Toronto York University: Joan and Martin Goldfarb Gallery | 6.71m | 1s | York University | Hariri Pontarini

Northern Light said:
There's a lot to like there...............but the near complete lack of glazing does not work for me. I know it's a gallery, but AGO showed you can put the principal hallways rather than the galleries next to the windows...

More transparency would be beneficial here.
Click to expand...

That circulation is perpendicular to the facade - and at least partially incorporated into the galleries on the upper floors - and it is a much, much tighter site than the AGO. This is fine for what it is.

AoD
 
The problem with much of York's Keele campus is that so many of the buildings are single use and have large dead zones around them beyond the entranceways to the buildings. Take this area, for instance. It looks nice enough in the summer with the landscaping and the decent built form, but the buildings don't do much to enliven the space.

The outside walkways are just there to walk through and otherwise dead spaces, which is what might happen to the Harry Arthurs Common area once it's fully pedestrianized. A gallery entrance and a restaurant or cafe fronting onto the public space would be better. The outdoor pedestrian spaces on campus need to be more than just sterile corridors for walking through; the built form should seek to animate the pedestrian spaces.
 
junctionist said:
The problem with much of York's Keele campus is that so many of the buildings are single use and have large dead zones around them beyond the entranceways to the buildings. Take this area, for instance. It looks nice enough in the summer with the landscaping and the decent built form, but the buildings don't do much to enliven the space.

The outside walkways are just there to walk through and otherwise dead spaces, which is what might happen to the Harry Arthurs Common area once it's fully pedestrianized. A gallery entrance and a restaurant or cafe fronting onto the public space would be better. The outdoor pedestrian spaces on campus need to be more than just sterile corridors for walking through; the built form should seek to animate the pedestrian spaces.
Click to expand...

100% agree.

Though.....lets look at that photo you linked:

1642102868002.png



I personally think you were a bit too kind in suggesting the trees saved it during summer.

I assume the concrete protrusion in the foreground has some logical purpose, though that isn't immediately obvious to me; and boy is it ugly.

The trees are all very small, I assume, relatively recently planted at the time of this pic (2011); hopefully they've done better since.

But I see lots of suspect choices in terms of landscape design/layout.

For a start, where is the lower level seating? The layout is organized such that everything turns its back on the lower level.

The terminal view point of the lower path is atrocious; and should either have been addressed by modifying that building; or by pointing the pathway on an angle to the open space, or by creating a landscape feature that obscures the blank wall.

There's no 'there' there. Place making is a thing.

Some paths are invariably just outdoor hallways, and that's ok, but then they need to be a bit narrower and more focused. This just feels disorganized and under-utilized.

No attention to 4-seasons landscaping.

No attempt to introduce interactivity w/the adjacent buildings.

Bah!
 
Last edited:
^That space is packed when the student clubs host their volunteer recruitment fair in September. The rest of the year it has decent pedestrian volumes, but yes, few linger.
 
As someone who went to this school for 6 years, the whole campus is very uninspiring. I'm personally not a big fan of brutalist architecture which you can find enough of at York... but say you like that, okay, cool.

What really does this campus in is as stated by above comments. The public realm is devoid of life. Even if at times there may be more foot traffic, the spaces outside are not functional, for the most part, other than footpaths to other buildings. The seating is minimal, the atmosphere is uninviting. The landscaping is bland.... the entrance to the school with the loop and open park is as stated, unused most of the year. It's mostly just open grass. Open grass does not make a park, there needs to be more moments and functional spaces to actually use.

What was stated above is true. The attached mall takes people away from the public spaces... but it's a small mall, and not very impressive itself, so I don't think it takes too too much away... there are other corners of the school where people congeal, but they are all inside. The other two food courts, the student lounge, the library... which makes sense given our climate. And who would want to spend time outside when the whether is as uninviting as the spaces.... from my memory, I can only remember maybe one outwards facing patio attached to a burger joint, but it faced to the back alley, not the front entrance.

Overall, the campus is poorly designed. It does not converse well with the outside world or with its own components on the inside.

I will say, the newer developments at this school seem nice at least from an architectural standpoint. I was there as they began building the subway station, but I never got to see its completion.

I like the way this art gallery looks, but as someone said, it looks like they'll remove a footpath in the making of it, which is unfortunate.
 
The funny thing however is that the single function buildings with little to no real engagement to the street is also what we have at say U of T St. George. What I'd argue is that the campus lack "intimacy" - the public space is overly expansive, haphazard - hindered further by broken street patterns and unengaging architecture.

Also it would be interesting to look at how people move about on campus - because that's really half the activity that enliven the public space. I suspect you'd find rather different movement patterns.

AoD
 
Last edited:
Don Coyote said:
And who would want to spend time outside when the whether is as uninviting as the spaces.... from my memory, I can only remember maybe one outwards facing patio attached to a burger joint, but it faced to the back alley, not the front entrance.
Click to expand...

In my day, that was Blueberry Hill, near the entrance to York Lanes.
 
Undead said:
I thought Don was referring to the Absinthe, the arts kids' hangout?
Click to expand...
It's been a while since I've been there so my memory is hazy, but I think Absinthe was the underground bar at the food court? I remember there was a cafe right beside it that had some indoor seating with a nice window. There may have been a patio outside of there as well?

I never actually went into the bar but I passed by it a lot... a quick google comes up with Absinthe being a bar/cafe? So I don't know, maybe those two places merged or go by the same name?
 
Don Coyote said:
It's been a while since I've been there so my memory is hazy, but I think Absinthe was the underground bar at the food court?
Click to expand...
No, that was called...the Underground 😆

The Absinthe pub was located in the basement of one of the other college buildings (can't remember exactly which one), and yes, it was the one known to attract a more alternative crowd. At the time I was at York, there were 13 bars/pubs on campus. The aforementioned Underground was actually a full-fledged nightclub as well.
 
Don Coyote said:
It's been a while since I've been there so my memory is hazy, but I think Absinthe was the underground bar at the food court? I remember there was a cafe right beside it that had some indoor seating with a nice window. There may have been a patio outside of there as well?

I never actually went into the bar but I passed by it a lot... a quick google comes up with Absinthe being a bar/cafe? So I don't know, maybe those two places merged or go by the same name?
Click to expand...
That was the Underground (creative name, I know). The Ab was in Winters College.

In my time, the York Lanes bar was Shopsys but they shuttered early during COVID.
 
Not a bar, per se, but many an early 2000s Friday evening were spent in The Cove, the internet cafe / arcade in York Lanes. Friends and I actually skipped prom to go there. I still think we made the right decision.
 
You must log in or register to post here.

Back
Top