Architecture générale (ressources, mussées, écoles)

[IluvMTL]

 

Héritage Montréal

 

Promoteur de l’ADN de la métropole depuis plus de 30 ans !

 

Fondé en 1975, Héritage Montréal œuvre à promouvoir et à protéger le patrimoine architectural, historique, naturel et culturel du Grand Montréal. Au cœur d’un vaste réseau de partenaires, Héritage Montréal, un organisme privé sans but lucratif, agit par l’éducation et la représentation pour faire connaître, mettre en valeur et préserver l’identité et les spécificités de Montréal.

 

Des objectifs découlant de sa mission

Faire connaître le patrimoine et défendre sa protection auprès de tous les milieux

Conscientiser et conseiller tout décideur dont les actions affectent le patrimoine

Aider les acteurs publics et privés à se doter d’outils adéquats pour la protection

Veiller au bon usage et au développement de ces outils ainsi qu’à la mise en valeur du patrimoine

Apporter un regard critique fondé sur la connaissance et l’expertise

Rassembler, mobiliser et concerter les intérêts

Maintenir une organisation permanente, efficace et fiable

 

Définition du patrimoine

Héritage Montréal s’intéresse d’abord au patrimoine que l’on peut situer et décrire sur un plan. Ce patrimoine est constitué de biens immeubles et peut être traité par les instruments de l’urbanisme. Tout en reconnaissant qu’Héritage Montréal concentre son action sur le bâti, il y a cinq facettes à ce patrimoine immobilier montréalais sur lesquelles l’organisme se penche. Ce sont :

Les sites d’intérêt commémoratif (bâtiments ou lieux associés à des événements ou des personnages historiques, toponymie)

Les sites d’intérêt archéologique (sites ou vestiges, enfouis ou non, témoignant d’une étape de l’histoire qui s’est déroulée à Montréal)

Les sites d’intérêt architectural (bâtiments exceptionnels ou typiques de toutes époques, ouvrages de génie civil, œuvres d’art public, aménagements paysagers)

Les sites d’intérêt paysager (vues et repères urbains, fleuve, montagne, topographie, arbres de rue, grands parcs, canal, caractéristiques architecturales des quartiers)

Les sites d’intérêt écologique (sites identifiés aux termes des sciences naturelles, hydrologie, évidences géologiques, écosystèmes forestiers, haltes migratoires)

 

 

http://www.heritagemontreal.org/fr/

[IluvMTL]

 

 

Spacing Montréal is your hub for daily dispatches from the streets of Montréal to cities around the world, offering both analysis and a forum for discussion. Our contributors examine neighbourhoods, architecture, urban planning, transit, cycling and just about anything that involves the public realm of our cities.

 

Spacing Montréal is published by Spacing, a Toronto-based magazine that focuses on the joys, obstacles, and politics of our urban landscape.

 

Find it in stores across CanadaSubscribe to Spacing

Spacing Montreal est un lieu où vous retrouverez vos dépêches quotidiennes en provenance des rues montréalaises et rejoignant les villes du monde en offrant des analyses, ainsi qu'un forum de discussion. Nos collaborateurs examinent les quartiers, l'architecture, l'urbanisme, le transport en commun, le cyclisme, et à peu près tout ce qui se rattache à la sphère publique de nos villes.

 

Spacing Montréal est un blog hebdomadaire publié par Spacing, une revue traitant des joies, obstacles et politiques de notre environment urbain.

 

Disponible en magasins à la grandeur du CanadaAbonnez-vous Spacing

 

http://spacingmontreal.ca

[IluvMTL]

 

http://calendrierdupatrimoinedemontreal.com/fr/

[acpnc]

Très intéressant, merci pour tous ces détails et descriptions. Une contribution qui met en lumière plusieurs organismes méconnus de la scène montréalaise.

[IluvMTL]

J'invite d'autres à révéler leurs sources...

Modifié 18 juin 2011 par IluvMTL

[IluvMTL]

Présentation

+ de 300 concours d’architecture, d’architecture de paysage et d’urbanisme répertoriés dans notre catalogue

+ de 82 concours documentés

+ de 2276 projets listés (dont 225 documentés)

+ de 22555 documents numériques dans la base de données (dont plus de 90% concernent directement les projets)

+ de 11253 documents accessibles via Internet

 

LE CATALOGUE DES CONCOURS CANADIENS EST EN CONSTRUCTION PERMANENTE

 

Le Catalogue des Concours Canadiens (CCC) est un moteur de recherche conçu sur une initiative du Laboratoire d’étude de l’architecture potentielle, sous la direction de Jean-Pierre Chupin (Ph.D., architecte MOAQ), afin de rendre public une partie essentielle de sa base de données documentaire.

 

Le CCC est destiné à l'archivage, à l'analyse et à l'histoire de l'architecture contemporaine. Il repose sur la collaboration des architectes. Veuillez noter que le répertoire chronologique (catalogue complet) est en construction permanente et que les documents de la base de données ne sont pas tous en accès public.

