Israel and the West Bank) and The Fringe (Euro-Arctic boundaries of northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia). She hopes these studies of responsive social design will inform the Canadian architectural process for peripheral Aboriginal communities and enrich cultural exchange between communities. Ms. Paden’s internship will be with 0047 in Oslo, Norway. Together, they will develop a collaborative public exhibition to be showcased in Canada.

Paden was selected by an assessment committee consisting of architects Susan Herrington (Vancouver), Todd Emel (Saskatoon), Marie-Josée Therrien (Toronto) and Terrence Smith-Lamothe (Halifax).

Paden’s submission impressed the committee. They were “drawn to the manner in which she proposes to investigate the challenging theme of boundary through a thoughtful selection of diverse existing architectural interpretations and then relates them back to a specific Canadian condition.”

In 2009, Paden was awarded the Student Medal from the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, the American Institute of Architects Henry Adams Medal, and the A.F. Dunlop Traveling Scholarship, which will fund research travel to Nunavut in August 2010.


Want to see what 24 hours of creative awesomeness look like? Click here.



This news message is supported by The Creative Finder, an online platform for photographers, illustrators, designers, and art directors to promote their portfolios towards new clients and collaborators. Creatives who wish to sign up for an account can save 10% off annual fees with promo code 'designtaxi'.