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Day 3 of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat/Council on Vertical Urbanism Conference carried forward the week’s momentum, both in talks and on foot. The morning began with the IMEG-sponsored 5K Walk/Run along Toronto’s waterfront, giving over 60 attendees a scenic and energetic start before a full day of sessions. Topics ranged from decarbonization and facade performance to mass timber, urban comfort, and the evolving role of transit-linked development. The focus remained on how tall buildings can advance sustainability, livability, and resilience, including two Toronto-centred developer panels that showcased the city’s leadership in complex mixed-use design.
The Developer Panel on The Well gathered project leaders to discuss how one of Toronto’s largest mixed-use communities came to life through sustained collaboration and design integration. Moderated by former Toronto Chief Planner Gregg Lintern, the session brought together Andrew Duncan, Chief Investment Officer at RioCan REIT; Adrian Price, Principal of Architecture at BDP Quadrangle; and Michael Conway, Associate Partner at Hariri Pontarini Architects. Together, they traced the project’s evolution from concept to completion, emphasizing how its seven-building framework, combining office, retail, and residential uses, creates a permeable urban network connected to surrounding streets and transit corridors.
Later, the Developer Panel for CIBC SQUARE turned attention to another of Toronto’s defining downtown projects, exploring how its design and engineering have reimagined the Financial District’s southern edge. Moderated by Hines General Manager David Hoffman, the discussion featured Dominic Bettison, Director at WilkinsonEyre; Jonathan Pearce, Senior Managing Director of Leasing at Hines; and Marco Molinari, Senior Superintendent at EllisDon. They outlined the architectural vision behind the twin towers, emphasizing how the project includes office, retail, and transit infrastructure around Union Station’s active rail corridor, as well as The Park, the one-acre elevated green space uniting the site’s two phases over the rail corridor.
In addition, a full slate of technical sessions showcased expertise shaping vertical urbanism today. Decarbonizing Tall Buildings examined the reuse of structural materials, carbon-neutral design frameworks, and innovations such as high-rise gravity energy storage, while Designing Better Towers explored livability metrics and facade porosity in dense urban settings. Other highlights included Mass Timber: Retrofits, Housing, and Urban Innovation, which presented scalable wood-based construction strategies, and Transit & Towers, where designers discussed mobility integration in vertical communities.
The Closing Plenary and Lifetime Achievement Awards, chaired by Reed Kroloff, Dean of the Illinois Institute of Technology, honoured two leading figures in design and structural innovation: SawTeen See, recipient of the Fazlur R. Khan Lifetime Achievement Award, and Peter Murray, recipient of the Lynn S. Beedle Lifetime Achievement Award. In a dialogue centred on the evolution of vertical urbanism, See reflected on her decades-long career in structural engineering and her partnership with the late Leslie E. Robertson, highlighting projects such as the PPG Headquarters in Pittsburgh, Lotte World Tower in Seoul, and Merdeka 118 in Kuala Lumpur.
Murray, Co-Founder of New London Architecture, followed with his presentation The Architecture of Communication: the Communication of Architecture, charting his work in bringing design discourse to the public through publications, exhibitions, and festivals such as the London Festival of Architecture. A former Design Advisor to both Boris Johnson and Sadiq Khan, Murray closed his talk with characteristic candour, suggesting a possible mayoral bid to continue his advocacy for better cities. The plenary concluded with a moderated conversation between Kroloff, See, and Murray.
Following the plenary, CTBUH CEO Javier Quintana de Uña announced this year’s competition and fellowship recipients: Dr. Renmin Pretell, winner of the 2025 International Research Seed Funding; Yang Jiang of UNSW Sydney, winner of the 2025 International Student Tall Building Design Competition; and Liana Wong, recipient of the 2024 Leslie E. Robertson & SawTeen See Fellowship.
The evening culminated in the Awards Ceremony and Dinner at The Westin Harbour Castle. Attendees celebrated the Lifetime Achievement honorees alongside winners across multiple award categories. Among the evening’s honourees were several Toronto projects: Ontario Court of Justice was named Best Tall Building – Americas; CIBC SQUARE received the Urban Habitat Award; One Bloor West earned dual recognition, taking home both the Construction and the Structure Awards.
The awards culminated in the announcement of ZIN in No(o)rd, in Brussels, as the 2025 Best Tall Building Worldwide.
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