 

Le financement provient principalement du Fonds Québécois de Recherche sur la Société et la Culture et du Conseil de Recherche en Sciences Humaines du Canada.

 

1. Vos archives dans la base de donnée documentaire

Les chercheurs du LEAP de l'Université de Montréal sollicitent la collaboration des architectes afin de mettre régulièrement à jour la base de données ainsi que le répertoire du Catalogue des concours canadiens (C.C.C.).

Depuis 2002, de nombreux architectes, concurrents et conseillers professionnels ont déjà répondu très favorablement en nous permettant d'accéder à leurs archives. Nous travaillons également avec les archivistes du Centre Canadien d'Architecture et de l'Université McGill afin d'identifier les fonds déposés dans ces institutions.

 

Si vous souhaitez contribuer à cette entreprise de recherche et de diffusion pour des concours auxquels vous, ou votre firme, avez participé, ou si vous disposez d'informations concernant des concours qui manquent à notre répertoire, nous vous demandons de bien vouloir prendre contact avec les chercheurs du L.e.a.p. à l'adresse courriel leap-lab@umontreal.ca. Vous pourrez nous transmettre directement les projets qui se présentent déjà sous forme numérique, ou nous autoriser à les numériser dans nos locaux de l'Université de Montréal.

 

Contact LEAP : leap-lab@umontreal.ca

 

Fondée en 2001, l'équipe du LEAP regroupe 9 enseignants chercheurs

2. Qu’est-ce que le Catalogue des Concours Canadiens ?

Véritables matrices d'architecture potentielle, les projets conçus à l'occasion de concours constituent un patrimoine architectural (intellectuel et culturel) particulièrement méconnu et négligé. Pourtant, dans le seul contexte canadien on dénombre plusieurs milliers de projets issus de concours d'architecture et d'urbanisme depuis 1945! Or ces projets ont une valeur par delà leur succès dans le contexte d'un concours : on connaît nombre de projets non lauréats qui continuent d'influencer les pratiques ou les transferts de connaissance, de façon parfois bien plus déterminante que les projets réalisés. Si la situation du concours est riche en pratiques critiques et réflexives, pour ne pas dire innovantes et audacieuses, il apparaît d'autant plus étonnant de voir disparaître progressivement, et inexorablement, un tel patrimoine d'idées et de solutions potentielles.

 

Grâce à la générosité de nombreux bureaux d'architectes disposés à rendre accessibles leurs fonds d'archives professionnelles pour des fins de recherche universitaire, et fort du soutien financier de différents organismes subventionnaires (dont le C.R.S.H. et l'I.R.H.A.), l'équipe du Laboratoire d'étude de l'architecture potentielle de l'Université de Montréal, a décidé en 2002, d'entreprendre la constitution d'une base de données documentaires sur les concours d'architecture et d'urbanisme organisés au Canada depuis 1945. Ce projet à long terme, dont les incidences scientifiques, culturelles, pédagogiques et technologiques sont multiples, devrait permettre d'éclairer et de mieux comprendre tout aussi bien les concours, les projets et l'évolution des pratiques architecturales, que les démarches contemporaines de conception et de médiation culturelle dans le contexte canadien.

 

Le L.e.a.p. tient à remercier tous les partenaires institutionnels et professionnels qui l'accompagnent dans cette vaste entreprise de connaissance et d'édification architecturale.

 

3. Les projets de concours d'architecture au Canada: un patrimoine intellectuel et culturel !

De plus en plus de chercheurs et d'historiens reconnaissent que la formule du concours est une situation favorisant la recherche et l'expérimentation : qu'elle stimule la conception de projets riches en solution techniques et en pratiques esthétiques innovantes. En outre, la procédure du concours participe, dans son ensemble, à la construction d'un espace public de débat, et de définition, sur les valeurs d'une société. En ce sens, les concours contribuent à l'intensification des pratiques d'exploration architecturale et de médiation culturelle.

 

De façon contradictoire, et en dépit de son potentiel démocratique, le phénomène des concours est toujours menacé par son caractère " spectaculaire ". On parle beaucoup des concours, mais on ne dispose pourtant que de très peu d'études sérieuses et documentées sur la question. En outre, on tend la plupart du temps à ne diffuser que les projets lauréats, et les expositions publiques qui clôturent un concours ne suffisent généralement pas à assurer la visibilité durable des différents projets. Les comparaisons sont rapidement rendues difficiles, voire impossible, et les projets se perdent dans les oubliettes des bureaux d'architectes. Cette contradiction, inhérente à la fois à la temporalité complexe des projets d'architecture et aux particularismes des situations de concours, renforce la dispersion des documents et dévalorise l'architecture à l'état de " projet " : elle mine le débat d'idées en transformant le concours en situation purement évènementielle.

