Article
'Marilyn' finds a mate
Mississauga's curvy new condo tower is proving so sexy the developer is planning a second
IVOR TOSSELL
Special to The Globe and Mail
In the heart of Mississauga, the prospect of a 56-storey concrete Marilyn Monroe went over so well, she's coming back for an encore.
With the original Absolute World condominium tower -- whose curvy design earned its Hollywood nickname -- almost sold out, its developers have announced a second distinctive tower to sit alongside the first.
The second tower will rise to 50 storeys, somewhat shorter than its counterpart; its developers say that while the first "captures the feminine," the second will be "lithe and romantic in its silhouette but more rugged and perhaps more robust."
But what might be raising eyebrows more than the towers' design is their sales record.
Developer Danny Salvatore, president of Fernbrook Homes, says the second tower is 60 per cent sold out, based on pre-registrations alone.
And people seem willing to pay for the privilege of living in an eye-catching structure: for a space in one of the Absolute World towers, buyers are paying 20 per cent more than they would for the same space in one of the block's other three conventional towers, which have almost sold out as well.
The new tower will actually be the fifth and final tower in the Absolute City Centre project, rising at the corner of Burnamthorpe and Hurontario.
The first three towers, currently under construction, are fairly conventional; the two Absolute World towers, on the other hand, were jury-selected in an international design competition.
The winner, Bejing's Yangsong Ma, provided the design for both; construction is slated to begin next spring.
The two buildings join a handful of new or soon-to-be-constructed twisting towers that are turning heads worldwide.
These include Stockholm's "Turning Torso," by Santiago Calatrava, who also designed the arching atrium in Toronto's BCE Place. (Mr. Calatrava is set to repeat the trick with the twisting Fordham Spire in Chicago, which could top the CN Tower as the world's tallest building.)
Closer to home, a twisting 52-storey hotel and condominium is set to rise in Vancouver, designed by Arthur Erickson.
In Toronto, some say the Absolute towers' success could spark a new interest in so-called "landmark towers" that stand out for their flamboyant design.
"People are starting to be more and more sensitive to the design of buildings, which wasn't always the case," said Vladimir Losner, vice-president of design at Page + Steele, an architectural firm that has designed a number of Toronto's prominent condo towers. (The firm was also on the jury that selected the Ma design for Absolute.) "We see more and more examples of very unique buildings," he says, noting that these also include a new crop of strikingly slender rectangular towers, such as the Spire, currently under construction at the corner of Adelaide and Church Streets.
"I think most people realize that in the end, a well-designed piece of architecture has better value, and will appreciate better than your standard building," said Craig Taylor, director of marketing for Context Developments, which has partnered with architectsAlliance to build the Spire. As for Absolute World, Mr. Taylor calls its design "tremendously exciting," but points out that a building will always look good in a pre-construction rendering.
"There's a lot of question marks. Will it get built to look like that? What will the materials look like?"
But beyond being confident in Absolute World's success, some of its backers are predicting that we'll be seeing more like it in the years to come.
"We can actually see that the market in Toronto is sophisticated enough now that people will pay more money for design excellence," said Michael Wilson, a consultant who's been working to sell the Absolute World towers. "All my other clients are wondering about what they should do next," said Mr. Wilson. "Not so much because they love this design, but because they can see the results of the design. People are willing to pay more."
In which case, the remaining question mark might be what name to give Marilyn Monroe's more masculine companion. The DiMaggio? The John F. Kennedy? Or maybe just the Arthur Miller?