The future of Ontario place

Or: the future of the past’s future.

Opened in 1971, Ontario Place represents both our idealistic past and our betrayal of it. A masterpiece of modernist architecture by Eberhard Zeidler, who also designed the Eaton Centre, it has been forgotten by the city. Shawn Micallef, author of Stroll and an associate editor of Spacing magazine, says, “it has this wonderful, faded grandeur, which is kind of romantic, but maybe we don’t want it on our waterfront.”

Attendance has plummeted from a high of 2.5 million its inaugural year to less than one million for seven years in a row. So it’s little surprise last week’s news that Ontario Place issued a Request for Information, opening the doors to an extreme makeover, was greeted with a mix of nostalgia, mutters of good riddance and horror at the prospect that some of Toronto’s icons may be lost.

Behind the scenes at Parliament Hill

Rick Mercer visits one of my favourite buildings in Canada.

Alien world discovered under Montreal

Under Montreal‘s latest adventure, well, under Montreal is both beautiful and creepy. OK, mainly creepy.

Previously:

• Urban Montreal goes digging through history

Under Montreal goes digging through history

Urban exploration blog Under Montreal visits the Point St. Charles collector and finds some artifacts from the past and signs of new life.

Perhaps the most interesting underground features in the Montreal area are found within the old sewers built during the mid to late 1800s. Usually constructed entirely of brick and of sizes up to 9’ in diameter, they often appear to be steeped in history in a way that newer concrete sewers just can’t compare to. They have a warmer and organic quality to them as well that I tend to appreciate. Where concrete sewer systems can feel like cold modernist pieces of architecture, the brick ones  more like inviting Victorian homes.

“It has a life”

There’s an excellent piece over at Torontoist about Toronto’s TD Centre and The Ring, a sculpture that used to stand in the centre’s plaza.

Four of the six towers that comprise the TD Centre complex loom over the plaza (the other two, one of which was purchased from another owner in 1998 and does not look like the others, are located just south of the plaza, on the other side of Wellington Street). Standing beneath them, one feels the presence of immense amounts of money and influence, as though raw economic power has coalesced on the spot and crystallized into these huge rectangular forms. The towers are tall, they are virtually featureless except for the steel I-beams that rib them lengthwise from top to bottom—and they are all very, very black. The plaza itself is expansive and austere, paved with dark grey, square slabs of granite. TD Centre is a sublime landmark, without question.

The Ring stood in the midst of the part of the plaza originally designed by Mies van der Rohe before his death in 1969, just in front of the TD Bank Tower, east of the one-storey Bank Pavilion that occupies the plaza’s northwest corner. The spot is now a flat, empty apron of grey slabs. It’s as though nothing was ever there. One of the picketing workers told us that the paving stones in the vicinity had been badly cracked and damaged prior to The Ring’s removal, and that they had just been restored. He supposed the new paving stones had cost Cadillac Fairview millions of dollars. The new stones are sparkly. They look great.

(Image from Jaixm’s Flickr stream.)

Let’s tear down the PM’s house

Maclean’s says 24 Sussex is an eyesore and needs to be torn down and replaced — and they want your proposals for a new PM residence. Holmes on Homes, anyone?

It has no fire sprinklers. Its walls are lined with asbestos. Its plumbing and wiring would not pass muster in any other house in Ottawa. It is drafty. Its air conditioners make a racket. It has, by all accounts, hideous carpeting on the stairs.

It has not had a thorough makeover in half a century. Fixing it in 2006 would have cost $10 million. Fixing it now will certainly cost more. Whenever the repairs begin, the tenants will have to vacate the property for at least a year, probably more. It was not built for its august purpose and it does not bear its burden gracefully. It oppresses its residents—though they are required by the unbreakable codes of populism to deny any problem—and it doesn’t uplift the nation. Frankly it doesn’t even do much for the neighbourhood.

It is the Prime Minister’s residence at 24 Sussex Drive, and it is time to tear the sucker down.

Creeeepppyyyy

BlogTO takes a photo tour of the abandoned Muskoka sanitorium. Do these people not watch horror films? Or parodies of horror films?

AGO hit with moisture problems

If I were the curators, I’d try to pass it off as installation art. PR, people, PR.

The new Frank Gehry-designed Art Gallery of Ontario, designed as an impregnable fortress against the harsh Canadian weather, is already showing cracks in its armour. Recent visitors to the newly reopened and much celebrated Toronto gallery have been shocked to find condensation fogging up and streaming down many of its outer windows, while buckets dot its famed Douglas fir central staircase, catching errant drips.

