The Renfrew Business Centre in Vancouver is nearing completion so I got off at Renfrew Station and did a walkabout in the late afternoon light. I had only seen it from the Skytrain so I was familiar with the south facade. Every side of this building is different and interesting to look at. Of particular interest were the "floating" glass panels on the west side, presumably to offset solar gain. They are perpendicular near the southwest corner and then turn more as they go to the north end, almost laying flat.
I think this is my newest favourite building in Vancouver. I look forward to going back again to get more shots of the undulating south facade.
The one in central Halifax is in the car bays of an old autobody repair shop.
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"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - George Bernard Shaw Don't ask people not to debate a topic. Just stop making debatable assertions. Problem solved.
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"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - George Bernard Shaw Don't ask people not to debate a topic. Just stop making debatable assertions. Problem solved.
John Bentley Mays
Special to The Globe and Mail
Published Thursday, Feb. 11, 2016 8:00AM EST
Last updated Wednesday, Feb. 10, 2016 2:17PM EST
The streetscapes of Toronto’s upmarket Forest Hill neighbourhood are staid, poshly ordinary and a bit on the dull side, which, it appears, are the things that residents like about them. You don’t expect to find much evidence of fresh architectural thinking among the mock-Tudor and faux-Georgian homes of the district. It simply wouldn’t be tolerated.
Or so I thought until a mild afternoon late last year, when an errand brought me into the attractive cluster of middle-brow shops and restaurants known locally as Forest Hill Village. I parked my car on little Relmar Road, at the edge of the commercial settlement, and was about to head out on my errand when something caught my eye.
It was a pair of tall, flat-topped semi-detached houses that did not look like the rest of Forest Hill. Instead of turning a politely dark, retiring, fustily historicist front toward the sidewalk, for instance, the small modernist complex faced the city boldly, and made no apology for being high-spirited and lyrical in humdrum company. The dramatically sculpted façade’s broad abstract planes of light stone and blackened brick seemed to crack apart and slide over and under each other, creating strong visual rhythm reminiscent of cool, smooth modern jazz. To switch the image: If there could be a Cubist façade treatment, this was it.
ANDREA BENNETT
MONTREAL — Special to The Globe and Mail
Published Thursday, Jan. 21, 2016 8:00AM EST
Last updated Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2016 3:21PM EST
At the corner of Villeneuve and Hôtel-de-Ville in the Mile End, a brand new white-varnished-brick building cantilevers over a traditional, restored red clay brick building. Together, the buildings comprise a new eight-unit housing project, the Hôtel-de-Ville Residence, designed by Montreal’s ACDF Architecture specifically to appeal to families.
The residence, located in a central and popular Montreal neighbourhood, is surrounded by an eclectic mix of other buildings: a car repair garage with a corrugated metal fence; high-end duplex and triplex conversions; a painted-brick housing co-op; and the concrete-wrapped Conservatoire de musique et d’art dramatique de Québec.
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