David Nam of Gehry stressed yesterday at the keynote that the building still has to fall within a budget. I would expect that the Toronto-ness of this project—something they are hoping to achieve here is to give this a sense of belonging to Toronto—is to pick up the rectilinearity of our city in the design, so I expect it is aesthetics in service to economics and sense of place.

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David Nam of Gehry stressed yesterday at the keynote that the building still has to fall within a budget. I would expect that the Toronto-ness of this project—something they are hoping to achieve here is to give this a sense of belonging to Toronto—is to pick up the rectilinearity of our city in the design, so I expect it is aesthetics in service to economics and sense of place.

Of course, given it is a private project that depends on the sell - but I am hoping that it can reference our rectilinearity and yet breaks it at the same time. Too early for details, but I would love to see something finer grained than merely positioning unitized walls an angular fashion in order to invoke fluidity (at least at the podium level).

AoD
 
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I was a little unclear but do the sentinels refer to the podiums or to the slightly shorter parts of the tall buildings?


So excited about this project and love the idea of the new public space. I do hope the gallery ends up being a jewel, compensating a little for the smaller size.
 
The Scotiabank at Queen and Duncan is now begging to be redeveloped into something iconic now that it terminates the street that bisects this project.
 
I was a little unclear but do the sentinels refer to the podiums or to the slightly shorter parts of the tall buildings?

I believe that the sentinels are the slightly shorter parts on the two towers, that are intended to be about the same height as the numerous other condo buildings going up in the area.
 
It's either metal or some composite material and it looks incredible! I can't wait for these to get built.....
 
Ugh, the wait for this is going to kill me. I wonder when it’ll begin construction.

Would sales begin shortly after the architectural plans are fully completed?
 
Ugh, the wait for this is going to kill me. I wonder when it’ll begin construction.

Would sales begin shortly after the architectural plans are fully completed?

According to yesterday's article...

The marketing of suites in the West Tower will likely commence in the last quarter of 2015.
 
^ Sales for the west tower are expected to begin around October 2015, and I believe Mirvish and his team said construction wouldn't start until winter 2016
 
If there is any kind of real estate bubble burst or economic downturn between now and then I will probably tear my hair out.
 
I use to think that 8 spruce is the most beautiful building In N.A but if this get build as shown in the renders and if they don't use cheap stuff this project might be the most beautiful project in North America.

I also hope we get 8 Spruce level quality.

But construction cost on 8 Spruce was $875 million in 2010 USD for 1 million sqft and 900 units.
M+G is roughly twice that size. Factoring in inflation and currency conversion, the budget on this would have to be in the neighbourhood of C$2 billion to equate to 8 Spruce.

NYC & London markets can absorb that kind of big ticket...not so sure Toronto can, given Toronto's condo market is mostly driven by cheap condo prices that don't even exist in NYC or London.

I can't see the budget at 8 Spruce levels, so I'm hoping Gehry can deliver something spectacular on a smaller budget, and I have a feeling he probably can. Luckily, both men involved are interested in making this a legacy project for themselves, in their home town, rather than just purely driven by profit like the other bland developers in this city (which nobody complains about).
 
... rather than just purely driven by profit like the other bland developers in this city (which nobody complains about).

I'm fairly sure that complaining about the bland developers in Toronto is one of the most frequent subjects at UT.
 

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