Below is a short list of the prestigious honours and awards that recognize Rocco Maragna’s exceptional contributions to excellence in design and innovation.
- B.Arch.(U of T), UAI (Venice) M.Arch.UD (Harvard ’77) MOAA, FRAIC, MRIBA
- As an architect and urban planner, he has overseen a wide range of projects, from private residences to the renovation of an Italian medieval town. Form the reconstruction of various towns destroyed by the 1976 earthquake in northern Italy to the design of anew urban centre in the former city of York. From churches to schools to a design competition for the Damascus Museum of Art. From designing the Canadian Embassy in Cairo to developing a landscape settlement planning strategy. Form a small villa in the heart of Toronto to a new city in southwest China.
- Founder and president of the Gallery of Human Migration (GHOM), whose first initiative was the publication of the book College Street Little Italy, Torontos’ Renaissance Strip, edited by Denis De Klerck & Corrado Paina (2006).
- Received the Eagle Feather from the Huron-Wendat First Nation for his efforts in recognizing the significance of Canadian First Nations. For several years, he has been negotiating with the Vatican Museums for the return of artistic works belonging to Canadian indigenous peoples that have been stored in the Vatican Museums’ underground archives.
- ‘Visiting critic’ in architecture at several Canadian universities.
- Received the ‘Canada 125 Commemorative Medal’ for outstanding contributions (1993).
- Fellow of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada for his contributions ot architecture. nI October 2019, the RACI College of Fellows recognized him.
- Winner of the International Prize, City of Florence, UT PICTURA POESIS (2018)
- Co-Chair of the ‘Welcome Italia’ exhibit at the 1997 Canadian National Exhibition (CNE), commemorating the 500th anniversary of Giovanni Caboto’s landing in Newfoundland.
- Awarded the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (1997), at the initiative of the President of the Italian Republic, Oscar Luigi Scalfaro.
- Co-founder of the Italian Contemporary Film Festival (ICFF), he inspired the creation of the documentary Fellinopolis, made by director Silvia Giulietti for the centenary of Fellini’s birth, which opened the 2020 edition of the Italian Contemporary Film Festival (ICF) and won the award for Best Documentary.
- Named ‘Fellow of York Centre for Applied Sustainability (1995), for his research on the need to rethink urban mobility, which he began in 1976 while attending Harvard University.
- Co-author, along with other Italian-Canadians, of a ‘Manifesto’ declaring that the Italian community deserved to be included in and accepted as equals in their adopted country (1986).
- Co-organizer of the Musicarchitecture Festival in L’Aquila, Italy, which had the merit of introducing the Italian public to previously unknown Canadian culture, until then only partially known, with over 120 participants including Canadian artists and architects, who returned to Canada and became in turn ambassadors of mutual knowledge and appreciation (1982).