University of Toronto Scarborough inaugurates the new Sam Ibrahim Building, a design where room to think starts with rooms that differ.

Aarhus- and Copenhagen-based CEBRA and Toronto-based ZAS have established a new home for inclusive learning and emotional stimuli at the university.

The University of Toronto Scarborough – along with major gift donor, Sam Ibrahim, President of Arrow Group of Companies – has officially inaugurated the Sam Ibrahim Building. Envisioned by lead design architect CEBRA and lead architect ZAS, the 19,300 m² (208,000 ft²) building aspires to improve academic well-being through architecture. It establishes a sensory-forward, inclusive landscape that extends learning beyond the classrooms and blends study, collaboration, and social activities with the surrounding campus.

The Sam Ibrahim Building will act as a central campus hub. It houses the Sam Ibrahim Centre for Inclusive Excellence in Entrepreneurship, Innovation & Leadership; offices and related spaces for Student Services; and academic spaces for the Department of Computer and Mathematical Sciences. The five-storey building features 20 flexible, technology-enabled classrooms, 124 faculty and staff offices, and several active-use spaces such as welcome areas, a café, lounges, and informal collaboration spaces.

As a response to UTSC’s efforts to enhance student well-being, the architectural design invites students to experience a diverse array of sensory-forward educational experiences. The 20 varied classrooms facilitate active participation, accommodate different ways of thinking, and support inclusive learning and social exchange. These spaces range from a campfire-like theatre-in-the-round to a collaborative auditorium of geometric banquettes.

Notably, the building reduces energy consumption in alignment with the Toronto Green Standards. This includes high-performance thermal insulation, a local geothermal system, and triple-glazed operable windows that improve energy use and indoor comfort.

Learning through feeling
The classrooms are connected by an interior landscape of both open common areas that stimulate social activities and more intimate zones for informal meetings and study. This allows students to seek out the setting that best matches their personal preference or the activity at hand, thereby increasing the experiential value of the learning environment and student engagement.

A mosaic-inspired exterior
The architectural concept is inspired by a 19th-century printer’s tray, a compartmentalized tool historically used to organize letterpress letters. The complex arrangement of rooms and open public spaces across multiple floors, many of which are sectionally interlocked, forms a three-dimensional composition, much like the compartments of the type case. Together, the building’s classrooms form a collection of memorable spaces, each providing a unique context for learning.

At ground level, the design envisions a 360° campus ‘living room’ that merges with the surrounding public realm. Drawing inspiration from the Highland Creek ravine that weaves through the campus, the landscape is extended indoors, with sloping mounds, embedded seating, and planting beds forming a natural terraced base. This terraced foundation extends upwards across the building’s five storeys.

The building’s facades display interior activities to the outside. Resembling the compartments of a printer’s tray, this mosaic-like exterior establishes a central beacon for UTSC’s northern campus.

Classrooms: The Arrow Group Innovation Hall, the Cave, & the Collaboratorium
The Sam Ibrahim Building combines different volumes, scales, surfaces, and spatial qualities as a response to the diverse student community that it serves. It was designed with comprehensive insights from CEBRA’s R&D unit, WISE, which draws on neuroarchitecture: the study of how spatial design influences cognition and well-being.

The 20 classrooms include the large Arrow Group Innovation Hall – a theatre-in-the-round hexagonal space with surrounding digital screens. Like gathering around a campfire, the 500-seat space positions the presenter at the room’s center, rather than front like in a conventional auditorium, thereby minimizing the distance from the back rows and promoting face-to-face exchange. This layout dissolves hierarchy and encourages dialogue and active participation.

Among the medium-sized, tiered learning spaces, the Cave is a calm retreat from the building’s lively ground floor. The interior surfaces, reminiscent of natural stone crafted from sound-absorbing material, engage the sense of touch and enhance student focus and concentration.

The Collaboratorium offers a cooperative environment that supports frontal teaching and group work. The layout consists of tiered niches that, drawing inspiration from nightclub booths, accommodate up to six people around a table and establish engaging coworking spaces, rather than the feeling of a typical lecture hall. Each booth includes tech with access to digital learning and online collaboration. The booths are lined with acoustic fabric to enhance in-person sound quality.

Among the smaller, tiered classrooms is the Keystone. Its horseshoe layout and warm wooden interior combine the effectiveness of traditional tiered classrooms with the intimate setting of a seminar room. Visible from multiple locations, its distinctive wooden shell makes it a landmark space within the building’s interior landscape.

Lead Design: CEBRA
Lead Architect: ZAS Architects + Interiors
Landscape Architect: LANDinc
Structural Engineer: Thornton Tomasetti
Mechanical Engineer: The Mitchell Partnership
Electrical Engineer: HH Angus
Civil Engineer: MGM Consulting
Acoustics: Swallow Associates
Sustainability: Green Reason
Photography: doublespace photography