The leaks and condensation problems at the AGO have dredged up memories of a negligence lawsuit that ensnared its architect, Frank Gehry, in late 2007 after another of his designs, at MIT, became cracked, leaky and mouldy. When word of the dispute reached AGO director and CEO Matthew Teitelbaum that November, he said he was confident the newly renovated Gallery would be “impermeable” and ready for the challenging weather of downtown Toronto.

(Image from ocad123′s Flickr stream.)

Reno your life

Kate Tremills and Kevin Corkum, friends of mine in Vancouver, have just begun renovating their house and, like any self-respecting tech geeks, they’ve launched a blog to record the process. Reno Your Life will document their experiences, both financial and philosophical.

Home renovations are so much more than knocking out walls. If you’re a creative person who wants the most from your home, why would you settle for a cookie-cutter reno?

Reno Your Life is all about asking the important questions. Discussing the options. And sharing the wisdom of a huge renovation community.

As we started our reno, we discovered that we didn’t really know what “home” meant to us. We’d lived in some nice places. We’d visited nice places. But, as two entrepreneurs without kids, our definition of home was unique. Just like yours is.

Join us on our journey as we unearth the exciting possibilities for creating our dream home. Not just in the materials we choose. But in the fundamental questions we ask ourselves about comfort, creativity, entertainment, and a place to belong.

I love the idea of planned interviews with the designer and contractors. It’s a simple but clever way to make sure everyone stays honest, and it’s good advertising for the workers if Kate and Kevin are happy with the job.

The Post calls for an AGO Modern

Sure, I’ll go along with that.

Yes, so far, Frank Gehry’s AGO appears to be as beautiful and well-thought-out as you’ve been hearing (ask us again in a year or so when we’ve had a chance to kick the vertical grain Douglas fir tires a little more). OK, ta-daa! It’s done. Why keep pouring money into it?

Meanwhile, Toronto lacks a major public contemporary art gallery. (The country’s only significant art museum dedicated exclusively to contemporary work is Montreal’s Musée d’Art Contemporain.) We couldn’t call the Power Plant major, nor the Museum of Canadian Contemporary Art. Much as we may enjoy visiting them, neither is worth a trip to Toronto, or even functions as a local substitute for, say, MoMA or the Tate Modern.

It’s true that the AGO now has two floors dedicated to art since 1960 in its new South Tower; moreover, they’re well done, a blend of chronological progression with rooms dedicated to particular artists, collectives and concepts (feminisim and the year 1979, for example).

Maybe it was just because of the crowd on hand at the AGO’s “artists’ party” Thursday night, but strolling through the Warhols, Richters, Paterson Ewens, Betty Goodwins and Michael Snows (with a Jeff Wall and a Michael Awad for good measure) was a popular thing to do despite the glitzy lure of the Galleria Italia and the Thomson collection.

Canadian Art on the AGO

Canadian Art magazine takes a look at the new Art Gallery of Ontario and likes what it sees. Man, I have to get back to Toronto for a visit.

After the underwhelming redesign and reopening of New York’s MoMA and the thin bombast of Daniel Libeskind’s ROM crystal, there was trepidation at what was being wrought on Toronto’s Dundas Street. But Gehry’s changes are elegant and understated, more a functional reno than a grand redesign.

What’s new at the AGO is a fully conceptualized rehanging of its collection. The art has never looked better, or more considered. The AGO is now a venue to spend the day rather than breeze through. A special emphasis has been placed on contemporary art, which has been interwoven with historical works to speak on themes that cut across time, and an effort has been made to bring visibility to work by women artists throughout the gallery. There are special installations by Kara Walker and Nancy Spero that inhabit a gallery otherwise given over to 17th-century Dutch painting, and the entry to the contemporary section is framed by sculptures by Barbara Hepworth and Louise Bourgeois. The AGO has a remarkable Rothko that’s now in proximity and conversation with Joyce Wieland’s Time Machine.

(Image from the AGO’s Flickr pool.)

AGO sets date to reopen

The Art Gallery of Ontario says it’ll open its doors to the new building Nov. 14. (Previously.)

The announcement heralds the final phase of the ambitious $254-million expansion and renovation project designed by star architect Frank Gehry, conceived in 2002 and under construction since 2005.

“I feel very inspired by having a real goal in mind and sharing that with the public,” said AGO Director and CEO Matthew Teitelbaum.

