On February 20, 2008 a fire destroyed eight business and the apartments above on an historic stretch of Queen Street West by Bathurst in Toronto. Amongst the affected businesses was Duke's Cycle, a local legend, and so far the only one of the affected concerns to begin rebuilding on the razed site. Here's a video that UrbanToronto member tgam took of that block from a bike before the fire:

Members of UrbanToronto documented the destruction of the block, and have been discussing the rebuilding plans ever since (The documention and discussions can be found here.). Once digging started for the foundation for the rebuilt Duke's Cycle, a new thread was created to follow the construction of the new building. Until now all we have had are images of the raw construction, but no hints as to how the new building would look when complete. Would it be a replica of the destroyed 3-storey red brick building? If so, how good a job would be done simulating an historic facade? Otherwise, might it be a more modern take? What nods might a modern design make to the past while still being of this time? What route is the appropriate one to go? Now we get the answer with regard to the route being taken by builder Form Design+Build as UrbanToronto member BobBob posts this image of the rendering which was recently put on the hoarding: 

Duke's Cycle Rendering, Photo by BobBob

The design is about as bad as it can get, and should satisfy very few people. It only recalls the destroyed building in that it still has three floors, otherwise the warmth of the red bricks have been replaced by cheap precast and a costly disdain for the public realm. The design neither harkens back to Queen Street's past nor embraces its future, but abandons the facade to a never-was vaguely historical and meaningless ornamentation which has neither function nor aesthetic merit. While larger buildings on Toronto's Avenues are now required to pass their plans by the City's Design Review Panel as part of the approval process, smaller buildings like this are not. This dog begs the question when the threshold might be dropped enough to stop projects like this from marring Toronto's main streets for decades to come. It's time for this town to grow up and for builders to be put on notice that they will not get a free ride when proposing trash like this.