Each Monday, Spacing will bring you some of the popular posts from our sister blog, Spacing Montréal. We’ll keep an eye open for topics and discussions that are pertinent to current public space issues in Toronto.
• Outremont is one of Montréal’s most picturesque boroughs, in part because of the area’s many parks. With water features, meandering trails, and pavilions, the parks are a legacy of Outremont’s booming development at the beginning of the 20th century.
• A series of Telus ads on McGill College Avenue put a different twist on graffiti advertising. Instead of being painted or stickered, the Telus ads are literally cleaned on to particularly grimy parts of the sidewalk. The resulting impression is somewhere between a messaged wiped onto a dirty car window, and the remarkable public art created by Paul Curtis (also known as Moose). How much are the Telus ads annoyance, art, or simply a message to the city about how dirty the streets are?
• During the weekend before last, Christopher DeWolf spent a day exploring some of Montréal’s downtown streets as they were closed to cars and open to pedestrians. On St. Catherine St., where 2 km of the street was closed for a street sale, DeWolf took in the crowds, buskers, and DJs and even noted one girl who was inspired to set down her shopping bags and dance in the street.
Photo be Christopher DeWolf