The Globe and Mail

For years, Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects, one of Canada's most pre-eminent firms, has produced architecture of strong bones and high polish. As arbiters of good taste in design, KPMB landed major commissions at Montreal's Concordia University and for the current redevelopment of the Royal Conservatory of Music and the Gardiner Ceramic Museum, both in Toronto. But with success came a KPMB formula of architecture -- including the signature curtain wall, the big steel and glass entrance canopy and the edifying splashes of stone and wood -- more pedantic than passionate. After resting on its laurels, the firm has pumped new life into its vision for design. The KPMB design for Centennial HP Science and Technology Centre uses an unabashed, organic strategy of design to activate an undesirable site along one of Toronto's urban fringes. The volumes are, at times, breathtakingly cavalier.