topofthetower

Like a Jean Prouvé extrusion. Would love to know who the designer was. Nit-picky note: background is likely the Public Library and Victoria Hall.

Believe this is a reclad/redo of the pre-war Hotel de La Salle

The reclad appears to be more banal than the original. While not a masterpiece, the blue spandrels and white mullions were honest expressions of their era and, I agree, one of the better early curtain walls in the city. At least the distinctive width of the windows is being kept, though a simple energy upgrade and cleaning (along with stripping of the out-of-place base) would have done the job.

Quelle horreur! This is an elegant Moretti/Nervi structure.

Montreal is fortunate to have such relics of the past in plain sight/contrast; they remind us of the city's manufacturing and industrial base. City centres with higher land values have long since lost such links with their past in favour of bland corporatized spaces or kitsch remakes. As development inevitably replaces even these last vestiges, Montreal may be fortunate enough to benefit from the fact that such urban renewal is happening at a time when the importance of preserving a link to the city's character is increasingly valued. With luck, the resultant urban fabric will be more reflective of the city's identity.

I actually think it's one of the better post-war curtain walls in the city...sort of a mix of CIL/Tour Telus and the old PepsiCo building on Park Ave in NYC. The out-of-context brutalist basilaire would need replacing though.

Yet another attempt to deal with an awkwardly-situated tower. Logic would dictate that the main entrance should be on the city's most prestigious business street: Rene-Levesque; that's also the way that the elevator core is oriented. Unfortunately the tower comes straight up to the property line on Boul R-L, leaving only a claustrophobic circulation space at lobby level on that side. I like the idea of restoring the "hint" of a plaza on the side of the square...and a grander entrance worthy of a lobby with a Henry Moore (which I believe is still there) would be appropriate, but I remain fundamentally disturbed by what the 1990s renovation created (and which this latest one seemingly will perpetuate): a boxy stump at the base of an otherwise elegant (if somewhat weirdly-proportioned) classic modernist tower. Take a hint from 277 Park Ave: they undid the miserable ChemCourt 80's glass addition and restored the original 60's building base (ignore the interior).