Timothy Belanger is a Toronto Chapter co-chair

For almost 20-years, Tim has focused his career on advancing equitable design and public placemaking. Over this period his focus shifted from print design and branding to experiential graphic design within the built environment. He joined MJMA in 2012, became a partner in 2018, and directs several aspects of the practice: Experiential Design, Community Engagement, Communications and Studio Operations. In all these endeavours, through extensive collaboration, he is able to bring together the innate synergies between architecture, landscape architecture, experiential graphic design, interiors, and community engagement. He sees interdisciplinarity and exchange between designers, and other professionals, as key to the future of design.

Tim has been especially dedicated to accessibility and inclusivity throughout his career. He has collaborated since its inception with Disability Solutions, a practice that helps organizations determine the business and social value of accessible design. Tim works with the leads of this consultancy to co-author white papers and target municipal, provincial, and federal levels of government — with the aims of identifying opportunities for advancing inclusive design and achieving better standards of accessible wayfinding and supporting graphics.

Tim was a fanatical skateboarder in his youth and he sees the various threads of his passion for design and architecture as rooted in its culture: graphic art (boards and zines), an awareness of the built environment, and a strong sense of community.