Geoffrey Massey (29 October 1924 – 1 December 2020) was a Canadian architect and urban planner noted for his modernism-inspired architectural works.
He was known for his partnership with architect Arthur Erickson that produced notable designs including the Simon Fraser University, and MacMillan Bloedel Building.
His father was an actor and theatre artist who had acted in movies including Abe Lincoln in Illinois, and was the great-grandson of Massey-Harris tractor company founder, Daniel Massey.
[1] Massey later said that his experience in the army had been formative, as he had been doing poorly in school before that but military service, and the break from education, gave him a sense of purpose and direction.
[1] After graduating from Harvard, Massey took up a job in Montreal before moving to British Columbia to put some of his learnings on modernism to practice.
[1] He joined Thompson Berwick and Pratt and Partners, who were building Kitimat, a new township in British Columbia, for the workers of Alcan's aluminum plant on the North Coast.
He also partnered with Erickson and Freschi to develop concepts for transformation of the Vancouver downtown corridor into pedestrian-friendly glass-domed shopping zones.
[8][9] Earlier, in 1963, he supported another Vancouver architect, Ronald Thom, to win the design commission for Massey College at the University of Toronto.
The college was commissioned by his uncle, Vincent Massey, who after his tenure as the 18th Governor General of Canada had initially wanted a gothic revival structure.
[1] However, Massey quit the council at the end of his two-year term disenchanted with municipal politics from the effort to realize even simple projects.