 

Entre 1960 et 2000, près de 150 concours ont été menés au Canada. Plus de la moitié de ces concours ont été organisés au Québec et plus d'1 /3 des concours a porté sur des projets d'architecture à fonction culturelle. Chacun de ces concours a généré des dizaines, voire des centaines de projets. Pour ne citer qu'un exemple, prenons le cas du concours pour l'Hôtel de Ville de Mississauga (1981) pour lequel près de 250 projets ont été soumis, ou, plus proche de nous, citons les cas du concours pour la Bibliothèque de Châteauguay qui a reçu près de 60 propositions en première phase et celui pour l'Orchestre symphonique de Montréal qui a donné lieu à plus d'une centaine d'esquisses en provenance du monde entier.

 

Si l'on s'accorde généralement pour reconnaître que les milliers de projets conçus depuis 1945 sont le résultat d'un effort intellectuel et créatif considérable, force est de constater bien peu ont été archivés, documentés, et encore moins étudiés. Mais il y a plus grave encore, car leur statut de projets non lauréats - leur condition mal reconnue d'architecture potentielle - fait qu'ils sont pour la plupart menacés de " disparition ". Il s'agit bien là d'une richesse intellectuelle et culturelle négligée : dont la dévalorisation est sans commune mesure avec la survalorisation - tant louangeuse que critique - dont les projets lauréats font parfois l'objet.

 

Ces projets, qu'ils soient gagnants ou non, construits ou non, nous intéressent en tant qu'architectures potentielles, c'est-à-dire d'abord et avant tout comme connaissances architecturales. En effet, les historiens de l'architecture rencontrent bien des cas de projets non sélectionnés ou non primés - et plus encore non réalisés - qui continuent d'avoir une influence sur la culture architecturale et ce, bien au-delà de l'événement du concours, et parfois même bien loin du contexte culturel ou historique d'origine. On remarque toutefois que l'influence qu'exerce tel ou tel projet dépend en grande partie du degré de diffusion dont il fait l'objet. Ainsi, le projet de Rem Koolhaas et du groupe O.M.A. pour le concours du Parc de la Villette à Paris, au début des années 80, a probablement rejailli avec autant d'impact sur l'éducation et la connaissance architecturale que le projet lauréat, et réalisé, de Bernard Tschumi. Plusieurs architectes se servent de projets de concours, même quand ils n'ont pas été sélectionnés. Ces projets sont représentés dans des offres de service ou sur des sites internet, mais il n'en reste le plus souvent que quelques images emblématiques : une mémoire morcelée en quelque sorte.

 

4. Le plan de documentation numérique des projets de concours d'architecture

On parle donc d'un ensemble de projets constituant une véritable collection d'architectures potentielles et de trajectoires intellectuelles et créatives dispersées et difficilement accessibles : d'un patrimoine culturel à re-connaître, à rassembler et à rendre de nouveau public. Or, jusqu'à présent, il n'existait pas de base de données ou de documentation systématique des projets de concours afin de rendre un tel ensemble de situation comparables accessible à la communauté universitaire, aux professionnels ou encore au grand public.

 

Au Laboratoire d'étude de l'architecture potentielle, nous considérons qu'il est de notre ressort de participer à la documentation raisonnée des concours et au développement de recherches, tant historiques que théoriques, susceptibles d'intégrer pleinement ces projets " endormis " au débat culturel et au transfert des connaissances. Nous croyons que l'architecture n'est pas seulement une marchandise, ou un service, mais aussi un leg culturel commun qui accompagne la collectivité et dont celle-ci doit profiter autant dans sa forme construite, que dans son potentiel symbolique théorique et réflexif.

 

L'objectif principal de cette base de données documentaires consiste à systématiser l'acquisition raisonnée de copies numériques des projets de concours au Canada depuis 1945 : incluant les documents préparatoires, les documents officiels, les esquisses, les planches de présentation, les photographies de maquettes ou de modèles, les textes de présentation, les rapports de jurys, ainsi que les articles de presse et de périodiques spécialisés. Cette base de données, constituée exclusivement de copies numériques, est structurée pour permettre différentes analyses génétiques et comparatives. Cette opération devrait permettre de reconstituer un patrimoine culturel des projets pour le rendre accessible à la communauté universitaire et, dans la mesure des autorisations des architectes concernés, pour rendre ce patrimoine accessible au grand public par l'intermédiaire d'un site internet géré par la direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

 

5. Les programmes de recherche et de diffusion publique associés

Cette base constitue pour les historiens et les chercheurs une source de documentation importante sur l'architecture contemporaine au Canada ainsi que du matériel propice au études comparatives afin de mieux comprendre les processus de genèse du projet d'architecture dans une situation particulière de la commande et de la demande. La base de données permet l'accès à des documents de référence et les étudiants peuvent y découvrir des solutions architecturales adaptées au contexte culturel canadien des 50 dernières années.

