The Export Development Corporation's new headquarters at Slater and O'Connor (Beique, Legault, Thuot Architects) is probably one of the best recent office buildings downtown.
Through a sequence of cutouts on the lower four floors the mass of the building at eye level has been slimmed down considerably - disguising the fact that there's a fairly large floor plate looming above.
They created a small entrance plaza with a soaring glass lightbox lobby at the corner. The whole based is wrapped by a continuous projection at the fourth floor, emphasized by another setback above. Unfortunately this design feature has been the undoing of EDC's minimal site landscaping. You can't grow trees under a roof.
The upper corner is cut away too, and topped with another roof projection punctured by four square holes. It was to be landscaped as well.
The holes were actually filled in, but a zoom view reveals two little trees up there.
This is EDC's fourth building with a one block radius. They started out in George Bemi's early 1970s brutalist building across the street, and the '80s moved into the sleek stainless steel tube at Laurier and O'Connor (Gillin Corporation). The third, a midrise office across Laurier (a Bill Teron building of the 1960s) was bought for EDC overflow and reskinned with dark blue glass and metal.
And now for the trees - service berries that are trapped beneath two sets of roofs. They had to be lopped off in order to get under the overhang.
The promised trees at grade were good intentions thwarted by the reality of the site and the impossible growing conditions created by the building above. With a little research it probably would been possible to spec a drought-tolerant trees that might survive this challenge.
Set into shallow planters with no apparent irrigation system, they receive no rainfall and very occasional light. I can't speak to the water system that might be up on top deck.
The O'Connor Street frontage was to have been planted with another row of obedient green lollipops.
Only a few went in, and they have the same problem - the double overhang of the Carrara marble bump out and the deeply overhanging wraparound ledge.
Some trees don't need any help - in fact you can't kill 'em. There's a thriving example growing out from under the north east corner of the Medical Arts Building on Metcalfe Street (Noffke, Sylvester and Morin, 1928).
It's a 'Chinese Elm', a scion of the street trees once planted by the City in the Metcalfe Street boulevards. Today they have been categorized as weed trees, and are not on the list of approved species.
The tree is growing up through a crack in the asphalt, with a Manitoba maple sprouting up around it - kind of a wild urban forest succession plan.
Chinese elms are fast growing but short-lived. By the bare stump you can see that its predecessor was cut away by the building owners about fifteen years ago.
EDC's Laurier Avenue elevation was to be greened up with a living wall of vegetation around the loading bay and underground garage entrance.
This was deleted from the final development, and the slate-grey precast panels were used in its place.
The Export Development Corporation's new headquarters at Slater and O'Connor (Beique, Legault, Thuot Architects) is probably one of the best recent office buildings downtown.
Through a sequence of cutouts on the lower four floors the mass of the building at eye level has been slimmed down considerably - disguising the fact that there's a fairly large floor plate looming above.
They created a small entrance plaza with a soaring glass lightbox lobby at the corner. The whole based is wrapped by a continuous projection at the fourth floor, emphasized by another setback above. Unfortunately this design feature has been the undoing of EDC's minimal site landscaping. You can't grow trees under a roof.
The upper corner is cut away too, and topped with another roof projection punctured by four square holes. It was to be landscaped as well.
The holes were actually filled in, but a zoom view reveals two little trees up there.
This is EDC's fourth building with a one block radius. They started out in George Bemi's early 1970s brutalist building across the street, and the '80s moved into the sleek stainless steel tube at Laurier and O'Connor (Gillin Corporation). The third, a midrise office across Laurier (a Bill Teron building of the 1960s) was bought for EDC overflow and reskinned with dark blue glass and metal.
And now for the trees - service berries that are trapped beneath two sets of roofs. They had to be lopped off in order to get under the overhang.
The promised trees at grade were good intentions thwarted by the reality of the site and the impossible growing conditions created by the building above. With a little research it probably would been possible to spec a drought-tolerant trees that might survive this challenge.
Set into shallow planters with no apparent irrigation system, they receive no rainfall and very occasional light. I can't speak to the water system that might be up on top deck.
The O'Connor Street frontage was to have been planted with another row of obedient green lollipops.
Only a few went in, and they have the same problem - the double overhang of the Carrara marble bump out and the deeply overhanging wraparound ledge.
Some trees don't need any help - in fact you can't kill 'em. There's a thriving example growing out from under the north east corner of the Medical Arts Building on Metcalfe Street (Noffke, Sylvester and Morin, 1928).
It's a 'Chinese Elm', a scion of the street trees once planted by the City in the Metcalfe Street boulevards. Today they have been categorized as weed trees, and are not on the list of approved species.
The tree is growing up through a crack in the asphalt, with a Manitoba maple sprouting up around it - kind of a wild urban forest succession plan.
Chinese elms are fast growing but short-lived. By the bare stump you can see that its predecessor was cut away by the building owners about fifteen years ago.
EDC's Laurier Avenue elevation was to be greened up with a living wall of vegetation around the loading bay and underground garage entrance.
This was deleted from the final development, and the slate-grey precast panels were used in its place. 
I've been making fun of these pathetic, doomed trees for months :D
ReplyDeleteIt's ugly. It's supposed to look like a regular building at street level then soars upward. There's no connection between the two though and the ground-level windows look like corporate window-dressing. It's the kind of building which begs you not to look up but is so hideous at street level that you do anyway. It's like this office building is embarrassed to be an office building. It should be.
ReplyDelete