The prolonged wait to set a fixed goal had set some nerves on edge, but the November date falls comfortably within the original timetable and aims to avoid conflicts with other institutions planning major openings or announcements, including the Royal Conservatory of Music.

Mr. Teitelbaum said he felt it was important that they not set a date until they reached a certain level of confidence that the building would be complete, with art installed in all 110 galleries.

“Our promise from the very beginning was ‘New art, new building.’ So we talked about art before we talked about the building,” he said.

That graphic above doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with your eyes. It’s the AGO’s new logo.

Senator proposes law to keep portrait gallery in Ottawa

Senator Jerry Grafstein wants to make it illegal to build the new Portrait Gallery of Canada in any other city — especially Calgary. OK, I made up the “especially” part — but you know that’s what he’s thinking.

Senator Jerry Grafstein’s bill, which will have its second reading in the Senate next week, would amend the Library and Archives of Canada Act, requiring the gallery to be located in Ottawa, rather than any of the other nine cities competing for the museum.

“Governments have to respond to bills. They can stall it, they can reject it, but they have to respond to it. They cannot ignore it,” Grafstein said Tuesday.

He argued that the gallery displaying works from the country’s portrait collection needs to be close to the special building operated by the national archives where the entire collection is stored — located in Gatineau, Que., directly across the river from Ottawa.

In addition, it should be where it can attract visitors already there to see other national collections.

Actually, there are some good comments about the issue by CBC readers:

Keeping the Portrait Gallery in Ottawa would eliminate the stated $2.5 million annual operating costs to ship artifacts outside the National Capital Region, as reported by Library and Archives Canada in the media.

Due to the concentration or cluster of national institutions that already exist in Ottawa, there are economies of scale that would be of benefit to the Portrait Gallery remaining in Ottawa. As part of a family of museums, it would benefit from destination marketing campaigns, programming synergies with federal and local cultural facilities as well as an extensive small business network available in the community that supports the museum sector such as artefact conservation services, translation services and historians.

If the Portrait Gallery was located away from Ottawa-Gatineau, Canada would become the first country among the G7 not to have such a gallery in its national capital.

ROM Crystal one of the seven wonders of the architecture world?

The National Post talks to fans and critics of the ROM expansion after Conde Nast Traveler calls it one of the seven new wonders of the architecture world.

William Thorsell, the Royal Ontario Museum chief executive who virtually willed the project into being, said yesterday he was not surprised the travel magazine took note.

“It’s the subject of a lot of conversation around the world,” he said. “A lot of people around the world know about the Crystal.”

Thomas Payne, founding partner at Toronto architecture firm KPMB Architects, was surprised the Crystal made the list.

“My list wouldn’t include it,” he said. “This is the commodification of architecture, where the expression of the architect dominates all. It’s not about an architecture that’s struggling to deal with its context.”

(Image from wvs’ Flickr stream.)

“Our tolerance for crap is now zero”

The Edmonton Design Committee is trying to bring a better skyline to the city, one new building at a time.

“It’s exciting, to get a look at what could be coming in the next few years, all the potential changes to the Edmonton skyline,” Shafraaz Kaba, an architect, writer and vice-chair of the committee, said in the Three Bananas Cafe on Sir Winston Churchill Square, ground zero of Edmonton’s urban renewal.

“I get a glimpse of what this city can be and what it should be. Hopefully, we’re having a deep influence on the urban fabric of the city, in terms of walkability, density, environmental sustainability, public art.”

The Principles of Urban Design set out by the committee, and available on the city of Edmonton website, are a truly inspiring read. It’s easy to see why Kaba and his 10 accomplished peers on the committee sacrifice 20 hours a month, for free, to improve and enhance Edmonton and the lives of its citizens.

(Image from captiveight’s Flickr stream.)

Destruction of a landmark

Vancouver Magazine looks at the demolition of Arthur Erickson’s Graham House in West Vancouver.

In late November, a flurry of finger-wagging media commentators discussed the demolition of an Arthur Erickson house in West Vancouver. A wealthy developer named Shiraz Lalji (with, the insinuation went, no interest in local heritage or fine architecture) tore down the Graham house at 6999 Isleview, near Horseshoe Bay, in order to replace it with a “monster home.”

What went unreported was that there was no treasure to tear down. Erickson’s Graham house—built in 1963 for David Graham—had been steadily stripped of its original genius over decades. Erickson built a 3,500-square-foot wood-and-glass icon on what everyone had considered an impossible site. By last winter, that house was a bloated 6,000 square feet, thanks to unsympathetic, non-Erickson additions. The fireplace was built over. An elevator had been installed. The house was lost not when bulldozers arrived in the front yard; it was lost piecemeal over many years. And the culprit was not a wealthy, London-based businessman, but a community that failed to safeguard its own heritage.