 

Les élus et administrateurs publics y trouvent un outil de référence contenant des données précises sur les concours leur permettant de procéder à des analyses quantitatives et qualitatives, afin de contribuer à l'élaboration de politiques informées. Les experts professionnels, qu'ils soient architectes, ingénieurs, conseillers professionnels, membres du jury, etc. ou encore promoteurs, y trouvent des informations précieuses pour guider leur pratique et pour évaluer le type de concours qui convient à leur projet; les coûts; une liste des intervenants, la définition de leur rôle; la copie numérique des principaux documents de concours (programmes, règlement, rapport du jury, etc.).

 

Finalement, le grand public peut accéder à la partie " visible " de l'information de cette base et se familiariser avec les débats publics qui s'y rattachent. Les projets de concours proposent des réflexions sur l'organisation de l'espace et de la société canadienne, ils devraient aussi permettre d'accéder à une compréhension plus éclairée et plus fine de notre histoire commune.

 

 

soutien financier équipe de réalisation avis importants copyrights

 

Fonds Québecois de Recherche sur la Société et la Culture

Institut de Recherche en Histoire de l'Architecture

Conseil de Recherches en Sciences Humaines du Canada

 

http://www.ccc.umontreal.ca/

[IluvMTL]

La référence sur les gratte-ciel et bâtiments historiques de Montréal

 

 

Édifices

• Gratte-ciel
  
• Églises
  
• Banques
  
• Bâtiments industriels
  
• Hôtels
  
• Maisons anciennes
  
• Appartements
  

 

Paysages urbains

• Parcs
  
• Graffitis
  
• Places publiques
  
• Horizons
  
• Monuments historiques
  
• Publicités murales
  
• Ponts et viaducs
  

 

Les quartiers

• Vieux-Montréal
  
• Mile-end
  
• Outremont
  
• Westmount
  
• Centre-Ville
  
• Plateau Mont-Royal
  
• Côte-des-Neiges
  

 

Les rues

• Boulevard Saint-Laurent
  
• Rue Sherbrooke
  
• Rue Sainte-Catherine
  
• Rue Saint-Denis
  
• Boulevard René-Lévesque
  
• Boulevard de Maisonneuve
  

 

Diagrame

Satellite

Expositions

Cartes

Télécharger

 

 

Images Montréal est un projet à but non lucratif dédié à la photo, plus particulièrement la ville de Montréal et son patrimoine. Le but est de monter une base de données contenant des photos de rues et édifices historiques la plus vaste possible. Nous ajoutons jour après jour de nouvelles images et fiches d'immeubles.

 

Vous trouverez sur ce site des images sur les édifices patrimoniaux de Montréal ainsi que de nombreuses images des différents quartiers et arrondissements. Une attention particulière est donnée à la collecte d'information sur l'architecture des édifices de Montréal.

 

Pour nous, un monument historique a droit de regard autant qu'un graffiti ou une tour de condominiums modernes, peu importe l'arrondissement. Voilà pourquoi nous avons des photos sur tous ces sujets. Montréal change, c'est pourquoi vous trouverez aussi des images historiques ainsi que des photos d'édifices en construction.

 

 

http://www.imtl.org/index.php

Modifié 7 juillet 2011 par IluvMTL

[IluvMTL]

http://www.archdaily.com/

 

 

ArchDaily, published daily by Plataforma Networks

Broadcasting Architecture Worldwide

© ArchDaily LLC, 2008-2011

 

ArchDaily was founded in March 2008 with the one mission of delivering the most complete information to architects around the world; every week, every day, every hour, every moment: as soon as it is happening. It is the online source of continuous information for a growing community of thousands of architects searching for the latest architectural news: projects, products, events, interviews and competitions among others.

 

Our editorial staff works in a daily basis with the most prestigious and influential architectural practices around the world in order deliver specific and valuable content to a premium readership of architects, designers, consumers and influencers. In one year ArchDaily has quickly established itself as one of the leading architectural websites in the world due to our editorial staff’s meticulous understanding of what the audience is really looking for: the best architecture around the world, as soon as possible.

 

Follow this link to see what others say about us.

 

Team

David Basulto, Graduate Architect – Executive Editor

Twitter – Linkedin profile – Facebook – Contact

 

David Assael, Master in Urban Development – Director

Linkedin profile – Contact

 

Nico Saieh, Graduate Architect – Associate Editor

Linkedin profile – Contact

 

Sebastian Jordana, Journalist – Associate Editor

Linkedin profile – Contact

 

Karen Cilento – Associate Editor

Linkedin profile – Contact

 

Kelly Minner, Graduate Architect – Editor

Linkedin profile – Contact

 

Contributors

 

The following people have contributed with ArchDaily: Sarah Wessler, Andrea Giannoti, Ethel Baraona, Amber P.

Modifié 3 octobre 2012 par IluvMTL

[IluvMTL]

http://www.lifeofanarchitect.com/the-best-architectural-websites/

 

 

 

Life of an Architect’s Favorite Websites:

 

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John Hill’s A Daily Dose of Architecture was the first architectural bog that I started reading. Full of critical evaluation and first-hand knowledge, this is a great site to visit for any fan of architecture.

