“How did my calculus book become far and away the best-selling calculus book in the world?” he says. The Concert Hall of James Stewart's Integral House in Toronto. The consensus since then is that it’s a fantastic room for music, and for bringing people together. It took another six years to build the five-storey, 1,672-square-metre house.Īrts organizations started asking about the performance space even before the house was done. Sutcliffe, who worked on designs for three more years before construction began. After three years of searching, he chose Ms. I want curves and I want a performance space,’” Mr. “I said, ‘I have two principal requirements. The money, and his interest in architecture, got him talking to architects about a house where he could continue, on a larger scale, the chamber music evenings he had held in previous houses. That book, now in its eighth edition, has become a standard text, followed by others that made Mr. The first came after he followed the suggestion of a couple of his students at McMaster University that he write a calculus textbook. He reckons he has had two great pieces of luck in his life, one of them growing out of the other. “They think of modern houses as being austere, and this house is anything but.”Ī seating area inside the concert hall of James Stewart's Integral House in Toronto. “A lot of people who aren’t fans of modern houses love this house,” Mr. The architects extended their design idea into everything, including furniture and kitchen cabinets. Toronto architects Brigitte Shim and Howard Sutcliffe gave their client a curvaceous, light-filled home that expands downward into the ravine. The architectural press was buzzing about Integral House even before it was completed in 2008. “That was a thrill for me, one of the best.” “Steve Reich premiering a new piece here, and Philip Glass performing here – I never would have met these people otherwise.” Jose Antonio Abreu, founder of Venezuela’s El Sistema music education program, came here after winning the Glenn Gould Prize in 2008, for a performance by members of the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra. Stewart, who was also an accomplished violinist until arthritis forced him to stop playing two years ago. “It really has enriched my life,” says Mr. Mathematician James Stewart in his 18,000 square-foot Rosedale home Integral House Friday, August 29, 2014. The room can handle an audience of about 150, and has become a target destination for fundraising performances by the likes of Soundstreams and Necessary Angel Theatre Company. The glass wall follows a curve that some people see as an allusion to the shape of a guitar, or of the grand piano that stands near one end. The heart of the building is a tall, wide, balconied room facing onto a ravine. Stewart, who is 73, looks a bit frail and moves cautiously on his artificial hip, but he’s still up for giving me a complete walk-through of his beloved multilevel home in Rosedale. His bequests will have a wide and immediate impact, because he’ll be giving cash to fund operations, not to put his name on a building. He also mentions the Glenn Gould School, the National Youth Orchestra and the University of Toronto’s music faculty, where he wants to endow a resident string quartet, and the Fields Institute, a U of T mathematics body. “I’m sure the Toronto Symphony and the Canadian Opera Company and many other organizations could use an extra million dollars or so,” he says. Stewart’s executors will give most of the money to his favourite arts and scientific organizations. (Tim Fraser for The Globe and Mail)īut while the music plays on, real estate agents will be quietly looking for a buyer for the house, and when they find one, Mr. An exterior of Integral House Friday, August 29, 2014.
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