Canada's 50 Tallest Proposals

[LilZebra]

Re: SkyTower Pinnacle Yonge. No thanks.

[travis3000]

Originally Posted by LilZebra

Re: SkyTower Pinnacle Yonge. No thanks.

It's stunning! Your loss is my gain.

[WhipperSnapper]

How is it a loss or a gain for that matter? We're the two of you competing for the same unit?

[TorontoDrew]

Originally Posted by LilZebra

Re: SkyTower Pinnacle Yonge. No thanks.

What's wrong with it? I know SkyTower is no SkyCity.

source: https://lh3.googleusercontent.com



source: https://canada.constructconnect.com

[Nouvellecosse]

It's like when there's a big trend introduced by a luxury or prestige brand that gets super popular and everyone is lusting after it until eventually it trickles down into lower and lower market segments until one day you go into Dollarama and see a $3 version of a $3000 Burberry or Christian Dior product. Some people will automatically like the cheap version because it reminds them of something expensive while some will automatically dislike it just because they know it's cheap and they worship money. But let's face it. The price is not the only difference to anyone but the least detail oriented.

Structural diagrids have been around for a long time appearing in mid-century international buildings like John Hancock Center, but Foster really popularized them by integrating them with high quality glass facades which gave the dazzling appearance of prisms, shards, and diamonds. They were an innovation not just in aesthetics, but also in engineering since the designs could reduce the amount of structural materials required and added flexibility to floor plans. But then came the Dollarama versions which hoped to take advantage of the comparison. Conventional, bargain-priced buildings that just stuck some cutsey facade treatments on in order to be "on trend" without doing anything interesting or innovative and in many cases without even investing enough thought and money to make it look convincing... or for that matter, even good.

Most people who are interested in architecture like and appreciate innovation. A creation gets credit for being a milestone or breakthrough in terms of engineering or aesthetics. Many also appreciate pure forms (a single, clear style or concept as opposed to a derivative hodgepodge of various influences). Most people also appreciate the quality and attention to detail often seen in works that are truly groundbreaking. So taking some superficial element from them and creating a Dollarama pastiche is not going to seem very impressive.

[uzi]

new renders

https://waterfrontoronto.ca/nbe/wcm/conn...5%2C+2020+-+Watermarkted.pdf?MOD=AJPERES

[urbandreamer]

Not a fan. I wish Toronto had kept its intimate-scaled historic core. Or build stuff like they do in Portland, Hamburg, Newcastle, Dublin etc. It's just another boring wall of glass covering a football field.

[uzi]

dude what have you been smoking? its a pretty looking tower.

[travis3000]

Originally Posted by urbandreamer

Not a fan. I wish Toronto had kept its intimate-scaled historic core. Or build stuff like they do in Portland, Hamburg, Newcastle, Dublin etc. It's just another boring wall of glass covering a football field.

If you don't like a tower like this you won't like anything being built in Canada. They are all glass towers.

Let's get real, it's a beauty.

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by travis3000

If you don't like a tower like this you won't like anything being built in Canada. They are all glass towers.

Let's get real, it's a beauty.

I find the tower pleasing. It's Hariri Pontarini. I expect inspired designs from other work than innovation or emergence of their own brand. His point was there are too many glass and aluminum towers and not enough creativity in cladding materials. He also points out the scale of the urban form which has the human scale and feel of Sunbelt development than Toronto the good or the cities we admire. As much as I despise facadectomies I'm also very thankful for them. I can't explain why new greenfield development can't build off these great environment and intensification does everything to destroy them. This is not directed at developers. They are middle men in the simplest terms. This is directed at consumers that just need to have something shiny and tall waved in front of their faces. Raccoon City.

[TorontoDrew]

Originally Posted by urbandreamer

I wish Toronto had kept its intimate-scaled historic core.

Where is this intimate-scaled historic core you speak of? It's not in that render, that land used to be under Lake Ontario.

[Maldive]

I don't think diagrid facade detailing has worn out it's welcome yet.

Salesforce in SF coulda benefitted from something to break up the relentless curtainwall mass imo.

HP's SkyTower is redolent of other tower volumes, but the devil is in the details and this is where they shine.

Entirely original? Nope. But subtle building shaping and some diagrid facade details adds up to a winner (better than most).

