Robarts Library, a landmark on the University of Toronto’s downtown campus, is an iconoclastic building and one of North America’s most significant examples of Brutalist architecture. Originally constructed in 1973 and designed by architects Mathers & Haldenby the library is, by contemporary standards, notably lacking in amenities for the students and faculty who inhabit its stacks and reading rooms.
Carter AI provided architectural design services and project management services to the University of Toronto, as part of a larger redevelopment of the library, to introduce a Starbucks café into the mezzanine level of the building. Carter AI successfully guided the project through design and construction addressing Starbucks’ need to assert a strong brand identity within the space of the library and the University’s own requirements to respect the integrity of the original design and the triangulated geometries and exposed concrete structure of this important cultural building.
