junctionist
Senior Member
I would argue otherwise. Toronto may have pockets of nice buildings here and there, but overall our architecture is either boring (plain glass and big box sky-scrapers) or just plain ugly like the UofT Athletic Centre & Grad House residence.
What Toronto is missing is a real section of historic buildings. Most of them have been burned down, and the ones that remain are in dilapidated state. Also, the main problem in Toronto is that there are poor architectural standards and coherence. Many buildings don't fit well with each other, and often there are stark contrasts between old and new, tall and low.
There aren't many buffer zones, and we often see a small building like a church being completed overwhelmed by glass towers (like at University/Bloor). It looks terrible. Some areas work well in the city, but mostly it's generic forgettable architecture. Look at our office skyscrapers.
It seems that our city is bursting with interesting buildings in every neighbourhood. (Have you ever browsed tobuilt.ca? Browse by neighbourhood or style, and I'm sure you'll discover a variety of great buildings around the city.) Whether it's the Beaux-Arts bank or Art Deco apartment in a streetcar suburb, the large Victorian neighbourhoods, the calculated modernism of a bank or school in the 416 suburbs, or some of the many gems of modernism apartment building. GradHouse residence isn't beautiful, but it's anything but boring in it's challenging architectural conventions. To simply slam it as ugly is immature and reflects a very shallow view of architecture as working on a simple "ugly/beautiful" "boring/exciting" dichotomy.
Our landmarks include some brilliant buildings, our office towers are a collection of fine modernism, late modernism and respectable PoMo. There repetitive and uncreative buildings, but realize that these make up the majority of buildings in even the most distinguished cities.
But I definitely agree with your points on the public realm. I think we're less inclined to even notice architectural details when clusters of overhead wires are usually blocking the view.