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St. Gabriel's Passionist Parish
North York, Canada

The Community of Passionists’ St. Gabriel’s Parish is a new 700 seat facility designed to be an architectural manifestation of the Order’s unique eco-theological mandate. Extraordinary measures were taken to ensure that the building would be a green and sustainable legacy. For instance, the majority of required parking is provided for below grade thus allowing significant and lush grade level roof garden to become a central symbol of the church. The garden is present in the worship space as a full height curtain wall with an immense canopy to mediate summer heat gain composes the southern wall and provides controlled passive thermal gain. Storm water is poetically harvested to feed the garden via control flow drains and a large roof scupper and splash garden.

"St. Gabriel's Church ... is an exemplar of high, minimal design supported not by flying buttresses but by its serious grounding in environmental design and place-making."

Lisa Rochon,
Globe and Mail

St. Gabriel’s Parish is a certified Gold LEED™ building and was the first building of its type in Canada to achieve this rating. The project received several design awards including the Toronto Green Award for Green Building, the American Institute of Architects Faith and Form Award of Merit for Religious Architecture, and an Ontario Concrete Association Award for Architectural Merit.