I don't think it has anything to do with the development at 488 University Avenue whatsoever. First off they're separated by another building and a street. Secondly 488 was planned long after this tower was. I believe it may have something to do with being built up to the lot line on the north side.
 
steveve said:
I dislike the North Side as well. I wish they slanted the fin at the top and got rid of the checkered spandrel pattern.
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Really? I dislike the south side, the balconies are the boring part. To be honest the north side with the checkered spandrel is my favourite. Its fun. If builders used spandrel like this more I'd be just fine with that. Also the "facadism" on the west side looks great. Who cares if it looks different?
 
steveve said:
I think some of it has to do with the structure of the building (being so thin) that there is a concrete wall instead of windows, but as drum118 said, some of it is cause 488 University going up nearby, but at the same time, there's still plenty of breathing room between the two towers for decent north views. There's a sizeable building in between them.
I dislike the North Side as well. I wish they slanted the fin at the top and got rid of the checkered spandrel pattern.
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I was referring to the building beside it, not 488
 
am29 said:
I don't really like the North side of this building. It seems really dead when walking south on University av. Is there a reason why theres no windows on that side?
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The building is built up to both lot lines on the North and South. Tribute was able to negotiate with the property owner of the Zurich building to effectively 'sterilize' the property, meaning they can no longer redevelop their property up to the lot line. The building to the North did not agree to this, so the North side had to be built as a fire wall with no windows, in order to allow for redevelopment if they choose to do so in the future.
 
It's certainly amongst the very best looking "blank walls" in the city. They were pretty much forced to accept the ersatz RCMI facade at the base, but otherwise Tribute and Zeidler did a great job with this building.

Every elevation works for me. The east and west elevations are elegantly thin, the south elevation's balconies look great thanks to the repeating bolder edges every half dozen floors, and the north elevation's pixelation nicely enlivens an otherwise dead space. Could the north elevation have had other art or another design, sure, that's all debatable, but barring being able to incorporate windows, I think what we got here works great.

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Yep, with the exception of the north face of the building, which I find nice but at times unnecessarily busy, this is a great building. Well, the facade is okay. Could be far worse. But overall, yeah. Solid contribution.
 
this did indeed turn out very nicely and it adds a whole new dynamic to University Ave with its height... which we are about to get a whole lot more of with the other nearby proposals.

nice picture^^^ very unfortunate about the messy light pole and hydro wires.
 
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