2025 Top Glass Conference & Exhibits
Registration for Canada’s architectural glass show is open and OGMA will be there! Join us on April 30 at the International Centre in Mississauga, Ontario, for a day full of great discussion with your industry peers. Be on hand as OGMA announces the 2025 Awards for Excellence winners at the show. Best of all, as a member of OGMA, you qualify to receive free admission to the event and plant tour (a $49 value). Please email us at info@ogma.ca to get your promo code. Click here to register.
Experts will speak on the following topics: Cross-Country Codes and Standards Update; The Glass Marking Panel (including OGMA’s own Andrew Dolphin); Training our Future: The Architectural Glass and Metal Technician Certification; and Esthetics of Sustainable Design. In addition, on April 29, you can get a behind-the-scenes tour of Trulite Glass and Aluminum Solutions in Vaughan, Ontario, one of Canada’s top glass fabricators, who will showcase new fabrication technology and the over $20 million in new equipment they’ve installed in the last two years. Details about the plant tour and the show schedule can be found below.
Schedule
April 29 – Trulite Plant Tour
Where: 385 Connie Crescent, Vaughan, Ontario
Registered attendees can tour Trulite Glass and Aluminum the day before the show. Part of one of North America’s largest glass fabrication networks, Trulite has been manufacturing insulating glass, spandrel, custom printed and laminated architectural glass since 1975, as well as custom architectural aluminum solutions. But today, the plant is a showcase of new fabrication technology with over $20 million in new equipment installed in the last two years, including a Glaston lamination oven, an HHH tempering furnace, a Tecglass digital print line and a LiSec insulating glass line.
Sign up online at topglasscanada.com (OGMA members: email us at info@ogma.ca to receive a promo code that will allow you to register for free!), then drop by on the 29th to see the latest in advanced glass manufacturing and talk to the people who execute it. Tours will run all day from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. and attendees will be assigned a suggested time slot.
April 30 – Conference and Exhibition
Where: The International Centre, 6900 Airport Road, Mississauga, Ontario
9:00 a.m.
Show opens
Top Glass is where you can visit top suppliers to the architectural glass industry. Over 40 vendors with a laser focus on Canada’s ICI glazing market will be on hand to answer your questions. You might learn more on the show floor than in the lecture hall! Sign up online at topglasscanada.com (OGMA members: email us at info@ogma.ca to receive a promo code that will allow you to register for free!).
10:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.
Cross-Country Codes and Standards Update
Presenters: Terry Adamson and Amy Roberts
The 2025 National Building Code and National Energy Code for Buildings are due for updates this year. And those codes point to AAMA/FGIA standards that have been revised since the 2020 codes went into effect. Fenestration Canada technical director, Terry Adamson, and Fenestration and Glazing Industry Alliance director of Canadian and technical glass operations, Amy Roberts, will team up to deliver a top-line look at the important changes affecting architectural glazing. These include new limits on solar heat gain.
Adamson and Roberts work with the committees and standards authorities that are writing the rules we will use to specify architectural glass going forward. There are no better sources for information on what is new and what is coming in Canadian codes and standards.
11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.
The Glass Marking Panel
Moderator: Patrick Flannery, editor, Glass Canada
Panel Participants:
Matthew Christie, Architectural Manager and Sales Representative, Walker Glass
Andrew Dolphin, General Manager of Glass Operations, BVGlazing Systems and OGMA Vice-President
Adam Mitchell, Marketing Manager, AGNORA
Adam Shearer, President, iMagic Glass
Architectural glass can be altered on its surfaces in a myriad of ways and for a number of reasons. Adding colour and design; changing opacity and translucence; meeting standards for bird and human safety; increasing thermal resistance – it pays to know what fabricators can do to change the look and performance of glass with advanced marking technology. So we’ve invited four experts from top marked-glass producers to outline their techniques and explain the possibilities and benefits of each. Join Adam Mitchell of AGNORA, Andrew Dolphin of BV Glazing, Adam Shearer of iMagic and Matt Christie of Walker Glass for an exploration of ceramic frit, laser etching, digital printing and acid etching.
