Toronto 2 St Thomas | 80.46m | 26s | KingSett Capital | Hariri Pontarini

"I don't know why everyone's so coocoo for cocoa puffs over 1 St Thomas. "

compare it to other similar type buildings going up in Toronto or elsewhere in Canada (ex. Vancouver and Grace) and its pretty obvious that this is a very attractive, well executed design that will only improve with time (grit)
 
Okay, to respond and expand...

Could you expand on your comments, they are a little academic for me. The problems center on "sticking out, being white, and silly"?
Click to expand...

The photos on the forum of 1 St. Thomas (check out Archivistower's pics at www.acadieville.ca/2006Update/ ) mesh with my experience of it: seen from near or far, this is the brightest, whitest building in the city. While I don't look for every building in the city to be bland or the same colour, this one is glaringly white to me, and sticks out the way that the beautiful limestone covered Whitney Block doesn't. Whitney's subtle colouring proves you can do something different without screaming 'I'm different!'. I'm also afraid the white precast will not age gracefully. Limestone ages gracefully. White precast, well, I'm afraid staining under 1 St Thomas' protruding window bays is inevitable.

compare it to other similar type buildings going up in Toronto or elsewhere in Canada (ex. Vancouver and Grace) and its pretty obvious that this is a very attractive, well executed design that will only improve with time (grit)
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what 'Vancouver and Grace' refers to Mark. Neither am I familiar with any similar type buildings going up in Toronto or elsewhere in Canada. I think 1 St Thomas looks silly because it is not architecture of our time. It's Robert A. M. Stern doing something Whitney Block-like, or Commerce Bank tower-like, (which are wonderful buildings), reaching into the past for a vocabulary that we don't really speak anymore, not unless we're putting on airs anyway. An example of the nods to the past here are the precast window details, with expensive looking multi-angled trim, which I find fussy and unnecessary. If the proporations are handsome, you don't need that kind of frippery to make a building work. I'm definitely of the less is more school (when it's done well), and 1 St Thomas is having none of that.

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Of course, the Whitney Block would have been much lighter when built. It now has the benefit of decades of exposure to air and dirt, giving it it's current patina.
 
Hey, it could be worse
vittoriano.jpg
 
Minto vs. St. Thomas:

Contemporary neo-Modernism takes on what should have been a creative take on deco but turned out to be a rather grand looking faux-ish building not unlike others in that neighbourhood.

The result: Good design betters "good taste".
 
Oh, I'd welcome a giant white marble typewriter. This city is sorely lacking in that sort of exuberantly monumental kitsch.
 
I agree completely. You can't take everything so seriously.

But where to put it? Perhaps we could come up with something near Casa Loma, nice big hill there, and the Castle Hill development might set it off magnificently.
 
Build it in Vaughan as a mausoleum for Julian Fantino when he croaks.
 
Would that make Julian the man below the ground in the city that is above Toronto?
 
Minto - Charles & St Thomas

They appear to be blocking off the site in preparation for demolition. I wonder whether Minto & Glass will overlap one another during sales & construction?
 
Yes, the two projects will be around 20 metres from one another.
 
I'm glad to see Minto going ahead with demolition. Although they were lovely old homes, they were lovely old homes many years ago, and merely rotting eyesores for the last decade.

No hint in the media of when sales will open though, is there?

It's amazing how many high end condos are already competing for sales in this market...

Very High End
77 Charles West
155 Cumberland
MuseumHouse
Four Seasons
ShangriLa
Trump
Ritz

High End
Festival Tower
11 Bedford
Sapphire
Regency
Uptown
L?

Moderately High End
Panorama
Lumiere
Florian
Milan
M5V
L?
X

High End of Moderate
Everything Else

I'm sure I'm missing some

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