As one of the most—if not the most—photographed construction projects in Toronto, the 58-storey L Tower continues to draw our eyes and cameras upwards towards the sweeping sail-like curve which is redefining our east-side skyline. Since the Cityzen, Fernbrook and Castlepoint Numa joint-venture topped off earlier this year, we have paid close attention to the progress of cladding installation, and with much of the main tower structure now fully cladded, we returned to the project last week for an exclusive peek at the ongoing work up top. For the first installment in our trip to the top, we take a look at the louvers now being installed on the southern façade of the tower’s massive mechanical penthouse.

Newly installed louvers on L Tower's mechanical floors, image by Jack Landau

Mechanical floors finish off the top of modern skyscrapers, housing the equipment needed to heat and cool the building’s interior, dampers to reduce sway, machinery to run the elevators, and more. Large scale equipment like boilers and air conditioning units typically requires ventilation, a necessity that can be a challenge to attractively incorporate with the rest of the architecture. The teams at Studio Daniel Libeskind and Page + Steele / IBI Group Architects has met the challenge by designing L Tower’s louvers to closely match the tone of the tower cladding.

Upper floors of L Tower, image by Jack Landau

While the tone match isn’t 100%, the louvers do manage to blend in pretty impressively with the cladding below. In fact, from street level it is very difficult to even tell that one is looking at metal louvers as opposed to a continuation of the window wall system seen lower down the southern, eastern, and western façades. From close up, however, the slatted steel louvers are much easier to see.  

Looking up at the newly installed louvers, image by Craig White

The hidden interior of the louvers has a steel mesh grid secured to it.

Wire mesh covering the interior of the louvers, image by Craig White

In the photo below, we can see a few important items (aside from a dizzying perspective of the rail tracks and Backstage construction site): not only do we get a close up view of the powder-blue louvers, but also top down perspective on the swing stage being used to install the mechanical floor cladding, currently resting on a wooden platform which has been temporarily installed in the building's grand penthouse suite.

Looking down towards the swing stage and temporary wooden platform, image by Craig White

Raising and lowering the swing stage relies on a complicated scaffold recently constructed atop the tower’s distinctive tip, something we will look at in our next story, tomorrow.

Swing stage used for mechanical floor cladding installation, image by Jack Landau

Until then, additional information including building facts, renderings and floorplans can be found at the associated dataBase listing, posted below.  Want to get involved in the discussion? Check out the related Forum threads, or voice your opinion in the comments section provided at the bottom of this page.