Reimagining Ottawa’s architecture

[Urbanarchit]

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[J.OT13]

I'll try this again (posting a picture). Here is something I would like to see for one of the Place de Ville Phase IV towers; a 460 foot tall, 930 000 square feet. As a clean and modern international style building, it would complement phases I and II, it's not too flashy so it might pass the height limit red tape and if that extra height is allowed, it would add a few more years to the quickly depleting stock of CBD development sites.

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[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by defishel

What building is this? It's a bit small to see

From what I can see, it would probably be the best looking building in that area, and the podium would be an interesting feature, as well.

A new RBC building in downtown Toronto near the Air Canada Centre, south of the Gardiner.

http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2011/12/...new-renderings

[Harley613]

I would move mountains to have something like Absolute World in Ottawa. Dow's Lake or Bayview.

[OTSkyline]

Some of my favs:

88 Scott St, Toronto. I love the interesting cascading rooftop (not flat) and I love how its a mixture of traditional & cement (lower) mixing with modern glass tower at the top. Would be great for a Office/Condo tower downtown.


So this one is a bit of a long shot for Ottawa but it's a design from a Chinese or Hong Kong firm for a tower in India. I love the interesting shape, the balconies, the podium everything and I think it would be amazing to have something like this on Carling fronting Dow's Lake. Note: This is the tower with the "mini-pools" or "water balconies" which is really sharp but we could obviously do without.


h2O Tower in Calgary.Love the glass, the interesting podium and "dome" shape and the really interesting rooftop and pinnacle, this would add a lot to our skyline. This would be great anywhere downtown or maybe even on Rideau (maybe at the Metro site)?

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by OTSkyline

Some of my favs:

88 Scott St, Toronto. I love the interesting cascading rooftop (not flat) and I love how its a mixture of traditional & cement (lower) mixing with modern glass tower at the top. Would be great for a Office/Condo tower downtown.

A 500-600 foot version of this one as part of PdV IV, along with the shorter RBC building I posted earlier would be awesome. Either there or at Standard Life III.

[amanfromnowhere]

I would like to see Dow Honda site and surrounding area like this (view from Colonel By Drive)... by 2344 year:


1982 ... concepts- 'Bladerunner'

PS. Richcraft buildings will be considered as low rise and therefore are not depicted here.

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[citydwlr]

Originally Posted by defishel

I also like Steven Holl's Linked Hybrid Complex in China (Beijing, I believe?). I would rather just have this building with the joining bridge between the towers in Ottawa, perhaps around LeBreton, Bayview or Tunney's Pasture, but I wouldn't mind the entire complex either (it takes up a fair bit of space, though, which I believe could be used for other buldings).

They enclose a green space and pond, and if you can see, the window sills (and the walls and ceilings of the sills) have different colours, so from different angles the building looks colourful.

Interesting buildings! I like the use of green space on the roofs. I've often wondered why buildings (mostly apartments and condos) don't consider the roof as a design element. The building should look good from any angle, and certainly once a taller buildings goes up close by, they'd like a better view than just a gravel or cement roof-top with mechanical elements on it.

The added colour on this building and creative use of lighting and exterior cladding is interesting as well. Tunney's would be a neat place for this one, for sure!

[citydwlr]

I'm really liking this proposal (pictures below) from Gehry and Partners for an Art Gallery in China. It didn't get chosen as the final design, however, I think a Jean Nouvel one did. That leads me to a question though:

Do local government and real estate developers ever send requests for proposals to national/international architecture firms?

I don't have a specific location for this in Ottawa, though Le Bretton comes to mind - not that we need art gallery (maybe a MOMA)...It could be repurposed as something else... Anyway, I highly suspect wherever it were to go in Ottawa it would be too "bright" for local residents...

Here are the renderings from the Gehry & Partners' Art Gallery proposal:









More renders via Archinect

[J.OT13]

I'm also not a fan of the C.D. Howe. The glass seems flat, the concrete bits ugly and the mechanical penthouse on top, one of few things that somewhat pierce the skyline, looks cheap. I must say I like the updating on the ground floor (see Three Brewers on the corner of Sparks and Bank) with clean new glass. If the whole building was re-clad with this and something would be done to the penthouse, it might not be too bad.

That building in Montreal across from Victoria Square, in fact that whole "Quartier International des Affaires" they build on top of the Ville Marie tunnel is what I imagine a redeveloped King Edward Avenue could look like once a truck tunnel was completed (but not build on the tunnel but on each side of King Ed's Avenue).

Originally Posted by defishel

One Building I really dislike in Ottawa is the C.D. Howe building (the one on Queen and Sparks with Holt Renfrew). There's nothing about it I like. I'd much rather have the building building take it's spot, it's in Montreal. They're actually the exact same height (13 floors, approximately 60 meters).

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