“Piece by Piece” is the title of an exhibition of architectural projects by the Renzo Piano Building Workshop. The event, which is taking place in Toronto from 16 July to 11 September 2022, was organised by the Workshop itself, the Italian Cultural Institute and the Consulate General of Italy.
Eleven projects have been selected to reflect the diversity in geography and time of the architectural production of this world-class architecture practice. The exhibition provides a glimpse of the collective cross-disciplinary process that exists within the workshop. The selection of projects includes the Centre Pompidou (1977), The California Academy of Sciences (2008), the London “Shard” (2012), the Emergency – Children’s Hospital in Uganda (2021) and the soon-to-be-completed New Toronto Courthouse.
Visitors experience a sort of tour through the drawings, materials and instruments used to bring to life projects that are all vastly different but characterised by a common link with their specific context and by the objective of designing “places for people”.
At the opening of the exhibition the film “Inside Renzo Piano Building Workshop”, a documentary illustrating the work of the practice’s offices in Genoa, Paris, New York and Los Angeles, was screened. The film depicts the day-to-day life of these office: a succession of meetings, phone calls, project reviews, decisions and second thoughts. And lastly, the birth of the projects, from the drawing stage to actual construction.