“The new AGO is a building fully engaged with its surroundings”

The Star likes the new AGO as much as the Globe and Mail does.

Though it won’t reopen until next fall, this will be a project Torontonians can embrace. After its Frank Gehry-designed remake, the AGO will emerge not just as a destination, but a marvellous place to spend time and look at art, and a fabulous building in its own right. With its spiral stairwells, glass-fronted sculpture atrium, Douglas fir walls and light-filled rooms, it couldn’t be more welcoming.

As AGO CEO Matthew Teitelbaum puts it, “We wanted an institutional scale but a domestic feel.”

Though restrained by Gehry standards, the $225 million overhaul illustrates the brilliance of an architect who has figured out how to move design forward without leaving the audience behind. Unlike, say, Daniel Libeskind, whose angular and aggressive Crystal has alienated so many, Gehry manages to bring the masses with him. His unique brand of populist avant-gardism actually makes people feel good about architecture. It’s neither challenging nor demanding. The guiding principles are ease of passage, clarity of orientation and, above all, pleasure.

(Image from the AGO’s architectural models.) 

Some interviews with Daniel Libeskind

The Globe and Mail sits down — briefly — with “starchitect” Daniel Libeskind and talks about the ROM’s crystal.

What do you like best about this building, I ask? “I love to see the wonder in the little children’s eyes,” Libeskind says, his eyes glittering now like a Cheshire Cat on amphetamines. This has not gone well. “It’s the way the world of actual physical objects are displayed in space where imagination can breathe.” I’ll buy this. It pretty much captures what I am seeing taking place in the gallery behind me.

By the way, I ask him, packing up, is he aware that there has been a controversy about the hot-dog vendors’ carts being moved away from the front of the building, to relieve pedestrian traffic flow and eye strain on his Bloor Street plaza? I know this has nothing to do with him; I’m just curious on his take. I tell him that city Councillor Adam Vaughan has suggested that he design a hot-dog cart that would blend in better with the building. “I like hot dogs,” he laughs. “I’d be delighted to design a hot-dog stand. It’s urban furniture.”

BlogTO managed to get a video interview with Libeskind (a brief one).

(Image from Vlastula’s Flickr stream.)

AGO redesign a success?

The Globe and Mail likes the Frank Gehry Art Gallery of Ontario, even though it’s not due to open for another year.

The truth is already plain to see: One year away from being completed, the Frank Gehry redesign is a staggering success.

True, Gehry’s original design was worrisome for its heavy-handed treatment of both the front and back elevations. The back addition, to the south, was a cumbersome box, lording, like a dour Calvinist, over the pastoral landscape of Grange Park and the artful pyrotechnics of the Ontario College of Art & Design. The front was first imagined as an oppressive canopy in steel and glass running an entire city block along Dundas Street. But Gehry listened when the client asked for more.

Now, it’s possible to be convinced of the great pleasures already being delivered by the project. More than two dozen curved columns – radials constructed of Douglas fir from Canada’s West Coast – create the bones of a monumental second-storey glass promenade, setting up one of the many exhilarating stages Gehry has designed from which to experience the rooftops, the brickwork and, especially, the mess of people circulating through his old neighbourhood.

(Image from louder’s Flickr stream.) 

ROM wants street vendors moved away from crystal

The ROM says it doesn’t mind street vendors near the museum, but it doesn’t want them to obstruct the view of its Daniel Libeskind crystal. Because, you know, nobody likes to look at that kind of juxtaposition.

The Royal Ontario Museum is trying to shoo a handful of long-time hot-dog and ice-cream vendors away from its dramatically renovated building because they don’t fit with its “glitzy” new image, deputy mayor Joe Pantalone says.

Changes to the vendors’ permits, watered down but still approved Tuesday by the Toronto and East York community council, were an attempt to force them out of business by moving them to sites where their sales will sink, Mr. Pantalone charged.

“I think it is simply wrong. I think the city is more than glitzy arts or other places,” Mr. Pantalone (Ward 19, Trinity Spadina) told councillors, saying many street vendors are immigrants struggling to make a living. “It’s also people who are operating food carts. And that’s what it’s about. To me it is a question of social equity here.”

(Image from pmorgan’s Flickr stream.)