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Ontario Association of Architects. Toronto February 5th, 1937.

I am honoured to be asked to open the exhibition of your Association. I am always honoured to be asked to do something for which I am manifestly unfitted, since the invitation implies a compliment to a knowledge which I do not possess. But architecture is one of the arts in which every man must have a personal interest. It affects us all in our common life. We may be blind to the beauty of pictorial art; we may be totally deaf to music; but we must have a roof to cover us, and the most complete Philistine must have some interest in architecture.

I have no technical knowledge of the subject, but I would venture to offer you, with profound respect, a few observations. I was brought up in a country, Scotland, which has comparatively few old buildings of any architectural pretensions. What between fighting England and fighting among ourselves, and being a little too vigorous at the Reformation, we managed to destroy most of the architectural achievements of our ancestors. I have spent most of my life in a country, England, which has happily many noble relics of the past. And in my youth I spent some years in a country, South Africa , which did not destroy her old buildings, for the simple reason that she never had more than a few. I have, therefore, been led to reflect a good deal upon what an architectural tradition means in a country. It seems to me that you may have too much in the way of a tradition, and you may have too little. The world moves fast, human needs change their character, new mechanical inventions develop. If you are bound hard and fast by a narrow tradition you will be apt to produce buildings which do not truly serve the needs of the com-

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[com]munity. On the other hand, if you reject tradition altogether you are in danger of falling into a narrow utilitarian groove and rejecting beauty.

Today we hear a great deal about the functional purpose in architecture. Well, that is a perfectly reasonable point of view as long as we do not interpret the word too narrowly. The first duty of an architect is to build something which will exactly fulfil its purpose. I can think of some recent buildings which have every merit except that they do not meet the purpose for which they were erected. For all their magnificence they are a serious handicap to those who have to work in them. But let us not interpret the word "functional" too narrowly. Beauty of line, an appropriateness to its setting, is as much a function of an edifice as its practical utility.

[ST: the following paragraph was typed & corrected but then struck out in its entirety] There was a time when modern Europe went crazy over this word "functional", and credit a collection of soapbox monstrosities. An unfriendly critic once said that Wagner's music was not as bad as it sounded, and I can only hope that these buildings are not as ugly as they look. One of the few merits of the new regime in Germany is that it has put a stop to this form of ugliness. [ST: end of struck out type]

But there is just as much danger on the other side. A good tradition may be so slavishly followed that it becomes wholly inappropriate, both to the modern landscape and to modern conditions of life. I could give examples of many modern Scottish country houses in which the Scots baronial style has become a thing of pepper-box turrets and sham battlements; or some of the hideous specimens of bastard Gothic in Oxford today. But all the same it is a great thing to have a tradition behind you. How much of the

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beauty of much modern architecture in the United States is due to the fact that they have had their colonial tradition behind them? A good instance is South Africa. The simple Doric of the old Dutch farm-houses has been adapted by Sir Herbert Baker into some of the most beautiful dwellings that I know. The point about a tradition is that it should be a growing thing, elastic, adaptable, a principle and not a pattern. A sound tradition must be adapted not only to fit modern needs, but to suit its environment, whether in town or country.

Here in Canada, it seems to me, you have a great chance. You are not under the bondage of any one tradition. You have a variety to choose from, and the opportunity of working out a new tradition for yourselves. You have excellent local materials in stone and timber. You have a variety of landscapes, so you cannot be bound to one form. What is in place among the wooded hills of the East would not be right for the Prairies, or for the Pacific coast. Most of your cities are still growing, and you have a magnificent chance of town-planning, for you have not the congestion of space which makes that difficult in the Old World. I would cite Regina as an example of what can be done by a little care, with very few natural advantages. With a little pains I think that Ottawa and Vancouver could be made among the most beautiful cities in the world. I speak, as I have said, without any knowledge, and am only giving you the views of a most friendly spectator. But I have seen many new buildings in Canada which greatly pleased me - country houses and camps which melted into the landscape; and an urban building like the new

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Auditorium at Winnipeg which has high merits, it seems to me, both of function and of art. I like, too, enormously what I suppose would not be generally classed as architectural achievements - I mean the grain elevators in the West. I have seen a few things which pleased me more than those tall white towers and domes, carrying the eye from the great flat spaces of the Prairies up to the blue Prairie Sky.

And lastly let me say one word about bridges. Canada must always be a country of bridges, and a bridge is, to me, one of the most beautiful of human creations. I hope that our architects will give their mind to this subject, for they have a tremendous chance. With modern materials bridge-building has become a thing of infinite resources, and I want to see everywhere in Canada bridges worthy of their superb natural setting. We are to-day a nation of road-makers, as the Romans were. I want us to be like the Romans, also, a nation of bridge-builders, and to leave behind us things of enduring value and beauty.