When this top Canadian architect hits a creative obstacle, he draws to find the solution

Bruce Kuwabara sketches every day. The architect, who is considered one of Canada's top talents in the field and leads one of the country's most-decorated firms, habitually scratches away, trying to transcribe the ideas from his mind onto paper.

Whereas masters like Frank Lloyd Wright believed you shouldn't even pick up your drafting tools until you've perceived the whole vision with your mind's eye, Kuwabara practices the reverse: he draws in order to see.

It is an "impulsive" activity, he says. One he's practiced for more than 50 years now. At every stage of design, from conceptualization through detailing, Kuwabara draws to find the solution. He describes the creative process as a "tug of war" between his "intuition about what things should be like" and "the reality of not having it all figured out." The architect uses his fountain pen to navigate this treacherous gulf — and to find his way across it.  

CBC Arts recently asked 67 notable Canadian artists for a simple trick they use whenever they encounter an obstacle in their work. The whole trove of wisdom and inspiration can be found here, in this interactive digital resource called Think Like An Artist.

So what did the architect who's designed 14 Governor General's Award-winning projects have to add? Kuwabara's contribution says: "Drawing is seeing."

Just as writers make outlines, Kuwabara notes references, roughs out studies and sketches details to understand all the constituent parts of his vision. He shows off a notebook page doodled with liquid forms, cat eyes and yin-yang symbols. Here he was riffing on curvilinear shapes that would influence the design of the CAMH Research and Discovery Centre, now under construction in Toronto. 

"I'm not doing a sketch to be published; I'm doing a sketch to tell me more about what I intuit," he says. "For me, it's a way of tracking thought." When there's a lively discussion in the field about what architecture is — the building or the idea of it —being able to capture, consolidate and communicate the stuff of your mind is critical. You'll find the genesis of all Kuwabara's best-known buildings scrawled somewhere in his sketchbooks.

So where do the ideas originate from? And when do they decide to strike? This is another rung in the architect's unique creative process. For decades now, Kuwabara has visited the same acupuncturist. "The theory," he says, "[is that] they basically stimulate the flow of energy and blood, which brings oxygen to the area you want treated." Just as other artists find moments of clarity during a long walk or a hot shower, it's after a treatment, while he's lying face down on the acupuncturist's table, that Kuwabara's head fills with images. 

"I really start seeing things," he says. "It's the kind of eureka-like moment when you discover something you've been thinking about." 

That's when he gets up, goes to work and draws.

He sketches quickly and loosely to catch the thoughts. "They're scratchy, [but] I don't care," he says. "All I know is that they really work for me." As with anything practiced over time, Kuwabara has developed a dexterity and confidence in his drawing abilities. He feels like he can draw anything and that a good drawing can help to solve the problem. 

Over the years, members of his office have tried to persuade the architect to sketch on a tablet or a computer for convenience. But Kuwabara says there's a certain pleasure in using the pen. It's tactile and familiar, but also, it's a ritual that represents something more. 

"The key," Kuwabara says, "is to find a way to slow things down so you can actually make a really good decision. I think in almost any field, a lot of people would agree that things are moving so quickly. There's so much flux, there's so much confusion, there's so much thrown at you every single day … The people who are really, really creative find a way to create space for themselves."

If drawing is how Kuwabara sees, it's through his pen and his sketchbook that the architect finds the space he needs for his vision to take shape.