Toronto One Bloor East | 257.24m | 76s | Great Gulf | Hariri Pontarini

officedweller said:
It's a Nordstrom Rack people.
It's Nordstrom's DISCOUNT store (it's a slightly more expensive WINNERS).
It's like people have never heard of it or visited one before.
You don't walk into a No Frills and expect Whole Foods - what did you expect?
Click to expand...
While Nordstrom's Rack stores can (and probably will) get away with it since it's an off-price model, they should revisit their little arrangement with MG2 (the design firm they're working with). The dark and dingy in-store model they've been putting in a few of their recent stores just like here at 1 BE isnt the best model. And on a side note, Winners and Nordstrom compete in the same off-price market (it's not necessarily more expensive than Winners).
https://mg2.com/work/nordstrom-rack/

Not all new Rack stores look this off-putting. Calgary's Rack store, and Chicago's Lincoln Park were executed better:

NordstromRackMensShoes.jpg

Calgary
by Phil Crozier

image.jpg

Chicago
by Brendon Brown
 
Amare said:
On a side note, the more pics I see of that Nordstrom Rack, the more convinced I am that it is one ugly space. I'll have to check it out for myself on of these days and see if things are really that bad inside there.
Click to expand...

Laduree, it is not. It doesn't help that they didn't bother to install a ceiling.
 
Judging by my visit to the store last week, it is significantly more expensive than Winners. Much higher quality stuff too - but far from bargain basement prices. Barely any shoes under $100 beyond a few sneakers, Jeans in the $60-$100 range, etc. It may be "off the rack" - but it is still nordstrum quality stuff at the end of the day.

I found the space to be fine generally. Obviously nothing extravagant - but that isn't what the store is.
 
bmiller said:
That's the discount warehouse look. It indicates minimalism, which is reflected in the cheap prices. I have no idea how much cheaper, but there you have it.
Click to expand...
Not a whole lot cheaper in many cases. I bought a pair of boots at the Bay during "Bay Days" that was far cheaper than the same pair at Nordstrom Rack. But yes, there's a lot of psychology involved in retail and it's incredibly fascinating. Loblaws' No Frills (and the No Name brand) are by far the best example of this:

The brand colours are intentionally disarming; Fewer cashiers and registers create longer lines; Products are intentionally put out on pallets; Products are more likely to "run out"; Stores are franchises. This creates the discount "feel", even though they're a brand owned by the biggest, richest grocery/drug store company in the country and seem to actually have more staff on the floor (higher labour costs) than the average Loblaws store per square food. It allows Loblaw Companies Limited to position itself *against* itself and grab more overall marketshare with less liability (see: Franchise).

Most companies have discount brands/discount stores. More people will buy Gap clothes if they feel they're getting a deal on Gap stuff from a Gap Outlet (even though the vast majority of the clothing lines carried are mutually exclusive). Nordstrom Rack is for the people who want to say they buy from Nordstrom proper and can't afford it. But Nordstrom is happy to oblige if it puts more money in their coffers.

I digress though, but I'm just such a wonk for this stuff.
 
When did proper ceilings go out of fashion? Yonge Street must have some kind of special curse on it cuz everything that opens there seems to completely miss the mark. Well, it's only the most famous intersection in Canada. *big sigh*
 
Irishmonk said:
When did proper ceilings go out of fashion? Yonge Street must have some kind of special curse on it cuz everything that opens there seems to completely miss the mark. Well, it's only the most famous intersection in Canada. *big sigh*
Click to expand...

We as Canadians only care because we hear of US intersections and US media makes a big deal about intersections. Can you name a famous one in London? Berlin? Mexico City?
 
Amare said:
While Nordstrom's Rack stores can (and probably will) get away with it since it's an off-price model, they should revisit their little arrangement with MG2 (the design firm they're working with). The dark and dingy in-store model they've been putting in a few of their recent stores just like here at 1 BE isnt the best model. And on a side note, Winners and Nordstrom compete in the same off-price market (it's not necessarily more expensive than Winners).
https://mg2.com/work/nordstrom-rack/

Not all new Rack stores look this off-putting. Calgary's Rack store, and Chicago's Lincoln Park were executed better:

NordstromRackMensShoes.jpg

Calgary
by Phil Crozier

image.jpg

Chicago
by Brendon Brown
Click to expand...

Indeed. I was in a Nordstrom Rack recently on State Street in Chicago. It too has the exposed ceiling, but looked a lot better than 1 Bloor East. It shouldn't even take too much to give the exposed elements a brighter, consistent coat of paint and have slightly better lighting.

