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A lot has changed since we last checked in nearly seven months ago with a front page story on Karma Condos. Designed by architectsAlliance and developed by Lifetime Developments and CentreCourt Developments, Karma will bring 495 residential units to the Yonge and College area when it is complete in 2016. Construction on the tight Grenville Street site has required major moves to be made in order for work of the 50-storey condominium to begin.
The biggest move was that for the heritage 1873 residence known as John Irwin House, which was being relocated from the northwest corner of the lot to the northeast corner. Before the house was moved, deep holes were drilled into the soil and rock where the house would stand, and then concrete and steel columns were formed in the holes, atop of which a concrete slab was poured. The Second Empire style house was moved onto the slab and then excavation of the pit got underway below. Once the excavation was finished, the four-storey underground garage was built to place and the house now appears to rest on the ground like any other building.
Following the completion of the garage, the three-storey podium was formed and construction is now continuing on the repetitive floors of the tower. In the west-facing image above, Karma Condos can be seen rising behind an adjacent Yonge Street lot where work to build YC Condos recently started. Karma had reached eight storeys tall when this photo was snapped last week.
At this stage the building will rise more quickly into the air. The installation of glazing will be the next obvious change on the exterior, and we can see in the image above that cladding panels have been delivered and stacked inside the units, awaiting that time.
Additional information with renderings of the completed project can be found in our Karma dataBase file, linked below. Want to get involved in the discussion? Check out the associated Forum threads, or leave a comment in the space provided at the bottom of this page.
| Related Companies: | architects—Alliance, Baker Real Estate Incorporated, Cecconi Simone, SKYGRiD |