 

 

 

I discovered the BUILD website a few months after starting my own. I would like to think that other than the personalities that go into writing the articles, their website isn’t much different from my own (other than theirs is better). Informative, personal, interesting, and transparent … everything a good architectural blog should be.

 

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I started reading Coffee with an Architect from the beginning and I had the good fortune to meet Jody Brown in person approximately 6 months after I started blogging. Jody is a funny guy, clever writer, and from what I can tell, a pretty good architect. Jody’s site doesn’t really focus on his work – he focuses on the stereotypes associated with architects,architecture, and the design process and writes about them in a way that relates to almost every working (and not working) architect in the country.

 

 

 

What is there to say about the ArchDaily website? It’s only the most trafficked architectural website on the planet. They have been the leader in aggregate architectural sites from the beginning … and for good reason. If it’s out there, most likely it’s covered on this site.

 

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The Architect’s Newspaper is an aggregate site for projects, news, competitions, job postings and much more.

 

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Scott Taylor in my office originally turned me on to NOTCOT and it has become one of my most favorite websites regardless of any sort of classification. A great site for designers to visit just to see what other designers are doing.

 

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I have been reading Architectural Record the magazine for 20 years – migrating to their website just makes sense. One of the things that distinguishes the Architectural Record website from most of the others are the stories and the consistently high quality writing. This is one of the websites that I aspire to getting my work published. Maybe one day they will write an article about blog sites and Life of an Architect will make that list. (fingers crossed)

 

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Evan Troxel is a designer and educator that I became aware of through twitter and it has worked to my advantage that I have. Evan is a sort of digital renaissance man and his collection of websites (starting with evantroxel.com) have entered my rotation of “what’s that?” websites. I don’t understand most of what he writes about but I can’t help but feel that if Evan is talking about it, I should figure out why … and then do it.

 

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Better Living through Design is a design and lifestyle website that has something for everyone. It’s easy to go to this site only to look at the clock and realize that you’ve been surfing their pages for a long, long time.

 

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Energy Vanguard is the nerdiest website I go to – and I don’t ever regret going (I just keep it to myself or I’ll lose my “Architects are indifferent” card.) Posts here are written by Allison A. Bailes III – who happens to have a PhD. in Physics that he puts to good use teaching others about building science and energy performance. Normally I might steer clear from a site whose topics generally involve HVAC design protocols but with posts titled “Release the Kracken! – The Ductopus is Bad for Air Conditioning” how could you not take a look?.

 

 

 

As an architect that focuses mostly on residential projects, Residential Architect is my go-to magazine / website of choice. The proper collection of projects, technology, news, and general articles that inspire creativity, this is another magazine that I aspire to gracing.

 

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Architechnophilia is an aggregate site and a really good one at that. There are a lot of architecturally themed aggregate sites out there but few are as current and as relevant as this one.

 

 

 

Simply put, Design Milk is a bad ass site. If it’s cool, it’s here: architecture, art, furnishings, interior design, style, technology and news … everything related to design. It was originally founded by Jaime Derringer but there is an army of talented and cool people assembling information for you. Based on their website, I bet they throw really good parties (that I will never get to attend.)

 

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Rounding out the triumvirate of magazine/ websites is the aptly named Architect. This is THE magazine of the American Institute of Architects so what does that tell you? It’s relevant, engaging and always full of interesting articles on all things related to the built environment. Recently I was lucky enough to make it onto the pages of this fine magazine – an experience neither of us will soon forget. The article can be found here [brace yourself - shudder]

 

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Materialicious is a designers aggregate site – plenty here to explore, be prepared to lose track of time for a while … don’t be surprised to learn so much time has passed that you have to shave again.

 

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I am a Texas Architect so therefore I am interested in what is going on with regards to Texas Architecture. There is no better place for me to find out – and to follow – the happenings from around the Lone Star State than to check in on the Texas Society of Architects website.

 

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Everyone knows that architecture students are always in the studio … Stuck in Studio is an architectural blog geared towards architecture students and the excitement, opportunities, and challenges unique to architecture students. There are plenty of architecture student blogs, I just think this one is the best. This is the one site that sort of breaks my rule since they haven’t posted in a while – my message to them? Get it going! [oh yeah, they are probably in stuck in the studio]

 

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Not so much an architecture site but rather an art and interior design site. Most of the Interior Design websites that I traffic have so much product information that it all becomes noise … and in a just a very short time my brain becomes quite addled. What I like about MoCo Loco is the balance they strike between design and designers, art and artists. They have made the effort to bring me the story behind the products and as a result, I love their site.

 

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Because she can say it better than I can – from Blueprint editor Vicky Richardson: ‘Blueprint aims to use the subject of design to reveal the workings of society. The magazine is about the important role that design and architecture can play in shaping the world.’ The online version is as good as the printed version – if you aren’t subscribing, you are missing out.

