I honestly (really) like the profile and the step-backs on each side of the building and the form above in that shot by urbandreamer. I've never found them very dramatic until now. Great shot.
 
The boldness of the setbacks is commendable. It's too bad the cladding and finishes in general are mediocre.
 
I vote we declare a moratorium on using the word "beast." It ranks right up there with "world class city" in the realm of hoary cliches.
 
Torontovibe said:
^^ And what word do you suggest we use instead of "World Class City"?
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Alpha City?
Global City?
World City?

Toronto ranks very high as a city on all of these metrics.
We are among some very old and notable cities on these lists.
By any measure we punch above the weight class many want to put us in.

From Wikipedia
Global city

A global city (also called world city or sometimes alpha city or world center) is a city generally considered to be an important node in the global economic system. The concept comes from geography and urban studies and rests on the idea that globalization can be understood as largely created, facilitated, and enacted in strategic geographic locales according to a hierarchy of importance to the operation of the global system of finance and trade.

The most complex of these entities is the "global city", whereby the linkages binding a city have a direct and tangible effect on global affairs through socio-economic means.[1] The use of "global city", as opposed to "megacity", was popularized by sociologist Saskia Sassen in her 1991 work, The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo[2] though the term "world city" to describe cities that control a disproportionate amount of global business dates to at least the May 1886 description of Liverpool by The Illustrated London News.[3] Patrick Geddes also used the term "world city" later in 1915.[4] Cities can also fall from such categorization, as in the case of cities that have become less cosmopolitan and less internationally renowned in the current era.
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Love it or hate it, it is an accomplishment to build something of this scale out of the core. I don't think we would be a worse city if the landscape was dotted with 50-80 story buildings throughout the city. Build them on a podium that can act as an urban centre, provide public facilities that could make the trek desirable and such construction could be in impetus for urbanizing our city to a greater extent.

We will all love some projects and hate some others but let's get on with the building and offer critiques later. Community councils and Design Review Panels should deal with these developments only at the most basic level with a clear set of guidelines.
We can have our say on design when the Pug Awards come around.
 
jaycola said:
We will all love some projects and hate some others but let's get on with the building and offer critiques later. Community councils and Design Review Panels should deal with these developments only at the most basic level with a clear set of guidelines.
We can have our say on design when the Pug Awards come around.
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Couldn't disagree more. It's my right to critique a building as it goes up, especially if I dislike it or believe it to be the unfortunate product of a flawed process. It's your right to disagree with me, or find me annoying, or tell me that I ought to silence myself and move on. But waiting for the thing to be built and then commenting? No thanks. Sounds far too complacent to me.
 
That shot of Aura from Gerrard St East is the best photo of the building I have ever seen. Now some might say it is because you can barely see the building itself through the snow... :)

But it is striking.
 
From the get-go the City should have made it clear to canderel that if you want to build a tower this tall, you need to use curtain-wall.

All projects over 50 floors should use some type of curtain-wall or hybrid curtain-wall system whether they choose stone, or glass, its their (developers) call, but it has to have high end cladding to make sure we don't end up with massive eye-sores.
 
67Cup said:
That shot of Aura from Gerrard St East is the best photo of the building I have ever seen. Now some might say it is because you can barely see the building itself through the snow... :)

But it is striking.
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That's actually from Yonge & Carlton

caltrane74 said:
From the get-go the City should have made it clear to canderel that if you want to build a tower this tall, you need to use curtain-wall.

All projects over 50 floors should use some type of curtain-wall or hybrid curtain-wall system whether they choose stone, or glass, its their (developers) call, but it has to have high end cladding to make sure we don't end up with massive eye-sores.
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I've thought this at times, but it's hard to legislate good taste - see Trump as a great example. Fine curtain-wall, but it's another mess.
 
It's rapidly going the way that taller towers are going to need to use curtainwall. The insurers don't want to touch windowwall because of all of the service and warranty issues
 
Lenser said:
Couldn't disagree more. It's my right to critique a building as it goes up, especially if I dislike it or believe it to be the unfortunate product of a flawed process. It's your right to disagree with me, or find me annoying, or tell me that I ought to silence myself and move on. But waiting for the thing to be built and then commenting? No thanks. Sounds far too complacent to me.
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Sorry Lenser, I don't mean you as an individual or anyone on this board really. You can criticize all you want as a private citizen. If you see crap call it!

What I object to is the level of intrusion on the design process I witness at the city and supported amongst many here. It's not that there should be no development rules and guidelines. There should be many rules and appropriate requirements to ensure development occurs in a manner in keeping with cities plan.

The Design review panel, intrusive city councilors, even community groups with their own agenda (not that the community should not be heard from) demand too many changes from builders that have little effect on the outcome.

This building is a prime example. Would the design have been more successful in it's original state?
aura_at_yonge_andcollege.jpeg.size.xxlarge.letterbox.jpeg

photo from Toronto Star article.
I don't know if the design review panel changed the tiering of the tower but I can't say I like the update more.
Looking at what has been built there, I might have liked the original better.
 
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Jaycola, I understand now what you're getting at. And I agree - the update is much better than the one on the left. It's less stodgy, for certain.
 
jaycola said:
I don't know if the design review panel changed the tiering of the tower but I can't say I like the update more.
Looking at what has been built there, I might have liked the original better.
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But you forget that the image on the left was just one more iteration. The original design for this corner was a two-tower development and it was terrible. What we got isn't great, but it's far superior to the first proposal.
 
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