The Fields Institute Turns Twenty-Five 170725 Final book with covers | Page 67

CHAPTER 10
What Does a Mathematics
Institute Look Like?
Alison Conway
“Fields was designed for the two things that it has become known
for—collaboration and communication.”
Long before I went to work at the Fields Institute I had heard
about a think tank in Toronto. My curiosity got the better
of me and I slipped into Fields one day to see what a think
tank might look like. In my mind I assumed I would see a
glass-walled fish tank of some sort with people walking in
circles, scratching their heads and thinking deeply. What
I found of course was a beautiful, light-filled building, with
natural wood finishes, a clerestory flooding light into the
interior and a wonderful transparency to the whole design.
Many years later I understood that the purpose of the building
had been misrepresented as a think tank, and ultimately Fields
was designed for the two things that it has become known
for—collaboration and communication.