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RZLBD
Reza Aliabadi (born 1974), OAA, RAIC, known as RZLBD, is a multidisciplinary artist and architect of Persian origin based in Toronto. His repertoire of work is broad, including art, writing, design and architecture. He is the founder and principal of Atelier RZLBD; a pseudonym he adopted that reflects his interest in abstraction and reduction.

Career

Aliabadi was born and raised in Tehran. He received a Masters of Architecture within the Faculty of Fine arts at the University of Tehran in 1999, where he was Valedictorian. He subsequently pursued a Masters of Philosophy in Architecture with honours in 2006 at McGill University in Montréal.

In 2010 after three solo expeditions, Canadian Arctic, backpacking Round the World in 49 days, and Trans-Canada Highway, he reestablished his practice in Toronto. Alibadi is interested in exploring microarchitecture, urbanism, and housing ideas for the future. He uses full range of scales to do so; from abject objects, furniture, installation arts, dwellings to large urban-scale proposals.

Writing

In 2017, Aliabadi's monograph RZBLD HOPSCOTCH was published by UK-based Artifice; it compiles selected built projects by collecting essays, project proﬁles, and annotated drawings. In 2020, Actar published a pocket-sized manifesto written by Aliabadi entitled The Empty Room: Fragmented Thoughts on Space; the book explores the idea of emptiness as the essence of architecture. Much earlier, in the Globe & Mail, the late John Bentley Mays had shown praise for Aliabadi's philosophy, "Where ingenious itineraries and openings and shuttings can be orchestrated, Mr. Aliabadi has shown himself to be a high-order poet of volumes and voids."

Aliabadi also has a regularly published zine called rzlbdPOST.

Opposite House
A two-bedroom dwelling located on a 2.7 acre site on the Scarborough Bluffs With a corridor that runs down the centre, the building is split in two and thus earns it the name, Opposite House. The northern half is programmed for service spaces, where the southern half is served – a gestural homage to Louis Kahn. Ideas of shadow and light, openness and closeness, black and white, textured and smoothness, opacity and transparency are explored here. At 146 feet long, it has the span of an A321 Airbus. Completed in 2016 it is the winner of the 2017 International American Architecture Prize (AAP) – later changed into Architecture MasterPrize.

Shaft House
The Shaft House was completed in 2010 and is a two and a half storey detached dwelling that proposes a creative and innovative way of addressing urban infill housing problems and density in Toronto while using cost-effective and sustainable materials. By creating circulation and services around a void of light, it makes the interior space more bright and airy.

100

As part of his drawing practice, Aliabadi's 100 series shows variations that experiments with taxonomy and iteration. The inauguratory series,100 Restless Cubes, explores variation of isometric cubes that play with the use and reuse of geometry. It was displayed at the World Architecture Festival in Berlin in 2017 and exhibited at Sir John Soane’s Museum in London in 2018.

Awards

2020, Honourable Mention, Architecture Master Prize (AMP), AK Clinic

2020, Honourable Mention, Architecture Master Prize (AMP), Twosome House

2019, Honourable Mention, Architecture Master Prize (AMP), Gazing House

2019, Runner Up, Juried Exhibition (The Promise of Sekishu Washi), Seven Veils

2018, 2nd Prize, Shinkenchiku Residential Design, Japan,100 House

2018, Honourable Mention, Architecture Master Prize (AMP), Flipped House

2018, Commended, The Architectural Drawing Prize (WAF), Spatial Cocktails (Night)

2018, Finalist, Italian Fashion Hub, Bologna, Italy, Centipede

2017, Winner, International American Architecture Prize (AAP), Opposite House

2017, Commended, The Architectural Drawing Prize (WAF), 100

2017, Green Award, Pape Bird Observation Tower, Latvia, Gnomon

2017, Honourable Mention, Amber Road trekking Cabin, Latvia, un(a)like

2017, Canada’s Top Emerging Talents, Canadian Architect magazine, Atelier RZLBD

2014, Award of Merit, Markham Design Excellence Awards, Gallery House

2011, Award of Excellence, OAA Awards, Transimage

2009, Honourable Mention, OAA Awards, Cart Shelter