Defining elements in this round of construction

[Hali87]

In your city and nationally, what would you say are the defining characteristics of projects built within the last couple years, under construction, and pre-construction?

I guess a few starter questions are: what would currently be considered a typical new lowrise, midrise, or highrise? What do these look like and how do they relate to their surroundings?

Are there any architectural styles, features or materials that are very prominent or widespread? Is this a new or long-established trend?

What uses are being built for? Is there anything novel in the way uses relate to one another or the buildings they're in?

What has been the effect on/response from the transportation network/agencies?

What is considered controversial within the realm of development, architecture, or planning/design at this time, in a broad sense or as specific examples?


Feel free to skip/expand on any of this - just wondering what the national trends are.

[esquire]

Excellent thread idea.

[Stryker]

Confused, between the split between traditional and modern the entire city of st john's I think has an identity issue.

Trapped between emulation and tradition this place needs therapy.

[Hali87]

Here, I would say most new lowrise SFHs/townhouses are still sort of throwback-craftsman suburban, although we are finally starting to see starkly modernist low-scale housing again - this was popular here for a while in the 60s or so but fell out of fashion in favour of more "traditional" (not necessarily to here) "house shaped" homes. The North End, particularly Gottingen Street, has a lot of interesting/quirky infill; something approximating laneway housing is starting to develop (we don't have laneways so the technicalities are quite different), and a lot of older houses and small apartment buildings are being redone in a distinctive charcoal-silver-brown colour scheme, like this:



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(this one's actually in Saskatoon - could this colour scheme be a national trend?)


There is also a certain aesthetic going into some new building construction and a lot of renovations. Seems to be spearheaded especially by a few prominent local architects. Kind of hard to explain so I'll just show:


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The building envelopes in these cases are a bit radical but the style of detailing is becoming common - sort of a postmodern prairie school throwback, and always made of wood and glass.



Midrises would be 4-9 stories generally. Most of the new ones are residential and many of these (particularly in the core) have retail on the ground floor. Designs are increasingly urban/ambitious/modern, but at present the average one would be a fairly simple, tasteful modernist box, clad in brick or precast. Nicer ones incorporate more glass, wood, and metal paneling. Some are very colourful, some are cement grey.

[SignalHillHiker]

Originally Posted by Hali87

In your city and nationally, what would you say are the defining characteristics of projects built within the last couple years, under construction, and pre-construction?

I guess a few starter questions are: what would currently be considered a typical new lowrise, midrise, or highrise? What do these look like and how do they relate to their surroundings?

The typical lowrise is generic North American SFD with more colourful vinyl and Victorian trimmings, or townhouse blocks staggered and set back from the sidewalk just enough to kill any sense of urbanity but not far enough to allow a useful green space.

Mid and highrises are rare, and tend to be either beautiful or butchered with faux-heritage elements. All, though, have extreme and obscene problems - ranging from no street interaction to that interaction being limited to ground-floor parking garages.

Originally Posted by Hali87

Are there any architectural styles, features or materials that are very prominent or widespread? Is this a new or long-established trend?

We love colourful wood, even on our tallest buildings. Elaborate ornamentation on windows and doors continues. Vinyl dominates for residential, some type of paneling for commercial.

Originally Posted by Hali87

What uses are being built for? Is there anything novel in the way uses relate to one another or the buildings they're in?

We're transitioning from hotels to condos to rentals. We have very, very few people actually living in the downtown core. Most of the would-be residential space there is for tourists. This is starting to change.

No novel uses. We have entire subdivisions still going up with nothing but residential. And we haven't built an exciting mixed-use building since the 1890s.

Originally Posted by Hali87

What has been the effect on/response from the transportation network/agencies?

None. Public transportation here is still a social service for the poor. A bus stop near a SFD probably lowers the property value here.

Originally Posted by Hali87

What is considered controversial within the realm of development, architecture, or planning/design at this time, in a broad sense or as specific examples?

Anything tall and/or modern is considered controversial. Once the Victorian block is torn down, its easier to get a Tim Horton's drive-through on the site than an attractive, modern building.

[Hali87]

This would be an example of a typical "basic" midrise design for a smallish lot. This one is in the North End:


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This one's a bit more elaborate, in the South End:


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There have been a lot of new institutional/corporate midrises as well. These have been driven by the universities, the military, and the financial/IT sector. The buildings tend to use a lot of LEED features and tend to be tasteful and interesting departures from the somewhat boring midcentury architecture while still firmly rooted in modernist principles, proportions etc. Here are a few:


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LeMarchant Place at Dal. Various offices/student services on the lower floors, residence above.



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Life Sciences Research Institute, Dal



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NSCC Waterfront Campus



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Nova Scotia Power HQ (converted power plant)

[someone123]

The "basic" example above is more of a "worst of" for lowrises in Halifax (I would say that it's more the norm in the suburbs but that one is actually uglier than a lot of suburban buildings too). That sort of plain design dominated by precast cladding should probably just be banned in the urban core. There is a design review committee that would normally reject projects like that but this one is outside of the district that the committee regulates. It's a good indicator that HRM by Design and the DRC are having an impact.

Two design idioms I've noticed in Halifax lately are curved or angled roof features and small blocks of relatively saturated colours. 5445 Rainnie has both of these but a bunch of projects have one or the other:

Originally Posted by someone123

Here's the side elevation:

[Pinion]

Super wide four storey condos are basically all they build near me, either "mountain village" style or very modern. e.g. This is all on one street


Photo by Pinion


Photo by Pinion

The Shore, North Vancouver by chrisjohann, on Flickr


Photo by wrenegade


Photo by wrenegade


Photo by wrenegade


Render by x61living.com


Photo by Pinion


Photo by wrenegade


Photo by Pinion

It has really done a number on the retail scene. Every place has retail on ground level in areas that used to be just auto dealerships, and they're very very slowly filling up after several years now. People just aren't used to shopping there, and don't realize they all have free customer parking in the back.

The rapid pace of developing a whole major street has also completely flatlined condo value. My place (which is similar and essentially on the same street) has not gone up at all in 10 years, which is weird for Vancouver.

The few single family homes that are built on the north shore of Vancouver are almost exclusively craftsman. A nice, timeless change from our dark history of trendy but cheap home styles.

Taller condo towers, unlike downtown Vancouver, are almost all bright white, more Miami-like than pure green or blue tinted glass Vancouver style. e.g.

[SignalHillHiker]

Note the progressively worse street interaction.

Our lowrise usually looks like this:





These next examples are done but Google Streetview is still a year out of date, and meh...

Midrise.



Highrise.