Toronto Four Seasons Hotel and Private Residences Toronto | 203.9m | 52s | Lifetime | a—A

Fountain???? More like Fountaint!

Hotel has barely been open a weekend and the cheap seats are critiquing it as though it was a local institution yet. The hubris here is exceeded only by the ignorance.

Lest it be overlooked- even in its current skeletal form it appears to exceed all local hotel establishments save for the one down the block.
 
Don't understand the choice of a fountain as the centrepiece of the entrance square, if the designer was worried about water getting on guests or their cars, could have chosen a sculpture instead (no water required). I can only hope it still gets used if only the upper portion ending with the largest (bottom) bowl and not continuing to the ground, otherwise there is no point.

I walked by the building today for the first time since the sidewalk was finished and construction fencing removed. I thought seeing the finished product would help me to warm up to the podium but unfortunately I still don't like it. The way the podium greets the street makes it seem rushed and unfinished, just a wall of black stone running straight down to the ground and window slits with steel frames. Seems like a wrong way to design a hotel, it should be welcoming and open but this gives the opposite feeling, cold, uninviting and sterile, seeming to say "stay away".

There is no real attempt at landscaping, nothing at all on Yorkville Ave. and a few stick trees on Bay St., doesn't look like they even tried to come up with a plan. A line of planters along the wall would have made a world of difference. The driveway mosaic looks very nice and I'm sure the park will be also, but they don't help the Yorkville or Bay sides of the podium at all. I was expecting much better from Four Seasons, especially since this is supposed to be their flagship.

The pictures of the interior look wonderful, so are the towers, it is too bad the podium exterior doesn't live up to those standards.
 
I agree that the comments that the podium seems very cold and uninviting. I'm hoping they'll do more with landscaping. Also the persian rug store accros the street is closing. That would be a great place for a restaurant/patio which with would really liven up the corner.
 
Walking up Bay Street the towers, in the right light, look sleek and attractive, but up close the entrance and podium are extremely bleak and sterile.

The fountain is the only real splash of colour, yet the whole scene looks like one of those black & white photographs where the subject alone has colour showing.
 
Well we've survived brutalism. I'm sure it wasn't the last indulgent and life-sucking assault on urbanism we will endure.
 
I can't believe the fountain will have no flowing water. That is really lame. If it's windy outside, they can simply just turn the water off, and nobody gets wet. They do this with fountains all over the place where it might get people wet.
 
It's no longer a fountain it seems. But actually that's a good point. Why not have an adjustable flow- if it is gusty some days then turn it down or off.

Or why not just move it a bit east and put it as the centre piece of the park. Then they can turn the water on and it won't be a problem. Without the water flowing, it's lifeless and just looks stupid. The location just seems wrong.
 
18 October 2012:

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A few snaps, excuse the slight warp on a couple of the panos!

From a couple of weeks ago or so:
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From today:

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[IMGhttp://farm9.staticflickr.com/8463/8101145628_8950f19317_b.jpg][/IMG]
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^I like that last one with the curve.

Heres one from tonight from up at my pad at 360 Ridelle Ave...

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Always makes me feel like im in NYC sitting on Central Park. Gotta love nature meets urban.
 
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I agree with the comments about the podium. It really is cold and uninviting. There is minimal landscaping on Bay St. It just looks like a cement and black slate alleyway. There is absolutely nothing to captivate a pedestrian's attention, and nothing exciting to look at. No planters, no lighting, no water features, nothing. Six trees hardly counts as landscaping. Where are the planners who approved this thing? How terrible.

This really pisses me off. The developer is making millions of dollars off this tower, with all the height they managed to secure. Yet they give almost nothing back to the street or to the public realm. It seems like the Four Seasons went out of its way to maximize its profits. I'm sure the inside looks beautiful and the guests will all be content. Yet it's as if they plopped down a 50-storey tower in the middle of downtown Toronto, with little consideration of the context, the street, the public, or what the pedestrian experience would be like. Huge fail.
 

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