Looking southwest at the Island of Trees, commemorating Robert Reid Moffat, co-architect of the Memorial Union Building, in front of the Arts building. Health Sciences building at left.
Bio/Historical Note: Robert Reid Moffat (1906-1960), partner in the leading postwar firm of Shore & Moffat, established in Toronto in 1945. Born in Edrans, Manitoba, he obtained a degree in Science from the University of Saskatchewan in 1926, and worked for one year as a junior draftsman for David Webster, a leading architect in that city. He moved to Boston and studied architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1927 to 1931, then returned to Canada where he worked for Darling & Pearson, for Mathers & Haldenby, and for S.B. Coon & Son, all of Toronto. He served as Assistant Superintendent of Buildings at the Univ. of Toronto from 1932 to 1936, then opened an office under his own name. He embraced the new modernist style being promoted in Europe and the United States, and entered the T. Eaton Co. Architectural Competition for House Designs in 1936, receiving an Honourable Mention for his progressive concept. His striking design was a radical departure from the neo-Georgian conservatism evident in some of the other entries. After serving overseas with Canadian Forces during WWII, he formed a new partnership in 1945 with Leonard Shore and during the next fifteen years they were credited with a number of significant modernist landmarks in Toronto (see list of works under Shore & Moffat). The firm also designed the Memorial Student Union Building on the campus of the University of Saskatchewan. Their firm was awarded a Massey Medal for the York Township Municipal Offices (1952), and another Silver Massey Medal for the Imperial Oil Research Centre in Sarnia, Ont. (1961). Moffat died suddenly on 17 December 1960 at Port Credit, Ont.
