After 2½ years of negotiations, the condo project Westbank King Street has been approved and is about to start sales. [...] The new condo will be hard to miss. It could be the strangest residential building ever constructed in Canada. Certainly, it will set an interesting example for new housing. While new condos and apartments are often faulted for being soulless, this promises to be a carefully detailed building, a distinctive place, and a village that contributes to the larger city. — The Globe and Mail
First proposed in 2016, BIG's Westbank King Street condo building in Toronto has been approved for development. With its "mountainous" forms and Habitat 67-inspired stacked design, the glass building is being described as a radical and experimental addition for richly historic King Street, a major thoroughfare in the city.
“How will this model – of intimacy and spatial complexity and surprising juxtapositions – work in an old part of a North American city? Mr. Ingels is optimistic,” writes Alex Bozikovic, architecture critic of The Globe and Mail, in the article.
It's becoming more convincing, but as was mentioned above and before those floor/roff dimensions appear to be way thin.
And I'm still curious about the appearance of these cubes for the street level, consuming the older buildings. The new elevations seem less convincing due to the application of the burning man globes.
I'm also curious about where all that water and mineral content is coming from to make those plans so green so fast- unless it's ruderal growth.
The final thing, I wish I could see what the building under the new construction would look like from the street and not in a rendered elevation. This is clearly a challenge for the project, and I'm curious how they will resolve it.
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looks good. where da haters at?
I like whenever there is a robust public dialogue and back and forth. I also like this project — but I wouldn’t call it great. The glass block is a nice addition, though not sure what makes it a “village” if each pod looks fairly distinct. Surely that’s more PR than anything.
The interesting distinction between Safdie’s Habitat and this must be that the earlier was pure structuralism — units of space that could be configured any which way, and had unexpected positioning. This feels more like a units that fit into a heavy handed shape — like Habitat by Gehry. Inside out vs. outside in
I am just glad it is not in the old historical part of Montreal among the stone buildings by the waterfront.
I cannot imagine what the heating bills will be in the winter for the residents. Trying to think what city would have the climate and existing flavor where this would fit in. Los Angeles comes to mind, no sarcasm intended.
Toronto is pretty boring so this helps break apart the long globs of generic fabric... but like Volunteer rightly points out, this will be a bitch to heat/cool. Hopefully Blake took some time to read the ontario energy codes for new buildings. Id's like to see how they plan to shoe-horn this in.
I'm not even going to touch those trees on infinitismally thin roofs.
Greenwashing.
I like that they added a spire so it'll fit into the city's established vernacular.
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It's kind of cool the way it maintains a pedestrian friendly street wall and breaks up above like the Habitat buildings. I wonder if those trees could be maintained healthy and nice though cause they look necessary.
It's becoming more convincing, but as was mentioned above and before those floor/roff dimensions appear to be way thin.
And I'm still curious about the appearance of these cubes for the street level, consuming the older buildings. The new elevations seem less convincing due to the application of the burning man globes.
I'm also curious about where all that water and mineral content is coming from to make those plans so green so fast- unless it's ruderal growth.
The final thing, I wish I could see what the building under the new construction would look like from the street and not in a rendered elevation. This is clearly a challenge for the project, and I'm curious how they will resolve it.
All good points.
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