Page 32 - 03_April-2025

‘BAAKFIL’
TO THE
FUTURE
Can the renowned architect Barry Johns
shift our approach to infill?
by SCOTT MESSENGER
photography AARON PEDERSEN
T
hese days, Barry Johns would be
fine with you not noticing his
projects. Maybe he’d prefer it.
Johns is the architect behind
the concrete-pillared MacEwan
University, one of Edmonton’s most conspicuous
buildings. But when he recalls his more than
50-year career, he doesn’t mention it. Instead,
he points to projects that blend in rather than
stand out: an inner-city social services complex
(Operation Friendship), or the Governor General’s
medal-winning Advanced Technology Centre, that
disappears into a southside hillside.
He talks about the future the same way. Now
77, Johns is fresh from earning the doctorate
degree that led to his new book, Effective Urban
Densification, a reimagining of infill’s role in
meeting housing needs. To achieve density,
affordability and sustainability, Johns wants to
leverage the unassuming and overlooked:
Edmonton’s established communities.
“The mature neighbourhoods are the best
bones in the city,” says Johns. So he questions
the replacement of those bones with skinny,
multi-storey infills.
“Infill is being used as a way to solve the
housing crisis — just get more supply out there.”
But that approach comes at a cost, Johns says. A
monolith towering above post-Second World War
bungalows cannot “respect” the character of a
neighbourhood; it’s disruptive. With conventional
infill, he says, “the very idea of place is ignored.”
32 EDify. APRIL.25
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