One to Watch: Studio North

For Calgary design-build firm Studio North, it's all about finding a sense of place.

“On every architectural drawing, that north arrow is literally used for orienting yourself to the site,” explains Matthew Kennedy. It’s why he and co-founder Mark Erickson named their Calgary design-build firm Studio North: the relationship between a project’s abstract layout and its sense of place in the landscape is at the core of their design philosophy.The duo places special emphasis on integrating their modern-rustic structures in harmony with the geographic and social settings, whether it’s a long, linear mess hall at a P.E.I. kids’ camp with a wall of oversized windows to let the Atlantic light stream in, or a 34-unit townhouse complex designed to reference a traditional mountain dwelling and oriented strategically to highlight the views.