ADFF Toronto 2026: Five Living Buildings (by Renzo Piano)

Five Living Buildings (by Renzo Piano) is a meditation on the often-invisible impact of architecture, told through the experiences of people who use and maintain buildings designed by Renzo Piano and his colleagues.

Across four continents, daily routines unfold at four recently built civic spaces — a Greek cultural center (The SNFCC, Athens), Ugandan children’s hospital (Emergency Hospital, Entebbe), American art museum (The Whitney, New York), and Chinese industrial park (OōEli Complex, Hangzhou) — as well as at the iconic Centre Pompidou (Paris), which celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2027. At each location, in turn, we meet student interns and gardeners, doctors and their patients, security guards and museum visitors, maintenance workers, and impending retirees. Key moments of growth and revelation unfold across their stories, each linked to their built environments. In symbiosis with the buildings around them, they not only inhabit the buildings, but transform them into “living organisms” of great influence.

TSA MEMBERS: Members get discounted tickets to all regular showings at ADFF: Toronto! When tickets go on sale, there will be a discount code in the TSA Bulletin and on your Member Dashboard.

About the Architecture and Design Film Festival

The Architecture and Design Film Festival (ADFF)—North America’s largest film festival dedicated to architecture and design—is coming back to Toronto for another year of great films and insightful discussions! From November 4-7, catch one of their amazing lineup of 13 films, from all over the world. Looking for the full list of films showcased at this year’s ADFF: Toronto? See the complete programme on the festival’s website!

The TSA is proud to once again be partnering with ADFF: Toronto to bring a series of panel discussions and post-screening Q&As that complement this year’s film roster. These panels bring together architects, film-makers, and subject matter experts to further explore the themes of each film and bring them back to our local context here in Toronto.