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Toronto, Radiant City

A new way of thinking about the slabs of the suburbs.

Skyscrapers to the people!

The 2nd Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art opened late last week, and today I braved the snow to visit the main venue, the Federation Tower, soon-to-be the tallest building in Europe, scheduled for completion next year. Not sure if this was a sly marketing ploy or a masterful curatorial stroke, but three floors (19th, 20th, 21st) were sacrificed to the arts for one month. I find contemporary art insufferable, especially in vast quantities, but the grand location here made sure there was always something delightful to look at. Particularly distracting, in the best possible way, were the squiggles on the windows by a Romanian artist Dan Perjovschi. I wonder if any art show has ever been upstaged (or at least neutralized) in this way before. The sprawling interiors took on the semblance of a raw exhibition space, although they are well on their way to being turned into multimillion dollar penthouses and offices.(There will even be a swimming pool on one of the top floors.) I hesitated to support the mammoth construction of skyscrapers in Moscow, but I always thought they will make at least one positive contribution, giving new vantage points for viewing this city. They have indeed done that. At least for now.

Waking Buildings

One of the more obscure aspects of my underexplored irish heritage that I have often appreciated is the ability to use the verb form of the noun "wake," as in, if Pearson's Terminal 2 to have its own wake, we are waking it -- reminding it to remain with us, alive, awake, until its final hour of departure? I'm not quite sure how that mythology works; not many of us sit through the vigil of soon to be departed buildings (although several did do so for this week's implosion of the Coliseum in my current home town). In any case, in contrast to the excited ease with which we celebrate the production of new lovely or wonderful spaces (such as Pearson's Terminal 1), it does seem suitable to celebrate the attachments we form even to airworld spaces we attempt to rush through, tend to be irritated by, or fail to notice.

I've always been fascinated by the deconstruction of buildings anyways, and am (somewhat skeptically) impressed by the prospect of recycling something like an airport terminal (or the coliseum). The massive destruction involved in dismantling steel beam and concrete structures presents a modern sublime, the kind of maudlin reflections over which (overlaid by the wailing as the concrete bits fly into your eyes) are just the thing to pass the time while waking.

And the requisite "time I had with" story: on my first visit, Terminal 2 hosted just the sort of bureaucratic helpfulness that became so endearing about Toronto: the Air Canada check-in desk attendant barked that I would JUST make it if I RAN. (I was late because the TTC was running an hour behind.) So I RAN across the whole terminal, a feat of athletic prowess highlighted by the technological magic created when "sticky rubber" soles meet industrial carpet. (Imagine instant meld of plastics, inertia of would-be passenger.) Breathless, with rather rugburned knees, I arrive at my gate to discover -- that the plane hasn't landed, that it's unlikely to make it back to Boston tonight, and, that, no, I may not have a band-aid because I interrupted the gate attendant while he was *speaking* to another gate attendant.

I missed the family party this afternoon ("Employees of Air Canada have already paid their respects after holding a goodbye party for the terminal"), but I'll raise my whiskey from the Coliseum rubble.

Green Urbanity

My story about the green Toronto offices of HOK-- one of the largest architecture firms in the world-- is up on the Metropolis site. The Torontonians in the group will enjoy it, but I'm more excited about the fact that the concept of what makes interior design 'green' was extended to the urbanity of the office, not just its fixtures-- particularly given the fact the project was chosen as part of the International Interior Design Association's/ Metropolis Smart Environments Awards program. Here's the urban analysis:

The location is at Toronto’s hipster heart, near both the boutique-lined stretches of the King West neighborhood and the clubs of the Entertainment District. “I hate to call it gentrification because it’s still got a nice edge to it,” Stratford, who lives in the suburbs, explains a bit sheepishly. Two streetcar lines intersect outside the door—worth a single LEED point, one of 36 toward a Gold rating for commercial interiors—and the regional commuter rail is within walking distance. A recent office survey shows that 82 percent of the employees who live in the city said they either take public transit, walk, or bicycle to work; 67 percent of employees living in the suburbs use public transit. Bike parking and showers are available in the building—earning another LEED point. As in many design firms, a sense of urbanity is embedded in HOK’s culture; with this space the firm was able to embody the feeling in its office. “We’re thinking about the community of people who work in our studio and how we can design a great space for them, but we’re also in a location that really feels like a part of the broader community we live in,” Stratford says.

Photo for Metropolis by Christopher Wahl. And make sure to check out the infographic on the office's commuting patterns.