Tag Archives: regent park

20141030. The empty, decaying yet classical modernist Duke of York public school (c.1958) in Toronto’s Regent Park.

20141030. The empty,decaying yet classicly modernist Duke of Yor
The property on which this former Toronto District School Board school sits has been purchased by the Toronto Catholic District School Board. Due to its bad state of repair, it will most likely be demolished.

20140822. Modernist high-rise demolition cross-section in Regent Park, Toronto.

20140822_1945-2We should applaud the revitilization in Regent Park but should also appreciate the design of these modernist towers before all five are gone.

They were very unique. John Bentley Mays did a good job describing these apartments: “Every one of the five high-rises is a stack of 97 one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments, each disposed, like a small townhouse, on two floors. By eliminating corridors on every second floor — the elevator skips the floors without hallways — Dickinson was able to open out the common area in each apartment to the width of the whole slab. The results: a sense of spaciousness, light coming from two directions, good cross-ventilation and views of Lake Ontario for almost every resident of the towers.”

20140623. Contextualism #2: The distant building addresses its context in terms of the materials, forms and details of the closer building.

20140623. Contextualism 2: The distant building addresses its context in terms of the materials, forms and details of the closer building.
If all of Peter Dickinson’s high-rises (foreground) are demolished, a memory of them will exist in 90 Sumach (background).
Note the similar forms and details: colour of brick, shape of each patch of brick, the window style and the way each building features vertical lines of windows.