Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Yorkville rises

Nothing over three stories existed in this photo five years ago.



The Yorkville neighbourhood continues to grow more dense with multiple high-end condos. The building in the distance with the two cranes is the new Four Seasons Hotel, which will contain both hotel rooms and more condominium units. The neighbourhood's cozy streets filled with restaurants, boutique shopping and all the usual amenities one needs to live make it a great location, not to mention it sits above and around two subway lines.

It's a great place for a pedestrian. Since the streets are so narrow, cars drive slowly.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Robarts Library

Robarts Library at the University of Toronto is adding staircases where they didn't previously exist and getting rid of its windswept 2nd floor plazas and turning them into glassed study spaces. These improvements were part of the original design of the library but were cut out due to budget constraints. The new staircase will add a new access point on Hoskin, which will improve flow to the library. The added study spaces are much needed for the large school body.

New staircase on Hoskin:



New glass with previously existing staircase on St. George Street side (additional stairs will be added here, seen in the open space on the right side of the picture):


Glass close-up: