[Halifax] Press Block | ? m | 9 fl | U/C
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The parking garage entrance will be on the George Street side according to the elevations and floor plans. Based on past articles about this it sounds like the small surface lot north of Province House can be turned back into a garden/square space when this garage opens.
Granville Street elevation. This is not a small development. Not sure how those gaps between the street-level facades will turn out: https://i.imgur.com/FWaHrUk.png Another rendering: https://i.imgur.com/WXdkubJ.png |
Could be better, could be worse. The treatment of the Acadian Recorder Building is pretty bad/looming. The Dennis Building treatment is pretty good, though it does encroach/envelop the building envelope too much from certain angles.
Retaining the top three Dennis floors is a big win, however. |
Losing the top 3 floors of the Dennis Building would have been really awful. Not sure if that was ever really on the table or if it was just miscommunicated (or was more of a possibility before the registration of the building). In a lot of cities, facadism wouldn't even be acceptable, let alone tearing down half of a facade on top of that. That upper cornice adds a lot of character to the area. Halifax has so many old buildings that look a bit weird because they are missing cornices.
I think the added storefronts and corner building on Barrington will make a big difference. The Dennis Building itself looks run-down and is empty these days too, and the Province House parking looks bad. The Province House and larger George Street area is one of those parts of the city that feels like it's 80% of the way to being great but has some prominent flaws. This is probably the most important vacant site in the city right now, while the Skye site is #2. |
I'm a bit surprised this is all residential except for the commercial space on Barrington. I guess they have a ready-made market for 30+ units with out of town MLAs, but I remain baffled how there isn't any office space at all.
I bet those residential units facing onto Granville will be lots of fun during the periodic demonstrations that occupy Granville St. |
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Well it's about damn time. That horrible vacant lot has been one of the ugliest eyesores in town for as long as I can remember. It may not be the biggest hole in the urban fabric but it's one of the most visible and central.
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From the rendering, the floor plates of the Dennis building do not match up with those in the new structure. I wonder how they will manage that. I also wonder what they will do about the small elevator in the Dennis, or if they will retain that at all. I suppose it could be used as a raceway for building services.
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It looks like from the floor plans that they do line up. I'm guessing it just looks this way from the exterior rendering with the floor to ceiling windows on the newer building and the smaller windows on the Dennis Building, but I'm not positive. The elevator will not be retained it looks like - I'm sure it will be gutted and rebuilt with the new building. |
One thing I do like about it is that from the Barrington Street side it looks like they are trying to roughly mimic the landmark buildings that were torn down from that site years ago, specifically the Cragg building on the corner and the Birks building further in.
http://pressblock.ca/wp-content/uplo...h-1024x683.jpg Source https://halifaxbloggers.ca/builthali...NcW4AALBiI.jpg https://halifaxbloggers.ca/builthali...birks_bldg.png https://halifaxbloggers.ca/builthali...1459416541.jpg https://halifaxbloggers.ca/builthali...92926701_n.jpg https://halifaxbloggers.ca/builthali...ington-street/ |
One thing I enjoy about historic buildings is that many of them seem to have a sense of heft or weight to them that similar modern buildings seem to lack.
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I think this should fit nicely into this part of town, which is distinctive for its medium-scale masonry buildings. The Governor is similar. |
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I was surprised at first, like others, to see Drexel proposing a mostly residential development. But it probably makes perfect sense on a couple of levels. Certainly Halifax's residential rental vacancy rate (at 1 per cent) is much more attractive than the commercial rate at over 15%. But it also makes sense, I expect, from a structural perspective. While I could not find exact floor-to-floor heights for the Dennis building, I'd estimate them at 10-11 feet, more consistent with a residential property and well short of the 12-13 feet that is typical today for a commercial building. Certainly the 2006 CBCL report noted that floor-to-floor heights would be in issue in any attempt to restore the Dennis building to office use. My biggest reservation with the project as proposed is the parking entrance off George Street. It seems to me that has the potential for a real bottleneck. But the only alternative is probably the area between the Recorder and Dennis buildings. And while that is now a parking lot, I don't think having a parkade entry opposite our legislative building is desirable. As much as I'd like to see the historic buildings rehabilitated it seems to me Drexel has done an excellent job of preserving the facade of both structures within complementary new construction that will not overwhelm them. |
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Then there is simply the fact that much modern construction had moved towards very flat, rectangular designs to the point of being almost featureless. IMHO, the old cornices and window features with arched windows, and deeply recessed and detailed brickwork are far superior from an aesthetic point of view to a rectangular sheet of glass with prefabbed cladding attached here and there. It's just a preference I realize, but just sharing my opinion... I do enjoy the newer buildings that strive to use better materials, like the Queen's Marque project, though. This one is looking like one of the better new projects that will fill an empty lot that has been empty far too long. |
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As noted, I am pleased with recreating the massing from those former landmarks on Barrington. In my perfect world they would move closer to recreating their appearance, but I realize with modern construction and cost restraints, this probably wouldn't be possible to pull off properly. |
I had feared the worst, basically that it was all but inevitable that the Dennis building would be demoed under any plan for redevelopment so I'm quite relived to be honest. I thought it would go something like, "Cool new skyscraper proposed set to start in 3 months, existing building rush demoed to prepare. Site sits empty for two year amidst rumours of developer struggles which they deny. Several revised versions of the project appear before developer goes bankrupt, plan is canceled, and province takes over building a 3 story parking bunker.
Ok... i can kinda see why people find me pessimistic. :haha: |
As much as I like this proposal I suspect I'm not going to like what appears to be blank walls facing Barrington St. and the Parade Grounds above Freak Lunchbox and the next two buildings. Where I think Dexel has done a good job designing a backdrop allowing for prominence of the historic buildings in its project, I'm not sure that blank walls above the aforementioned three buildings will be doing them any favour.
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https://i.imgur.com/XcBO5mH.png Looks like it's only about 1/4 of the facade on the upper floors so it seems not too bad. It could be covered in a mural. I think the J. W. Johnston Building has a similar setup and it's hard to see from Barrington, although the site is a bit different since it's facing other buildings and not the Grand Parade. The parkade entrance on George Street is unfortunate but I am not sure there is a better alternative. |
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Perhaps there could be a mural in the plan, as they are showing one on the south facing wall on Barrington in the renderings. On the topic of murals, this project will cover up the “interesting” one on the side of the Freak Lunchbox for future generations to see when this building is demoed some day. I wonder what people will think when they see it? :hmmm: |
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