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Canadian Urbanism Uncovered

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3 comments

  1. If the “before” shot was an older one, perhaps I would not be saying this: but between Saint Denis ’64 and ’08, I think I prefer the current streetscape, with new shops and businesses preserving classic buildings. Would people agree?

  2. I like the greater adventurousness in paint schemes all over the Plateau currently as against what I’ve seen of the stuffy old days, but it does disturb me to see nice old façades indifferently simplified into featureless square brick or concrete blocks. (The banality of petit-bourgeoise capitalism, I suppose.) The loss of old door and window frames particularly…

    BTW, a good book that goes a bit into the way streetscapes change is Stewart Brand’s How Buildings Learn. On the cover is an avant-aprés pic of two initially identical buildings in New Orleans.

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