[Gphorce]

It's monstrous, wow. And that grey spandral... Can't wait to feel what a fortress like development can do to a low-rise intersection.

 

[am29]

The first iteration looked the best. It was nice and slender at the top and the outer part had a similar look to the new Terrence Donnelly Health Sciences building at UTM. This one looks like a big bunker.

 

[Automation Gallery]

Oh well, the area residents that fought against the original point tower deserve this,
Anyways, hopefully one day the south east corner of Spadina/College gets developed to cover-up this shite

 

[Skeezix]

It hasn't been treated well, but it looks like it started off as a sleek minimalist modern building which perhaps housed a bank, similar to the more midcentury modern CIBC kitty corner to this location. I've always wondered about its origins.

You are correct. (June 6, 1981)

 

[am29]

I wish there was Google Maps street view from the 1980's would have spent days riding around 1980's Toronto.

 

[maestro]

Take it all the way to the 1950s. There's so much lost Toronto that has little visual record. That includes high rise buildings as well.

 

[interchange42]

Oh well, the area residents that fought against the original point tower deserve this,
Anyways, hopefully one day the south east corner of Spadina/College gets developed to cover-up this shite

AG, that's not fair. With nothing so high in the area, this is not an obvious spot for a 42-storey tower, so how can you blame neighbours from the low-rise surroundings for fighting that?

Anyway, while they won that battle, it's not apparent that they've won much of value. This is hulking like few other buildings in this town, and the cladding is going to have to be really good here for this to not be an absolute failure… but as a student residence where every dollar counts, I am not hopeful.

42

 

[Automation Gallery]

AG, that's not fair. With nothing so high in the area, this is not an obvious spot for a 42-storey tower, so how can you blame neighbours from the low-rise surroundings for fighting that?
42

I know it's not fair and i don't mean to say they were wrong,
...but sometimes, the height is the lesser of two evils

 

[Ramako]

Hmm... I seem to be the only one that doesn't mind this. I'm not particularly offended by the bulk. Sure the building goes very deep into the lot but the frontage on College is decently narrow and varied given the tower's size. It could use a couple more stepbacks but the overall proportions will get better as it continues to rise. We also haven't really seen much of the cladding materials yet, so I don't think it's fair to judge it on that basis just yet.

 

[Nastapoka]

This and its partner College condos across Spadina have some good angles and some really strange angles. For both, the stepbacks work from some vantage points and really don't from others. This one has some oddly tall and narrow masses (especially on the south end) that don't sit very well.

 

[ADRM]

I, too, find this project super frustrating. It seems like each iteration of the design whittled away at whatever architectural intrigue that was contained in the earliest renderings. Each step wound up making it progressively boxier and less interesting.

I could maybe have gotten excited about this one:

And then, I guess, this one had at least some more interesting boxes jutting out:

And then we were left with this piece of hulking crap:

All images from http://urbantoronto.ca/database/projects/university-place

 

[P23]

I actually prefer the last one. The random offset boxes trend will die out in a few years and those first two will look dated. Although they did have better street level presence I think.

 

[interchange42]

I prefer the last one as a high-rise jail.

42

 

[wolfewood]

Hmm... I seem to be the only one that doesn't mind this. I'm not particularly offended by the bulk. Sure the building goes very deep into the lot but the frontage on College is decently narrow and varied given the tower's size. It could use a couple more stepbacks but the overall proportions will get better as it continues to rise. We also haven't really seen much of the cladding materials yet, so I don't think it's fair to judge it on that basis just yet.

I'm sort of of a similar mind. I'm not liking what I'm seeing but maybe the final cladding will surprise me? The bulk itself isn't that bad but the low-quality design is definitely a lost opportunity. Urbandreamer took a photo of the College Condominiums a few months before this one blocked it but the point was that these two buildings bookend the view of College between Spadina and Yonge. Surely we could've asked for a little better here?

 

[Miscreant]

I haven't been following this project closely, but the 'development' of the design as shown in the photos above is telling. This building is horrific. I had no idea.