 

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The 2modern site is unique on this list for the simple reason that they sell the stuff they tend to talk about … but I don’t care. There is so much eye-candy on this site that I simply couldn’t leave it off this list. This was one of the first sites I added to my RSS feed and after two years when most sites than I can remember have been put on only to find themselves removed, 2modern is still there. Nice job folks, keep up the excellent work.

 

 

 

While this probably won’t be a fan favorite, the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB) website is a great website. Since I get so many emails from students or people who want to be an architect, I am constantly on this site to verify the information I include in the responses I send out. There are sections with information on “Becoming an Architect”, “Studying Architecture”, “Architectural Registration Exams”, and much, much more. To be honest, I wish they would improve their SEO or something so they could field more of the emails I am receiving.

 

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The ISSUE: Collective is a student-run blog for the University of Texas at Austin (which is also my alma mater). The blog serves as a school-wide forum covering current issues, new directions, and dilemmas at the UTSoA and features contributions from faculty members, current students, and alumni. Even if you didn’t attend the UTSoA, there is always something interesting to be found. The quality level on this site is so high it makes me question whether or not I actually graduated from this program.

 

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Metropolis Magazine is one of my favorite design magazines so it stands to reason that I would like the website as well (surprise!) Hard to really back this up with empirical data but I seem to find stuff on the Metropolis site that I don’t find anywhere else – and in this day and age where people seem to freely borrow from one another that’s really saying something. From their website, “Metropolis examines contemporary life through design—architecture, interior design, product design, graphic design, crafts, planning, and preservation.”

 

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So there it is – my top 24 websites. I’m quite sure that you have some that you love that didn’t make this list … just put them in the comment section below!

[IluvMTL]

 

It wasn’t until the 1950s that Canadian urban regions had the economic might to build modern cities. And what an intriguing legacy that era left us

The Canadian landscape has been easy to define because it’s so much a part of our national identity: wilderness, rural, water; repeat. Trying to define the Canadian cityscape is much more difficult, as our traditional Canadian identity has totally avoided cities, even though these are where most Canadians live. Try picturing “The Canadian City.” If you can conjure up something that represents the whole country, you’re a visionary. There are certainly landmark buildings and neighbourhoods across Canada that are famous for their striking images, such as the multi-coloured clapboard houses of St. John’s, or the walled Old Québec City. Distinctive cityscapes are an important part of the Canadian identity, but they are in no way typical of a wider Canadian style of urbanism.

 

So we’re back to a difficult starting point: trying to find connections across the country. Canada is far too spread out geographically, with too much variety in building materials, to have an overwhelmingly consistent look to our cities. Though there are many similarities between Canada and US, the latter had a growth spurt much earlier than Canadian cities, so many American cities have a fair amount of “City Beautiful” architecture — a monumental style popular in the late-1800s and early-1900s, when government and institutional buildings were built, often along grand avenues. This lent city centres, from New York to San Francisco, a somewhat consistent look.

 

Except for cities that developed early on like Winnipeg and Montréal, only a smattering of City Beautiful buildings exist in our cities. In 1904, while the United States was in the middle of its City Beautiful boom, Prime Minister Wilfred Laurier made his famous speech about looking towards the country’s next 100 years: “Canada has been modest in its history, although its history, in my estimation, is only commencing. It is commencing in this century. The 19th century was the century of the United States. I think we can claim that Canada will fill the 20th century.”

We haven’t come close to fulfilling Laurier’s dream, but we had a late start. It wasn’t until the 1950s that the built form of the country really began to expand, as two wars and the Depression left only a scant decade or two when the economics were right for growth.

 

Looking across the country with this in mind, and setting aside those historic downtowns and celebrated leafy Victorian and Edwardian neighbourhoods, an incredible amount of Canadian urbanism was created during the mid-century boom, just after World War II until the recession of the late 1970s slowed things down. This era of growth defined downtowns with skyscrapers and other commercial buildings, as well as provided strip malls and modernist bungalows to the suburbs. Yet we hardly talk about this.

 

Not noticing this aspect of our landscape is a common phenomenon. In the opening of the incredibly rich book Winnipeg Modern: Architecture, 1945-1975, editor Serena Keshavjee commented that though that city has some of the finest mid-century buildings in the country, she was initially caught off guard by them. “When I moved from Toronto to Winnipeg during the summer of 1996, I was prepared for the splendour of the Exchange district, which was declared a National Historic Site by Sheila Copps soon after I arrived. I was not expecting to find, however, the fine stock of mid-century modernist buildings throughout the city. I grew up in Don Mills, the paradigmatic, planned North American modernist neighbourhood, a suburban-style Garden City, with local parks, schools, and shops. Don Mills is well known for its modernist buildings and gets lots of attention for it. No one ever mentions Winnipeg modernism.” Yet there is was in plain sight, unacknowledged. Not unlike how Canadians approach a lot of cultural things.

 

The American Pavilion from Expo 67 in Montréal, designed by Buckminster Fuller. It is now known as The Biosphère, a museum dedicated to the environment.

