I'm surprised with the amount of hate Aura gets in this thread. While I'm not a big fan of the 3 tier design, I consider it as one of the better looking buildings we have in Toronto.

IRL I have never heard anyone dissing the appearance of Aura. Many of my friends like the building and recognize it as the tallest condo building in the country. Many of them love the light strips at the top (which I think looks pretty good at dusk but quite awful at night). Personally I think the building looks the best when you look at it from the west.

I see lots of comments teasing the underground shopping mall. While the commercial failure is a pity, I don't see why one should see Aura as a lesser building because of the empty mall. The mall is an extra feature which is not found in most condo buildings. It is a bonus, not an essential element. Some folks here are particularly harsh on Aura, I wonder if they are/were owners of some of those empty shops ;)
 
One of the better looking buildings in Toronto? Aura? The design is terrible from the ground all the way up to the last section with balconies. The only part of the building I like is the balcony-less oval portion. The podium is a terrible mess and street level it sucks. Harsh words but I see it every day from my unit. I can pick 20 buildings off the top of my head that are easily better designed.
 
David Webb said:
I'm surprised with the amount of hate Aura gets in this thread. While I'm not a big fan of the 3 tier design, I consider it as one of the better looking buildings we have in Toronto.

IRL I have never heard anyone dissing the appearance of Aura. Many of my friends like the building and recognize it as the tallest condo building in the country. Many of them love the light strips at the top (which I think looks pretty good at dusk but quite awful at night). Personally I think the building looks the best when you look at it from the west.

I see lots of comments teasing the underground shopping mall. While the commercial failure is a pity, I don't see why one should see Aura as a lesser building because of the empty mall. The mall is an extra feature which is not found in most condo buildings. It is a bonus, not an essential element. Some folks here are particularly harsh on Aura, I wonder if they are/were owners of some of those empty shops ;)
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@TheKingEast said it quite well. The podium is just hulking and awkward. It's not beautiful, but more to the point its massing and layout really make both Yonge and Gerrard less appealing in this stretch.

The idea of a patio along Gerrard was a good one, but this was poorly executed all around.

The mall is not a feature. It could have been, but it's a liability instead.

The tower from the outside is the least problematic part of the complex, but that's hardly redemptive.

Sure there are worse buildings from the outside.

Again, damn w/faint praise.

But, on balance it's a fail, and more so because of what it could have been and should have been, especially at that size and location.
 
Northern Light said:
@TheKingEast said it quite well. The podium is just hulking and awkward. It's not beautiful, but more to the point its massing and layout really make both Yonge and Gerrard less appealing in this stretch.

The idea of a patio along Gerrard was a good one, but this was poorly executed all around.

The mall is not a feature. It could have been, but it's a liability instead.

The tower from the outside is the least problematic part of the complex, but that's hardly redemptive.

Sure there are worse buildings from the outside.

Again, damn w/faint praise.

But, on balance it's a fail, and more so because of what it could have been and should have been, especially at that size and location.
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Why did the podium make Yonge/Gerrard less appealing? That space was a parking lot before Aura was built. I see Aura as a tremendous upgrade.

We like the restaurant at the corner (REDS), but yea, the patio is a little weird. It should be an easy fix though with some simple rearrangement, and should look even better after the south side of Gerrard is rebuilt (Chelsea Green Towers?)

We love the placement of Bed Bath and Beyond and Marshall. Some folks see them as failure due to the low foot traffic, but for us it's a clean and quiet place to shop at. I don't equate commercial success to the overall quality of the neighbourhood. I do wish at least one of the banks turns into a restaurant or a specialty store.

The Aura corner at Yonge/Gerrard to me is decent, not exceptional or gaming changing, but better than most other ones I have seen. Look at the intersections of Bay/College, King/Yonge, Yonge/Bloor, Bay/Bloor, Bay/Dundas, Bay/Adelaide. None of them is better than what Aura has to offer, and interestingly most of them have a bank or two right at the corners.

