Architecture
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How City Hall ended up on St. Clair Avenue
In the late 1940s, Toronto City Hall was bursting at the seams. Now known as Old City Hall, the building on the northeast corner of Queen and Bay streets...
By Chris Bateman -
“Canstruction” delivers big for Toronto’s food banks
I’m standing in front of a large pile of yellow cans of fruit — cherries, peaches, fruit salad — that has been designed and shaped to look like something...
By Kieran Delamont -
5 Things to know about Heritage Toronto Awards
Nominations are now open for the 2016 Heritage Toronto Awards. Michael Kushnir, development and marketing coordinator for Heritage Toronto, discusses the...
By Kieran Delamont -
A history of developers and holdouts in Toronto
When the Imperial Oil company began assembling land for its new executive offices on St. Clair Ave. W. in 1952, it didn’t reckon on tangling with...
By Chris Bateman -
Toronto’s Art Deco legacy celebrated
Facing each other across Spadina Avenue just north of Adelaide, the Tower and Balfour Buildings frame a striking entryway into Toronto’s Fashion District...
By Daniel Rotsztain -
How Exhibition Place got the retro Dufferin Gate
You can tell a lot about a place by how it greets its visitors. The goofy lights at Honest Ed’s tell customers “there’s no place like...
By Chris Bateman -
The modernist Bloor-Danforth line at 50
The Bloor-Danforth line turned 50 today. Five decades ago, on February 25, 1966, the first section of Toronto’s first east-west subway opened...
By Chris Bateman -
Pour one out for the Toronto Coach Terminal
The Toronto Coach Terminal is a sorry sight. Marooned a significant distance from the city’s main railway station, disconnected from other forms of...
By Chris Bateman -
Toronto’s history in two buildings
Back in May and June of 2015, the Guardian newspaper ran an intriguing series on its Cities page entitled “A history of cities in 50 buildings.” The list...
By Sean Marshall -
How the TTC lost and found its subway style
Not many people could have known that behind the advertising billboards on the platform of College station was something no-one had seen for more than...
By Chris Bateman -
How the Eaton Centre nearly wrecked Old City Hall
Ever since Toronto city council moved over the street in 1965, Toronto hasn’t quite known what to do with Old City Hall. The exquisite heritage...
By Chris Bateman -
Awe in the city
The study of awe — the kind of jaw-dropping experience that makes you recalibrate your understanding of the world — originated with natural phenomena...
By Dylan Reid