12:00 p.m. – 1:30 p.m.
We’ll take a break for lunch, which will be available for purchase at the cafeteria restaurant in the International Centre.
1:30 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.
OGMA Awards of Excellence
Presenter: Steven Peso, OGMA Director
Celebrate our industry with the Ontario Glass and Metal Association as they recognize outstanding achievements in design and execution. Top Glass is proud to host the OGMA as it announces the winners of its Awards of Excellence. Two awards will be presented to Ontario companies, one for outstanding design of an aluminum and glass building envelope and another for outstanding execution of an aluminum and glass architectural project. The awards are judged by an independent panel of architects and honour OGMA members and friends for the great work they do. The smiles are big and the plaques hang forever!
2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.
The Training our Future Panel
Moderator: Travis Nevins, IUPAT Glaziers
Panel Participants:
Jamie Clifford, Ontario Finishing Trades Institute
Matt Fox, IUPAT Glaziers Training Specialist
Alex Shikhman, Building Envelope Systems Installations
Noel Marsella, Architectural Glass and Metal Contractors Association
The pace of change in North American architectural glass challenges everyone to access the skills and knowledge we need to execute today’s projects. The International Union of Painters and Allied Trades is deeply committed to building the glazing workforce we need through its programs and with the help of the Ontario Finishing Trades Institute. Representatives from IUPAT and OFTI will discuss the needs of tomorrow’s workforce and how they are meeting them. Joining them to provide perspectives from contractors and the industry will be Alex Shikhman, president of BESI, and Noel Marsella, executive director of the AGMCA. This is where we’ll pick up key insights on one of the biggest hurdles facing our industry today: labour, and how to find the skills we need.
3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Esthetics of sustainable design
Presenter: Juliette Cook, Ha/f Climate Design
As we push our ingenuity, our clients and our governments toward more sustainable building envelope design, we must not lose sight of our mission as architects to create beautiful expressions of culture in the built environment. How can we communicate our commitment to sustainability through our facades and propagate it through our communities? Juliette Cook, partner at Ha/f Climate Design, has thoughts and examples from real-world projects that are sure to inspire your next architectural glass design.
Cook is an intern architect, lecturer, researcher and new mother. She leads a collaborative project through the Circular Opportunity Innovation Launchpad that showcases the economic viability and environmental necessity of deconstruction and material reuse across Ontario and has worked with the City of Toronto on a benchmarking study on embodied carbon, helping to inform a future system of tiered targets and developing a standard reporting template for whole building life cycle assessments. Cook has experience as a material research specialist at MASS Design Group, and as an architectural designer and sustainability consultant at White Arkitekter, where she created a palette of non-conventional, low-carbon materials for a large-scale cancer treatment centre.
4:00 p.m.
Show closes.
2024 Top Glass Conference & Exhibits
The OGMA was pleased to be on hand to help celebrate the 10th anniversary of Top Glass Conference & Exhibits on April 30, 2024.
The conference gave us a great opportunity to speak to our members and discuss the benefits of OGMA membership with industry participants. Thank you to everyone who stopped by our booth and engaged with our directors and association administrator, making this event a success.
During the event, Steven Peso, Awards Director, presented the OGMA Awards for Excellence to two worthy recipients: Diamond Schmitt Architects and Applewood Glass. Visit the Awards for Excellence in Design and Execution page for more information.
We look forward to seeing you all at next year’s event.
Photo Gallery:
Association Administrator, Lori Brooks, was on hand to chat with conference attendees and say hello to association members.
OGMA Awards Director, Steven Peso, presents the 2024 Awards for Excellence in Design and Execution at Top Glass Conference & Exhibits
Gary Watson accepts the 2024 Award for Excellence in Design on behalf of Diamond Schmitt Architects, winner for their work on the Robarts Common project.
Tony Menecola accepts the 2024 Award for Excellence in Execution on behalf of Applewood Glass, winner for their work on the Escarpment House project.