Mississauga Absolute World | 169.77m | 56s | Cityzen | MAD architects

[Recoil]

Really? The most illogical statement you've ever read? Ever? I challenge you to find the fallacy. If you can, I will retract it. Short of that, I will stand by my opinion. Which is what I suspect you really have a problem with, and not with my alleged fallacious statement.

The point of what I'm trying to say is that you can build grandiose buildings all day, but if they are in the middle of nowhere, why should anyone care? They're near a bunch of lousy hotels and a second rate shopping centre, none of which do these beautiful buildings justice.

These Absolute buildings remind me of the Burge in Dubai. Sure it surpassed in height many great buildings in North America, but who cares, it's in Dubai! All that crap in Dubai is just a giant corporate/oil money wet dream, built for no other reason than to prove that if you have nearly unlimited funds you can build nearly what ever you want. Well, I already knew that. Put something like the Burge in a lively, diverse and wonderful city like New York, Chicago or Toronto then see what happens. It's wasted in Dubai, much like Absolute is wasted where it is located.

These Absolute buildings are truly one of a kind and deserve recognition, but the surrounding area is so dull and lacklustre that it's depressing. I remember the first day I saw these and my heart sank immediately because while I saw so intrigued I was also depressed at the idea that they were relegated to such an uninteresting and depressing intersection. Poor public transit, no community feel, no street life, 6 lane roads. What a waste... tragic really.

Just imagine these buildings at Yonge and Bloor! How wonderful that would that have been. They could have single handedly improved that entire area south of Bloor and looked great while doing it.

 

[jje1000]

How about if they had used glass instead of spandrel around the bottle caps so you could see into the mechanicals (a la Matrix at CityPlace) and lit it up from inside? BAD ASS.

That would be idea, but I'm thinking of the current situation- any sort of night-time lighting will do wonders towards explaining why the tops are white.

 

[yyzer]

Recoil, the reason your 'logic' is flawed, is that if one were to accept what you are saying, then any architectural marvel that was built away from a city downtown - say, a country masterpiece by Frank Lloyd Wright - is wasted..the Taj Mahal is wasted, because it's out of the way...the Palace of Versailles is wasted because it's out in the country......ridiculous....architectural merit of a project has little or nothing to do with location...

I think you are pushiing a fake pretense of phony 'logic' that is pretty transparent, and that what you are really doing is simply spewing a predictable sniveling downtown attitude that we sometimes stumble across here, from a few unenlightened chauvinists like yourself.....

 

[Dan416]

Mississauga gets some kudos and the Mississauga bashers come out of the woodwork. I'd ban the lot of them, but then I am biased.

 

[aleesia]

...yet they remain at a faceless intersection in a suburb of Toronto.

Can you show me the "face" of Yonge and Bloor? Or College and Spadina? Or King and University? Do any intersections have faces?

Poor public transit

Is 3-to-4-minute service along Hurontario a sign of having poor public transit?
Is a corridor that has demand for a technology upgrade (to an LRT) a sign of having poor public transit?
Is 6.5-minute service along Burnhamthorpe east of Square One a sign of having poor public transit (which BTW is full of low-density sprawl)?
Is being the busiest transit terminal in the 905 a sign of having poor public transit?

Yikes!

no community feel

Torontonians tend to ignore the 905 because they are drowned with their own civic pride. I understand that.
But Mississauga has a great civic pride among its citizens. A great example is the programming at Celebration Square. Even though I live in Brampton, I frequent Mississauga more than I venture north of Queen Street. Whenever I attend some programs offered by the Square, I have never thought that Mississaugans can unite together and show their civic pride.

no street life

While this might be true, the city centre is lately seeing some signs of life, especially on the western side. There is definitely demand for street life, and the current developments and master plans are addressing it.

At the intersection of, from what I can remember, a six lane road with another six lane road.

6 lane roads

Two of which (in both streets) are reserved for LRT.

They could have single handedly improved that entire area south of Bloor and looked great while doing it.

The same thing in Mississauga. These towers have transformed the entire area. Demand for more architectural design has emerged within the area, and that's great. For example, after Absolute was finished, there are some proposals throughout the entire city that look really good. Like the one at Gordon Woods, as well as another proposal at Port Credit.

A real shame about the location.

Just imagine these buildings at Yonge and Bloor!

Someone's jealous about a new, emerging downtown! That's a good sign that Mississauga is doing great progress!

 

[bleeepbluuup]

Just imagine these buildings at Yonge and Bloor! How wonderful that would that have been. They could have single handedly improved that entire area south of Bloor and looked great while doing it.

OH GOD YOU'RE RIGHT. Yonge and Bloor is forevermore doomed to a blighted, depressing existence now that Absolute reigns in Mississauga. OH the tragedy. We should all just kill overselves now!!

*ahem*

Coveting thy neighbour's buildings is pointless. If Yonge and Bloor wants its own Marilyn, there's nobody stopping it from happening. The rest of the world is not going to wait while they get their act together.

 

[E.B.]

If Yonge and Bloor wants its own Marilyn, there's nobody stopping it from happening.

Yes their is. The developers. I suspect Hazel told Fernbrook/Cityzen they couldn't build unless they had something good. Why doesn't any builder in Toronto have architects from around the world/north america submit plans?

 

[doady]

To be fair, Highway 10 and Burnhamthorpe is a very inhospitable intersection, even compared other intersections in the Highway 10 corridor, especially Highway 10 and Dundas. But these sorts of things will be fixed in time. This part of why they are building the LRT.

