Toronto 150 Pearl Street | 180m | 57s | Conservatory Group | Richmond Architects

Automation Gallery said:
Stuff like keeping the Heritage intact and injecting a modern design overtop to give those old boys some life, .....what's there not to like?

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I like it.

It's "jumbled" because the forms / volumes that are above are being kept "small" so that they don't dominate the size of the heritage facades.
If you put a "uniform, clean, modern" façade on the lower half of the tower, the heritage building would shrink into obscurity.
As designed, the larger volumes start well above (twice the height of) the heritage buildings.
 
Lenser said:
Bang on. Useful in a snowstorm, maybe. But a pleasurable experience? Not really. I do see its utility but in my experience it tends to feel drearily subterranean and antiseptic.
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PATH could never be any less antiseptic than any standard mall, but buildings designed with PATH in mind typically have less dreary actions than ones where it has been shoehorned in later. (Mostly, not always.)

What hasn't been particularly successful yet is where PATH type commercial passages have been built through strictly residential developments. Any PATH through this area would need at least one major office tower amongst all the condos to be lively throughout the day, but throw a bigger supermarket into the PATh system through of one of these buildings, and they could make it work on this block. Those Mirvish+Gehry types aren't going to want to go all the way over to The Well for their groceries.

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I do however enjoy when PATH goes above ground through tunnels/ bridges. Then it offers protection from the elements but still gives you something to look at.
I think for me I just don't know why you would want to be underground in the parts of the city that have the most to offer above ground.
 
interchange42 said:
What hasn't been particularly successful yet is where PATH type commercial passages have been built through strictly residential developments. Any PATH through this area would need at least one major office tower amongst all the condos to be lively throughout the day, but throw a bigger supermarket into the PATh system through of one of these buildings, and they could make it work on this block. Those Mirvish+Gehry types aren't going to want to go all the way over to The Well for their groceries.
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This is a big point often overlooked.

We always decry on this forum of how stale the pharmacies, the banks and the supermarkets are for the street-level of all these new condos. Well, we can have more interesting types of retail at ground-level if we put those pharmacies, banks and supermarkets below-grade via PATH concourse.
 
officedweller said:
I like it.

It's "jumbled" because the forms / volumes that are above are being kept "small" so that they don't dominate the size of the heritage facades.
If you put a "uniform, clean, modern" façade on the lower half of the tower, the heritage building would shrink into obscurity.
As designed, the larger volumes start well above (twice the height of) the heritage buildings.
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Except the end result of the ensemble is just as dominating, and doesn't even look good. You can articulate a uniform, modern facade without resorting to a mess that is the current proposal.

Besides, if I maybe blunt, the proposal just plopped a 50s tower atop a heritage building - pretending to be not "dominating" at this point is like someone XXL trying to fit into a size 0 skirt.

AoD
 
AlvinofDiaspar said:
Besides, if I maybe blunt, the proposal just plopped a 50s tower atop a heritage building - pretending to be not "dominating" at this point is like someone XXL trying to fit into a size 0 skirt.
AoD
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Haha, you talk heritage like they're something great, sure it's heritage but just blah
It's not like anything built beside or over top is going to make them less attractive
 
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