 

Some of our modernism is not particularly beautiful and is actively forgotten for a reason, but there were also plenty of Victorian and Edwardian structures that weren’t pretty or were poorly built that nobody lamented losing. Everybody forgets about the junk, like that false adage about antiques says: “they don’t build them like they used to,” a notion that requires overlooking how people threw out junk and only the good stuff survived. This is one reason we fail to recognize the modernist landscape that connects and defines so much of Canada: a fair amount of it isn’t pretty and was built on the cheap, and simply hasn’t been torn down or revitalized yet. One ugly, unfortunate building can be enough to obscure an entire area. More importantly, Canada’s modernist heritage isn’t talked about because it’s in the teenage phase of its existence, awkward and unloved, the same phase that now-beloved Victorian and Edwardian buildings were in after the war, when nobody cared for the frilliness of those older styles and when the fashion of day was all-mod-cons and atomic age forward thinking.

 

Fashion is fickle and destructive though. It was during the immediate decades after the war that we lost a lot of older, unfashionable buildings to the destructive forces of the modernist boom. A lot of the junk went, but so did many of the buildings that have us lamenting or scratching our heads, wondering how we could have ever torn them down. The destruction of the Van Horne mansion in downtown Montréal for a modernist tower in 1973 was emblematic of this kind of push for removal, one that also included urban renewal schemes and expressway plans in many of our major cities, all of which resulted in organized resistance. In the Van Horne case, the “Save Montréal” movement was born, while in Toronto a similar group coalesced around stopping the Spadina Expressway. These groups and others across the country may have had a particularly Canadian way of tempering the most destructive modernizing forces before too much was lost.

 

The Riverdale Hospital — affectionately known as the “Half-Round” — is slated for demolition by it’s current owner Bridgeport Health.

 

Graeme Stewart, a Toronto architect and modern heritage preservation activist says that the anti-modernist reaction has meant that there hasn’t been much popular exploration and recognition of this aspect of Canadian cities, and what work on the subject does exist is paradoxically related to what modernism got wrong. Speaking about Toronto specifically, Stewart says that “prior to the recent boom of writing about the city there is quite little, and what does exist is largely a result of the wonderful, yet anti-modern, reform movement. Not many books were written during the postwar boom as observations or retrospectives. The general history of Canadian architects books seem to focus on the big guys like Toronto Dominion Bank, and generally ignore the ‘fabric’ modern architecture like schools, housing, shops that really defined the era.”

 

The recent boom Stewart speaks of is related to the growing modernist preservation movement in Toronto that the firm he works with, E.R.A. Architects, has helped lead, co-produceding the books Toronto Modern and Concrete Toronto with Coach House Books. What these and other publications have done is sound a warning that modernism is at an age when it faces the same risk of becoming as unfashionable as the Victorians and Edwardians did in the decades after the war, when the risk of demolition was greatest. This isn’t to say everything modern is great and worthy of a glossy spread in Canadian Architect, but in recognizing how much this era defines our cities we can more honestly access what has worked and what hasn’t.

 

With this in mind, casting an eye across the country, our modern urban fabric seems much more apparent, and those older downtown neighbourhoods, by comparison, seem a much smaller part of what the Canadian city looks like. Buildings built between the 1950s and ’70s generally dominate the skylines. In Halifax, the historic waterfront is still there, but what folks from Dartmouth notice are the modernist office towers. Old Québec City — save the Chateau Frontenac — is dwarfed by the buildings adjacent to the Plains of Abraham outside the walls, and the downtown is mostly modernist in nature. Similar skylines exist in Vancouver, Hamilton, Toronto, and other cities. Edmonton’s North Saskatchewan River valley is overlooked by an incredible line of mid-rise apartment buildings, from the legislature to the end of Jasper Avenue, much like Central Park in New York.

 

The Hydro Quebec building in Montreal

 

Two buildings that house public utilities, built just a few years apart, represent the kind of pride felt during the optimistic modernist age, and can be thought of as modernist totems of sorts. In Montréal, along what became René Lévesque Boulevard, the 1962 Hydro Québec building rose a few blocks north of the old city, complete with its lightning bolt Q logo. In the fantastic book, The 60s: Montréal Thinks Big, published to accompany a 2004 exhibition of the same name at the Canadian Centre for Architecture, the construction of the Hydro building was said to symbolize “the achievements of the state in the service of Québec Society,” a kind of concrete version of the Quiet Revolution. Perhaps with a bit less nationalism but equal amounts of pride, Vancouver’s Electra Building opened in 1957 as home to BC Hydro (though now it’s converted to residential). In both these buildings, the exploitation of national resources, a very big part of the traditional Canadian identity, is represented in a most central urban context, so a connection is made between the landscape and urban Canadian identities.

 

Two other notable modernist buildings have a connection to the traditional identity as well, this time in the realm of transportation. The CPR and the Last Spike are part of our founding mythology, so it makes sense that the second time Canada was bound together by air travel it manifested in an impressive, jet-age way. In Toronto, Aeroquay One was completed in 1964. Designed by preeminent Canadian modernist John B. Parkin, it was a terminal in the round where people could park in the middle, walk only a hundred metres and be at their gate. Also opened in 1964 was Winnipeg’s airport terminal designed by GBR Architects. Both gems are sadly demolished due to the incompatibility of their jet-age elegance with today’s mass transit requirements.

