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Old Posted Sep 25, 2013, 4:07 AM
Drybrain Drybrain is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by counterfactual View Post

This building, as it stands, could easily see it on this List-- "New York's Top 10 Best New Buildings of the Decade":

http://ny.curbed.com/archives/2009/1...the_decade.php

It could be something that people literally travel to the downtown core to see, residents and tourists included.

Seriously, look at some of those award winning designs in NY and tell me again why there is so much facepalming here?

Can't we be a little different for a change?
I think the big difference with those buildings and this is that while operating with a lot of the same general design vocabulary, the Ny ones are, for lack of a better word, elegant. The derive a lot of their beauty through symmetry and relatively simple massing. The Lydon Lynch proposal (and I'm surprised, because they're normally so good) is too mish-mashy.

Quote:
Originally Posted by counterfactual View Post
And there is even more vacant office space in older heritage buildings, which are low density, run down, and just not a place for new businesses to move. I think in a financial district like this, facadism *has* to be the way forward.
There are lots of places where older buildings are being incoporated into larger developments as sort of boutique elements--seems like it would fit with this project with all its hotel/residential components.

I posted this before, but check this project in Toronto out. A full restoration of a run-down structure as boutique office space and business incubator. (Before and after photos here.) If they can find a way to use low-rise, run-down structure in the middle of Toronto's financial district, surely we can do better in Halifax with the relatively small (and not growing) but still strong heritage stock here. Indeed, the preservation of the Merrill Lynch building suggests that. Given how stunning it is inside, I can imagine it serving as a kind of gala/event space for all the fancy folks who'll be using the office/hotel/residential tower. I'm sure that those brick buildings on this site, especially, have some original features inside.

But thanks to whoever posted that old design. I know some people like it, but...yikes!
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