Great Canadian Skyline Thread II

[Chadillaccc]

By Daemon on SRC : https://calgary.skyrisecities.com/forum/threads/calgary-skylines.24432/page-37





By me…

[TorontoDrew]

Bankers Hall shares no resemblance to those NYC Joke towers.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by O-tacular

Yeah, one is an anchor of a DT Core with integrated heritage structures and the other is a cheap and tacky disneyland version of New York architecture off a highway in a bedroom community.

versus

Wow, are those faux suburban townhomes around the faux Chrysler Buildings' base? At least stick with the NYC theme and build faux brownstones.

I'm solidly team Banker's Hall. Some good post-modern architecture that stands on its own vs the botched attempt at replicating one of the world's icons.

[WhipperSnapper]

Jacksonville has been dethroned!

[someone123]

It's been interesting to me to see Postmodern architecture age. I happened to (like many SSPers probably) grow up in the era when there wasn't much construction in Canada and a lot of the shiniest buildings were slightly aged PoMo built up to about 1990. Their appeal was some mix of the style itself and newness.

Today I think they are.. okay. I'm not sure the great ones are up there with the greatest International or Art Deco buildings. Many of them have aged decently well because they were built somewhat simply with high quality materials like stone. Certainly some are better than early 2000's buildings, which I think are mostly quite bad now.

That era was "peak office tower" in a lot of Canadian cities. Vancouver has taller ones now but they're mostly mixed use or residential. And now there's even more of a shift to remote working so it's getting harder and harder to justify a big office tower.

[O-tacular]

Most of the signature towers in Canada's skylines are PoMo. I don't get the hatred for it. There are some bad examples but mostly I like them. Montreal and Toronto are full of brilliant PoMo towers. Vancouver's Central Library is PoMo. Calgary's skyline was dominated by Petro Canada and Bankers Hall for decades. Like you said, early 2000's is the worst. I don't know what to qualify it as since it was built over a decade after the peak of that style in the late 80's early 90's.

[Chadillaccc]

I can’t think of any other truly PoMo towers built in 2000 or later except for Bankers Hall east, and that’s only because it was a near carbon copy of its 1989 twin. Interestingly, at 197 meters roof height, they are the tallest identical twins in Canada, and second tallest on the continent.

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by Chadillaccc

I can’t think of any other truly PoMo towers built in 2000 or later except for Bankers Hall east, and that’s only because it was a near carbon copy of its 1989 twin. Interestingly, at 197 meters roof height, they are the tallest identical twins in Canada, and second tallest on the continent.

I can't believe I forgot that the second tower was built in 2000. I watched it rising from my class window in highschool every day. Maybe I still classify it as 90's because I think it started in '99.

Edit: Wikipedia says 2000 but I started Grade 10 in '99 and remember seeing it then. Must have been right on the cusp. This excerpt makes me like them a little less though:

The distinctive crowns of the buildings are intended to resemble cowboy hats when viewed from afar;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bankers_Hall

[Monolith]

Autumn In Yaletown by Clayton Perry, on Flickr

[esquire]

Originally Posted by O-tacular

Edit: Wikipedia says 2000 but I started Grade 10 in '99 and remember seeing it then. Must have been right on the cusp. This excerpt makes me like them a little less though:


The distinctive crowns of the buildings are intended to resemble cowboy hats when viewed from afar;

Unless the architecture firm responsible for the buildings wrote that (DOUBTFUL AT BEST), then I call bullshit. That's just an urban myth someone foolishly decided to upload to wikipedia.

[q12]

https://twitter.com/Rochelle_NS/status/1448240876455661568

[esquire]

Nice postcard shot!

[lio45]

You guys let page 905 come and go without any Mississauga pics!

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by esquire

Unless the architecture firm responsible for the buildings wrote that (DOUBTFUL AT BEST), then I call bullshit. That's just an urban myth someone foolishly decided to upload to wikipedia.

It could also just be fake bullshit that they used to sell the design.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by O-tacular

It could also just be fake bullshit that they used to sell the design.

Cohos Evamy sells an image of upscale corporate sophistication... I would be gobsmacked if they purposely incorporated tacky stampitechture into their design. It would be like if Holt Renfrew set up a few racks of Affliction t-shirts and Flames jerseys next to the Dior dresses.

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by esquire

Cohos Evamy sells an image of upscale corporate sophistication... I would be gobsmacked if they purposely incorporated tacky stampitechture into their design. It would be like if Holt Renfrew set up a few racks of Affliction t-shirts and Flames jerseys next to the Dior dresses.

Could be like the Saddle dome. It received its moniker after it was built and was not designed to intentionally look like a saddle at all.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by O-tacular

Could be like the Saddle dome. It received its moniker after it was built and was not designed to intentionally look like a saddle at all.

Exactly like that. An architectural version of a backronym.

[J.OT13]

The tops of Bankers Hall don't look like cowboy hats by any stretch. Just the classic pyramid shape we see on many other skyscrapers. Saddledome looks like a saddle. Enough that I have a hard time believing that wasn't deliberate.

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

The tops of Bankers Hall don't look like cowboy hats by any stretch. Just the classic pyramid shape we see on many other skyscrapers. Saddledome looks like a saddle. Enough that I have a hard time believing that wasn't deliberate.

The Saddledome has its shape due to the technology they used to create the parabolic dome. It's just wires reinforced with concrete. There were others built with the same style iirc but I think the Saddledome is the only remaining example.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by O-tacular

The Saddledome has its shape due to the technology they used to create the parabolic dome. It's just wires reinforced with concrete. There were others built with the same style iirc but I think the Saddledome is the only remaining example.

And sadly will be lost as well.