I don't understand why the underground mall is a liability. We mostly ignore it and it's not in the way. If you have an empty den in your place that is tucked in a corner, would you call it a liability?

I don't think judging anything based on what it could have been or should have been is fair. Do you want to be judged that way? If a first overall pick, tapped as the next McDavid, turns out to be nothing more than a 3rd line grinder, should we look at him to be anything less than a 3rd liner? Emotionally, yes, we wasted our first pick on that bastard, but in the end of the day, he is a serviceable third liner who will punch Marchand in the face once in a while.

I'm rooting for Aura's management to do something creative with the underground mall, and make College Park Great Again (TM). The thing about Aura is that it has the structure, the space, and the traffic. There are still tons of untapped potentials that we can leverage.

As someone who is not living in Aura, I see the building as an adequate, business as usual, somewhat unique looking residential building, with a temporary tag of being the tallest of its kind in the country.

That being said, some of the best things about the building are stuff that we don't see or enjoy, such as the striking views on the higher floors, or the free membership to that huge gym. Even that indoor access to subway, despite the horrendous design, is still an invaluable feature that very few buildings in Toronto share.
 
3 things that Aura could have done differently imo:

1 - No balconies.
2 - Mullions colored to the same color as the glass on the square sides of the building, similar to how they were done on the upper rounded portion of the building.
3 - Break up the podium with exterior stair access to the upper retail.
4 - Restaurants/patios on the upper retail with colored canopies to add color and some texture.
5 - No basement mall.
 
Lyphe said:
3 things that Aura could have done differently imo:

1 - No balconies.
2 - Mullions colored to the same color as the glass on the square sides of the building, similar to how they were done on the upper rounded portion of the building.
3 - Break up the podium with exterior stair access to the upper retail.
4 - Restaurants/patios on the upper retail with colored canopies to add color and some texture.
5 - No basement mall.
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Are residential skyscrapers in Toronto allowed to not have balconies?
 
David Webb said:
Why did the podium make Yonge/Gerrard less appealing? That space was a parking lot before Aura was built. I see Aura as a tremendous upgrade.
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A surface parking lot at least has potential to be something good. The Aura podium doesn't have that.

David Webb said:
We love the placement of Bed Bath and Beyond and Marshall. Some folks see them as failure due to the low foot traffic, but for us it's a clean and quiet place to shop at. I don't equate commercial success to the overall quality of the neighbourhood.
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I used to love shopping at Eaton's for the same reason. It was so quiet. Seriously, I often had the place to myself.

David Webb said:
I don't understand why the underground mall is a liability.
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The lawsuits? The people who invested their hard-earned money in a turkey? The tremendous difficulty in ever re-purposing that space?

David Webb said:
I'm rooting for Aura's management to do something creative with the underground mall
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Now that it's been unitized, how do you propose they do that?

David Webb said:
make College Park Great Again (TM)
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Gross.

David Webb said:
I see the building as an adequate, business as usual, somewhat unique looking residential building, with a temporary tag of being the tallest of its kind in the country.
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Damning in your faint praise. "Adequate".

David Webb said:
That being said, some of the best things about the building are stuff that we don't see or enjoy, such as the striking views on the higher floors, or the free membership to that huge gym.
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It's the public realm which people are generally concerned about on this thread.
 
I'd be a lot less upset with Aura if:

a) their podium wasn't the most sterile commercial strip in the area
b) they weather-proofed their podium. I don't know how many people walk through the area regularly, but the water dripping on you is horrendous.
c) the PATH connection actually connected with College Park and was a usable shortcut from Gerrard to College. As it stands, it is quicker to walk out of College Park and get rained on under Aura's podium.
d) the light feature is properly maintained and wasn't failing. If you are going to build a massive phallic-shaped structure in the sky that is lit at night, make the effort to not have it fail.
 
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