This is not my favourite building, so I feel a bit odd wanting to jump to its defence here, but where those "fake windows" would have been is stone now. If they had put fake windows in (the more common term is spandrel) everyone would be screaming at them for replacing expensive stone with cheap spandrel to pretend that there are windows where there are not.

Essentially what we have here is a very tall building (but no, not a Supertall) with a very small footprint, so that a lot of items which are normally hidden "back of house" are actually pushed out along exterior walls here. Kitchens, storage space, etc., do not necessarily need windows, and in some cases the windows would actually take away from the highest use of the interior space. At least we got the indents that continue the window pattern.

That said, what a mess of a building.
 
drum118 said:
Dec 14
They were putting up scaffolding for the 2 overhead skylight frame when I was there.

Furniture in the lobby area now, but still wrap.

Sidewalk is done with a small section for the lobby area being fix to the point you walk inside the building on detour.

The next month or 2 will see the protection over the Scotiabank driveway remove, so the east wall can be finish.
6524279869_e6921ac306_b.jpg
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great seeing the top fin finally up on the north side! things are finally getting balanced out!

wow, that scaffolding makes the street level look so busy!... just when we thought this thing was complete!
 
ponyboy said:
on that lower east face, couldn't' they put in some dummy windows to make it look consistent with the window pattern above?
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The paradox with this building is that, in trying to disguise the presence of seven icky above-ground parking floors, and strap the entire parking/hotel/condo array into a coherent whole, the architect has produced a carapace that's disjointed and contradictory. If the various component uses of the tower had been clearly expressed on the exterior it might have been a healthier approach, and we'd have a design worth looking at.
 
Tewder said:
Trump looks rather fetching in that shot. You know, if you squint your eyes a bit and don't seek out the details. A lot of good things in life are like that!
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It's starting to look damn sexy to me.
I'm on my third martini..
 
WiddleBittyKitty said:
This is not my favourite building, so I feel a bit odd wanting to jump to its defence here, but where those "fake windows" would have been is stone now. If they had put fake windows in (the more common term is spandrel) everyone would be screaming at them for replacing expensive stone with cheap spandrel to pretend that there are windows where there are not.
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in my opinion, this is flawed reasoning... plenty of the windows on the Adeliade and Bay St sides are fake on those parking levels. We dont care if the east side ones are fake too. We want to see a consistent look. What sense does it make having frames for windows filled with stone? If the intent all along was to leave the majority of this space absent of windows, why not go with a clean and smooth finish, sans window frames? (like the podium at Uptown) Pick one look or the other - a blank wall or a regular placement of glass in the frames. I still have hope that we will see fake windows put in, although the fact that they have gone to the expense of filling them with granite does kind of make me wonder. If the east side remains as it is now, then surely it must be labelled as a design flaw and a hideous one at that.
 
http://www.travelvideo.tv/news/cana...details-in-advance-of-opening-january-31-2012

Trump International Hotel & Tower Toronto® Reveals Compelling Details In Advance of Opening, January 31, 2012

TORONTO – December, 2011 – Finishing touches are underway as the January 31, 2012 opening of Trump International Hotel & Tower Toronto® nears. Soon guests and residents will have first-hand access to Toronto’s most exclusive enclave. Until then, compelling details can be revealed as a hint at what’s to come. Did you know............

• Lifting the spire of the building (now Canada’s tallest residential structure) was the single largest lift in North America – if not the world? Weighing in at over 90 tons, it took over 12 hours to lift the spire in place on the roof of the hotel.

The wall mosaic in the porte-cochere consists of 500,000 handmade, hand-cut tiles, which took a crew of 20 artists three months to make? Up close, the work entitled “A Small Part of Something Larger” by Canadian artist Stephen Andrews will disclose a textural pattern of porcelain, glass, stone and gold. From afar, the mosaic reveals an image of a stadium filled with cheering people.

• There are over 18,000 pieces of crystal in the hotel from the Czech Republic? One of the more magnificent displays is the hotel lobby’s three-dimensional cherry blossom branch, which is estimated to weigh 3,000 lbs. It is lit with LEDs against a black glass background, and a specialist from the Czech Republic was brought in to note the precise points of connection for the lights, ensuring a perfect spectrum of glow.

• Encompassing 4,000 square feet on the 30th floor, Trump Toronto’s Presidential Suite will be the largest and highest suite in the city? The suite’s soundproof media room will include a projector screen and plasma display, ideal for film screenings.


• STOCK™ restaurant will have one of Canada’s most impressive lists of organic, natural and bio-dynamic wines? Its wine wall (featuring an ebony grid pattern – evidenced in the architecture of the high-rises lining Toronto’s Adelaide Street) will feature nearly 1,000 bottles.


• The kitchen will feature a dedicated, temperature-controlled “Chocolate Lab”? Pastry chef David Chow will tempt guests with extraordinary artisan chocolate creations designed from Valrhona’s esteemed family of Grand Cru Couvertures. Signature specialties include sea salt and caramel chocolate toffee, 66% dark chocolate + spring jasmine tea, and homemade artisanal scones with pure Valhrona chocolate hazelnut confiture.
 
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Sobolak said:
When is the hotel scheduled to open?
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January 31st. according to a tweet by Ivanka Trump:

@IvankaTrump
Just booked my flight to Toronto and can’t wait to explore @TrumpToronto –it is going to be exquisite come opening, Jan 31, 2012!
 
WiddleBittyKitty said:
This is not my favourite building, so I feel a bit odd wanting to jump to its defence here, but where those "fake windows" would have been is stone now. If they had put fake windows in (the more common term is spandrel) everyone would be screaming at them for replacing expensive stone with cheap spandrel to pretend that there are windows where there are not.

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No we wouldn't. And that would be a stupid thing to complain about since no stone would be "replaced"... rather, it would simply be seen as a logical place to have put fake windows and we'd never have thought twice. Why? Because it IS a logical place for dummy windows to be. Or some type of articulation greater than the way they've punched indents into the giant stone prison-wall that's there now.
 
drum118 said:
6524283097_c3ff966aed_b.jpg
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Wow, that just looks like hell. What a complete shame. The upper glass parts of the building, especially looking at it from the north/west (Nathan Philips Square area) is quite sharp, nicely defined, and nicely contrasted with some of Toronto's more bulky architecture in the core. But this lower portion, and especially this part int he picture, just looks terrible. I'm nowhere near an architect and I wouldn't have done that.

I mean...all that grey facade, just looks so cheap. It looks like a skyscraper in Tonka Truck village.
 
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Miscreant said:
Wow, that just looks like hell. What a complete shame. The upper glass parts of the building, especially looking at it from the north/west (Nathan Philips Square area) is quite sharp, nicely defined, and nicely contrasted with some of Toronto's more bulky architecture in the core. But this lower portion, and especially this part int he picture, just looks terrible. I'm nowhere near an architect and I wouldn't have done that.
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Exactly, it's so horrible. I have asked TrumpToronto twice on this but he doesn't respond - which probably means he knows that it's horrible and it's likely that not much will be done with this part.

Wopchop, do you have information on what will be done with the east and south lower-sides of the building?

To those who will come out and defend and say, "it's not complete yet", it doesn't matter, given that it's Trump, there's a good chance that it'll stay the way it's and therefore all the doubts (and disappointment) on the final product of this tower.
 
Are these not floors for the garage? If so, is it not possible perhaps that these are large venting machines as against these locations and hence could not have really had fake windows . In other words, I am wondering if there was not a necessary structural or other reason to having the stone on the outside as shown at this level.
 
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