Guess we're in a bad mood when an elegant (supertall) design is slagged lol.

As for UrbanDreamer's comment... was a parking lot of course ;-)

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by urbandreamer

Not a fan. I wish Toronto had kept its intimate-scaled historic core.

I'd agree if Toronto had a historical core worthy of a global metropolis but 95% of it is modest (some of it quite primitive) 2-4 floor row housing. Stuff like what exists directly west of the St. Lawrence Market and buildings like Dineen on Yonge are well worth saving but they're very much the exception. You're vastly over estimating the quality of what exists. This won't go over well with some on here but 90% of Yonge between College and Yonge Street is complete garbage. Something needs to be more than just old to warrant saving.

[TorontoDrew]

And before a parking lot it was old rail lands, before that docks, and before that just water.

Here it is in 1954, just a field/parking lot
source: torontopubliclibrary.ca


And before that it was underwater, old Union Station can be seen here. Those were really cool looking boathouses btw. I wish we still had some of those around. If I win the $70 million tonight I'll build one.

source: torontopubliclibrary.ca


Here is another showing how this is all reclaimed land. If this picture was taken today the CN Tower's base would be sitting in the water in the foreground.

source: torontopubliclibrary.ca
1884

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by TorontoDrew

And before a parking lot it was old rail lands, before that docks, and before that just water.

Yes, some people have a romanticized view of what existed prior. As much as we might not want to admit it, we never had an old historic core on par with London, NYC, or even Montreal. It's why the construction of new buildings of high quality and architectural merit is even more crucial to a city like Toronto than it is elsewhere. We're starting off from a far smaller inventory of noteworthy buildings.

[Innsertnamehere]

Toronto lost a lot of beautiful architecture in the 1960's and 70's. It just wasn't south of the tracks.

Much of the St Lawrence and Financial Core was rich in Victorian architecture, and much of it was lost.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by Maldive

I don't think diagrid facade detailing has worn out it's welcome yet.

Salesforce in SF coulda benefitted from something to break up the relentless curtainwall mass imo.

HP's SkyTower is redolent of other tower volumes, but the devil is in the details and this is where they shine.

Entirely original? Nope. But subtle building shaping and some diagrid facade details adds up to a winner (better than most).

Guess we're in a bad mood when an elegant (supertall) design is slagged lol.

As for UrbanDreamer's comment... was a parking lot of course ;-)

Diagrid "facade detailing" aka superficial decoration, was never welcome in my books to begin with. Diagrid structural form is something to be appreciated aesthetically because of what it represented in terms of the underlying structure not because of its superficial appearance. Personally I see nothing elegant in that kind of bling fakery. But I'm glad its providing others some enjoyment.

[WhipperSnapper]

Salesforce is an exceptional tower. It doesn't need any suggestions.

aA defined the beginnings of the boom and used the balcony play to great success. 20 years later, we've grown so accustomed to inspired wallpaper patterns that we can't imagine a tower without it. It doesn't define sophisticated design when 90% are these plays are tacky and the projects would look better as plain boxy, elliptical, etc. extruded forms.

This parking lot ending up lasting 2 generations. It was always meant to be developed. It's usage was understood as temporary. This overbuilt environment of poorly designed suites we are creating will be a permanent fixture and will endue for centuries. The environment being built here is subjective to ones preferences. Propping up a development as better than the parking lot it replaced is the lowest form of flattery.

[Maldive]

"I find the tower pleasing. It's Hariri Pontarini."

Nouvelle: Diagrid "facade detailing" aka superficial decoration, was never welcome in my books to begin with"

Guess u are saying no structural reason, no permission.

Not agreed. Ridiculous facades like 1 Yorkville.

I see the diagrid here as some filigree over massive curtainwall. Is a okay.

[urbandreamer]

The design is rubbish. It could be anywhere: a Walmart SuperCentre. An expansive block wrapped in glass and concrete and balconies: yawn. Yes I meant Toronto's historic Victorian downtown that was destroyed by 1)fire 2)builders 3)parking lot owners 4)condo development 5)railways. Toronto did have grand old buildings, sure not as nice as what the Scots built in Montreal but still much finer grained and interesting than the junk they're building today.