But I don't feel like it's worth making a big stink over.
 
zang said:
We as Canadians only care because we hear of US intersections and US media makes a big deal about intersections. Can you name a famous one in London? Berlin? Mexico City?
Click to expand...
Well, since we do identify with big intersections we should put extra care in buffing up their image, no? I was really looking forward to the completion of this project and the imminent spiffing up of the heart of the city. The result is a massive disappointment. There is still no public artwork on the NE side, and virtually nothing to animate on any side of what should be a vital space. It's just a big concrete nothing with crappy stores on all sides. (And I don't see an "Apple" store improving things that much since they're fairly niche oriented and kind of sterile.)

In Mexico it's all about the city squares, so you can bet their zocalos get lots of attention and have consistently strong personalities. Same with the various platzes in Berlin (though, the locals seem to hate Potsdammer Platz--which shows they have pretty strong feelings about how their squares look)

If it's all about intersections here, then make them look good. Especially on Yonge Street where they are consistently underwhelming or just plain crap. I'm tired of all of our shitty, ready-made excuses for our shitty, ready made public realm. If developers, city officials and locals don't give a damn then I guess the city gets what it deserves.
 
Irishmonk said:
When did proper ceilings go out of fashion? Yonge Street must have some kind of special curse on it cuz everything that opens there seems to completely miss the mark. Well, it's only the most famous intersection in Canada. *big sigh*
Click to expand...
The ceilings here are terrible! This being such a nice building, I was expecting something that at least looked like a proper finished ceiling but we got the same shit as a typical best buy, which in my opinion, is unacceptable for any retail store in the core!

Leave that crap in discount, suburban strip malls, not downtown Toronto!
 
If you look at literally any other Nordstrom Rack they all used the exposed ceilings so this was more or less expected.
 
Irishmonk said:
Well, since we do identify with big intersections we should put extra care in buffing up their image, no? I was really looking forward to the completion of this project and the imminent spiffing up of the heart of the city. The result is a massive disappointment. There is still no public artwork on the NE side, and virtually nothing to animate on any side of what should be a vital space. It's just a big concrete nothing with crappy stores on all sides. (And I don't see an "Apple" store improving things that much since they're fairly niche oriented and kind of sterile.).
Click to expand...

As much love as there was for Roy's Square, The SE corner of Yonge & Bloor was a pretty wretched clutch of bargain-basement retail, mediocre restaurants, over-signage and unremarkable architecture (with the exception of 719 Yonge, which was still far from outstanding), so claiming that the intersection isn't improved or spiffed up and that it's a "massive disappointment" is just a tiny bit hyperbolic. If you need a reminder:

http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2014/11/throwback-thursday-one-bloor-east
http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2016/12/throwback-thursday-roys-square-and-one-bloor-east

It's one corner, of four. Yes, that intersection needs work, but an all-or-nothing attitude towards that hangs on one or two buildings is ridiculous.

For the past decade, we've been trying to move away from the "US Model" and have been doing things like building *proper* plazas/squares and other public spaces and fostering P.O.P.S.s as well. Y&D square being the most obvious (and somewhat misguided) example of that, but there's a good swath of the Harbourfront, the Bentway and many more to come, including ones being driven by the Chinatown and Queen West BIAs. Just because it's a well-known corner doesn't mean by default it has to be a public square, nor does it mean it's a good spot for public space. Times Square is a clusterf-ck and pretty much unusable by the people who live in New York, despite how many people want us to emulate it.

Irishmonk said:
If it's all about intersections here, then make them look good. Especially on Yonge Street where they are consistently underwhelming or just plain crap. I'm tired of all of our shitty, ready-made excuses for our shitty, ready made public realm. If developers, city officials and locals don't give a damn then I guess the city gets what it deserves.
Click to expand...

It's "all about intersections here" because people such as yourself keep focusing on intersections, or emulating other cities instead of just creating usable public space. We have brilliant publicly accessible spaces here that you might want to actually take advantage of.

Plus, thinking you know better than the entirety of a city planning department is pure hubris.
 
Torontovibe said:
The ceilings here are terrible! This being such a nice building, I was expecting something that at least looked like a proper finished ceiling but we got the same shit as a typical best buy, which in my opinion, is unacceptable for any retail store in the core!

Leave that crap in discount, suburban strip malls, not downtown Toronto!
Click to expand...

I wonder how many in this thread complaining about it actually live in the area, let alone in the core. Many of us do, and many of us want a livable, walkable city. That also means affordability, and letting some of the (few) benefits of the suburbs come to the downtown.
 
You must log in or register to post here.

Back
Top