But in MCC it's really just that intersection and 10/Robert Speck that are really bad (e.g. just look at how far the stops for 102 are from Robert Speck). The rest of MCC is not like that, especially after recent developments.

 

[Red October]

Hurontario and Burnhamthorpe is is faceless? It's arguably the most significant intersection in Mississauga...

 

[Jasonzed]

Some Thursday day/night community feel at the Square

Random girl who just stood in front of me just as I was going to take a picture...she must have felt same bad vibes coming from UT

 

[guste]

Hey all, looks like Absolute World is getting a bit more attention today, with MSNBC.com posting an article about the lack of interesting tall buildings in the US.

 

[dcc008]

Really? The most illogical statement you've ever read? Ever? I challenge you to find the fallacy. If you can, I will retract it. Short of that, I will stand by my opinion. Which is what I suspect you really have a problem with, and not with my alleged fallacious statement.

The point of what I'm trying to say is that you can build grandiose buildings all day, but if they are in the middle of nowhere, why should anyone care? They're near a bunch of lousy hotels and a second rate shopping centre, none of which do these beautiful buildings justice.

These Absolute buildings remind me of the Burge in Dubai. Sure it surpassed in height many great buildings in North America, but who cares, it's in Dubai! All that crap in Dubai is just a giant corporate/oil money wet dream, built for no other reason than to prove that if you have nearly unlimited funds you can build nearly what ever you want. Well, I already knew that. Put something like the Burge in a lively, diverse and wonderful city like New York, Chicago or Toronto then see what happens. It's wasted in Dubai, much like Absolute is wasted where it is located.

These Absolute buildings are truly one of a kind and deserve recognition, but the surrounding area is so dull and lacklustre that it's depressing. I remember the first day I saw these and my heart sank immediately because while I saw so intrigued I was also depressed at the idea that they were relegated to such an uninteresting and depressing intersection. Poor public transit, no community feel, no street life, 6 lane roads. What a waste... tragic really.

Just imagine these buildings at Yonge and Bloor! How wonderful that would that have been. They could have single handedly improved that entire area south of Bloor and looked great while doing it.

Lol are you ok?

 

[WiddleBittyKitty]

"Marilyn" was just recognized as one of the world's best buildings and the first thing you guys do is complain about this and that.

The Council on Tall Buildings sees these buildings from the vantage point of Chicago and are seduced by the curves.

We complain because we are more familiar with them, and while we know how good, how great these buildings on the whole, we also see them up close where the flaws become apparent, and so we know what they deserve up top and down below and have not yet received. Cityzen and Fernbrook have cheaped out here and they know it. Until they improve the bottle caps and the base, they have lied to us too, to our faces.

Mediocrity in execution is fine for average buildings, not these.

 

[WiddleBittyKitty]

If Yonge and Bloor wants its own Marilyn, there's nobody stopping it from happening.

Yes their is. The developers. I suspect Hazel told Fernbrook/Cityzen they couldn't build unless they had something good. Why doesn't any builder in Toronto have architects from around the world/north america submit plans?

Wrong. Hazel's never seen a building she didn't like. The Absolute World competition was Sam Crignano's big idea according to an interview on Urban Toronto .

In Toronto we have lots of buildings by architects "from around the world/north america", (as if that automatically makes them better than locals). We may not have had competitions for condo towers lately, (apparently Concord's held a secret competish for their Signature tower) but we've got a Libeskind going up, and rumours swirling of something B.I.G., in fact two things from them, a Snohetta building has broken ground, a Rogers Stirk Habour on the way, a Yann Weymouth nearing completion across the the street from a completed Stern tower near Bay/Bloor, etc. etc.

So I don't think the sweeping generalizations help, but that said, yes, we need developers to pony up for more creativity from the people they hire. That they have to go offshore for that, I'm not convinced: bring on more Teeple, bring on more RAW!

 

[E.B.]

Wrong. Hazel's never seen a building she didn't like. The Absolute World competition was Sam Crignano's big idea according to an interview on Urban Toronto .

In Toronto we have lots of buildings by architects "from around the world/north america", (as if that automatically makes them better than locals). We may not have had competitions for condo towers lately, (apparently Concord's held a secret competish for their Signature tower) but we've got a Libeskind going up, and rumours swirling of something B.I.G., in fact two things from them, a Snohetta building has broken ground, a Rogers Stirk Habour on the way, a Yann Weymouth nearing completion across the the street from a completed Stern tower near Bay/Bloor, etc. etc.

So I don't think the sweeping generalizations help, but that said, yes, we need developers to pony up for more creativity from the people they hire. That they have to go offshore for that, I'm not convinced: bring on more Teeple, bring on more RAW!

Regarding the complaining, I found it a little odd that the very day it was being recognized by it's peers as an exceptional design; the posts here seemed very negative. I was surprised.

I read the Sam Crignano article and I'm glad that he thought of it and went ahead with it. ( I only said I suspect Hazel had say over the building). In the same article Sam is quoted as saying:

So we continued our golf game and that afternoon he went back to the office and had a conversation with Hazel McCallion. Shortly thereafter he calls me and he sais 'Okay Sam, let's do it', and I say to him 'do what?' [laughs]. He goes, 'this competition, it's a great idea, we love it'!

In Toronto we have lots of buildings by architects "from around the world/north america", (as if that automatically makes them better than locals).

My point was having a competition, not that we need architects from the rest of the world. And I don't think foreign architects are automatically better. It's interesting that you point out Libeskind, B.I.G., Snohetta etc. Do you think they have better designs, internationally speaking?