 

The construction of skyscrapers, along with massive events like Expo ’67, are just one part of Canada’s modernist landscape. So much of that everyday fabric Graeme Stewart talks about continues to be a living part of our cities. Across the country, major chunks of infrastructure — unglamorous roads and bridges, or sexy subway stations in Montréal that, at times, match Expo ’67 in capturing the spirit of the era — still help the country run. Many Canadians went to school in midcentury buildings with terrazzo floors, open concept rooms (often later divided into classrooms), and walls of windows. These schools can be found across the country, still in use and in varying states of care (vintage schools are at high risk of being lost, as heritage preservation is a low priority for boards of education).

 

http://spacing.ca/national/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/MOD-lethbridge-600x400.jpg

University Hall at the University of Lethbridge, Alberta. Designed by Arthur Erikson

 

The modernist era also saw tremendous growth in post secondary institutions across the country. Many universities and colleges feature some of the most avant-garde modernist designs in Canada. Older campuses got new buildings added while entire new universities like York, Simon Fraser, and Trent were created from scratch. Brutalist UQAM in downtown Montréal was woven into the urban landscape. Architect Arthur Erickson’s dramatic University Hall, set into the hills around the University of Lethbridge, is another connection between traditional images of Canadian landscape and new, modernist buildings. Another monumental Erickson work in Vancouver, the Law Courts, dominates the middle of the downtown peninsula like a human-made hill.

 

Modern city halls, libraries, apartment buildings, cul-du-sacs full of split-levels and ranch houses, community centres, churches, department stores, and entire underground cities in Toronto and Montreal plus a +15 elevated pathway system in Calgary — these elements add up to an overwhelming amount of modernist geography. Though often loathed for either planning mistakes or subsequent decline in care and maintenance, Canada’s public housing stock is largely modernist, from individual buildings to entire neighbourhoods that include Lord Selkirk Park in Winnipeg, Habitations Jeanne-Mance in Montréal, and Regent Park in Toronto (though this is currently being revitalized with entirely new buildings).

 

Some neighbourhoods in Canada blend modernism and prewar elements into charming and walkable areas. South of downtown Calgary, the railway corridor cuts just below skyscrapers beyond which is an old industrial warehouse district that has become, as these places often do, an entertainment and “creative class” district mixed with apartment buildings from 10th to about 17th Avenues.

 

South of 17th Ave. is a remarkable swath of fairly dense residential housing that includes older homes and modernist (and newer) low-rise apartment buildings. Like Los Angeles, there is an unexpected leafy kind of thick urbanity here. Walking down a sidewalk, an older home from the 1920s could have a post-war modern low-rise apartment building as a next door neighbour.

 

In 2005, I was in Calgary for a week and became friendly with a Calgarian who whisked us in a minivan north across the Bow River to the Crescent Heights neigbourhood. Another nice mix of pre and postwar residential homes, our destination was a party in a modernist bungalow. We’re taught to think these are homes to nuclear families, but inside there were some twenty-something professionals living communally, surrounded by expensive home entertainment electronics: a $20,000 video camera, the first domestic plasma TV I had ever seen, and other luxury toys for adults. Our host whispered “oil money,” which seemed to explain everything. The ability of modern homes to adapt to different modes of living, just as prewar houses do, is evidence that mixed living patterns can be replicated in modern neighbourhoods, too.

 

As Robert M. Stamp writes in his book Suburban Modern: Postwar Dreams in Calgary, the city embraced modernism well after WWII. They redefined it and built residential architecture accordingly: “They moved modernism out of the studios of the avant-garde producers and into the hands (and hearts) of the middle-class consumers, out of downtown art salons and design studios and onto the streets and into the suburbs [… ]and redefined modernism to include modern homes in modern suburbs, with modern furniture and modern appliances and modern cars. For postwar Calgarians, modernism meant personal betterment, achieving all those material gains that had been delayed or denied by 15 years of depression and war.” Years later, it remains a solid and defining part of Calgary.

 

This is how we live as Canadians. We are all touched in one way or another by modernism, where we live, play, or conduct business. Is there another element in Canadian cities that is so common? Focusing on our shared modern experience may be a start in uniting the country around its similar urbanity, rather than focusing on the plague of traditional regional divisions.

 

Shawn Micallef is a senior editor at Spacing. He is the author of Stroll and Full Frontal TO, both published by Coach House Books and writes a weekly column for The Toronto Star

This article appears in the Spring 2013 issue of Spacing (national edition)

photos by Brian Carson (Habitat 67 in Montreal), Mark Hanoi (Riverdale Hospital), Adam Fagen (Hydro Quebec), Steve Scrambler (University of Lethbridge)