Oliver Frayne




200 University Ave W
Waterloo, Canada

offrayne@uwaterloo.ca
548 384 6096



My design work emphasises multidisciplinary across a variety of scales, a result of my own design education as an architect and urban planner.

In professional work, Master’s studios, and my teaching, projects are enriched by attention to site histories and contexts, material sensibilities, and fostering interactivity for all users.

This portfolio is a selection of design work that reflects a versatile set of approaches and skills that I bring to architecture and teaching. All my design work has been experimental, iterative, and collaborative, working between drawing and modelling (and a bit of scripting!)
CV




Education
PhD Planning
University of Waterloo
2024-present

Critical Urbanisms
Philosophisch-Historische Fakultät
Universität Basel
2023-2024

MArch Architecture
University of British Columbia
2017-2021

BES Planning (Honours, Co-op)
Urban Design specialization
University of Waterloo
2012-2017



Employment Project Manager, Designer
Jill Anholt Studio
Vancouver, Canada
2021-2023

Architectural Intern
Leckie Studio
Vancouver, Canada
2019

Planning Intern
CDP
Perth, Australia
2016

Urban Design Intern
Dillon Consulting
Kitchener, Canada
2016

Marketing and Comms Intern
Collective Responsibility
Shanghai, China
2015

Student Planner
City of Waterloo
Waterloo, Canada
2015



Teaching
Instructor




Teaching
Teaching AssistantAdjunct Lecturer
Urban Design Seminar
School of Planning
University of Waterloo
2025

Graduate Teaching Assistant
PLAN 107: How Plans Are Made
School of Planning
University of Waterloo
2026

Head Graduate Teaching Assistant
PLAN 103: Planning Governance and Admin
School of Planning
University of Waterloo
2025

Head Graduate Teaching Assistant
PLAN 261: Urban and Metropolitan Planning and Development
School of Planning
University of Waterloo
2025

Graduate Teaching Assistant
PLAN 107: How Plans Are Made
School of Planning
University of Waterloo
2024



Competencies
AutoCAD
Adobe Creative Suite
Rhino
Enscape
SketchUp
QGIS
Grasshopper

Drafting, rendering, model-making, hand-drawing, photography, videography

English (Fluent)
German (A1.2)
Swedish (Beginner)


Research
coming soon



Awardscoming soon








Last Updated 26.1.9
Select Works






A Passing and a Pause
Studio

Partner: Lukas Vajda
Instructor: Thena Tak

2020



We often switch off while waiting for the elevator, on a sort of autopilot. Until the doors open and you are confronted with a group of strangers, someone you were trying to avoid, and so on. The elevator as a space presents opportunities for exploring a highly standardized, everyday space as it relates to sociability and physical presence of bodies in a small space.

Through discussion and model exploration, we discovered that both butter and the elevator share a similar characteristic of awkwardness, derived from psychological and physiological consequences of engaging with either. Our concept was to enhance this through the transformation of the space.

For this studio project, my partner and I were tasked with designing and fabricating a response to a prompt for a micro-site in the Lasserre Building. In two weeks we iterated, modelled, drew, and constructed an intervention into our elevator.

This built work provoked broader discussions on relation and experience of bodies in standard, everyday spaces, and ways of relating in mundane spaces to each other. By transforming the floor and walls of the space, the types of interactions typically of an elevator were also changed.


Detour
Competiton - Winner! 
Edmonton, Canada
with Meredith Yee

2022


Our design is centered around 3 components: a decking module, vertical support members, and a sinuous double wall made from standard building paper. It is within the space between and around the double wall that the community contributes their own garden pot. This collection of flowers, herbs, and shrubs not only delineates the parklet buffer with a soft planted edge, it also is a spontaneous display of community collaboration and neighbourliness. All the construction materials are cost-effective, sturdy, and allow for volunteers to come out and help build the parklet, as it requires no overly specialized tools. 

The travelling parklet can easily be broken down again to move to its next site or to its final resting spot with the community league. While it travels the community, the parklet will add a playful element to the streetscape, its irregularly perforated screen allowing intriguing glimpses of pots, plants, and people. 

Design selected by the Parkdale-Cromdale Community League as the winning proposal, with the intention of being built in the summer months.




Radii of Precedence
Doctoral Research
School of Planning, University of Waterloo

Ongoing


Coming soon.



Intimate Distance
Public Art
Burnaby, Canada
Jill Anholt Studio, Glasmalarei Peters, TransLink

2025


Intimate Distance seeks to interpret and express the overlooked perceptual and social phenomenon of high speed train travel by creating an experience that captures the intriguing and shifting ways that we perceive near and far objects, and each other, when travelling on mass transportation. Commissioned for TransLink at the new Brentwood Skytrain station in Metro Vancouver.

I was project manager and lead designer on this project, while at Jill Anholt Studio. I  took it from initial photography to fabrication documentation. I produced all construction detailing and devised fabrication solutions for seamless installation. Glasmalarei Peters was responsible for chrome application and hand airbrushing the motion gradients.



Telliskivi, Tallinn, EstoniaSketch

2025



Glass Eyes
Studio

Instructor: Thena Tak

2020


Drawing the door from the introduction of Little Dieter Needs to Fly (1997), Werner Herzog. Graphite on graphite paper on sketch pad.






© Oliver Frayne