On Saturday, I went on a bike ride all around Toronto. We cut across midtown (checking in on One Delisle), stopped at the Chester Hill Lookout (which if you grew up in the east end is where you probably went as a teenager to make out), shot down the Don Valley, and then turned west along the waterfront. The weather was perfect.

As we were going along the waterfront, we passed the new Aqualuna building that is under construction on Queens Quay East, near Parliament Street. Being the architecture nerd that I am, I immediately noticed that as you pass by -- at the speed of a bike -- the balconies create this really nice cinematic effect.
So I stopped to take these photos (I probably should have taken a video now that I think of it):

I then tweeted a tweet calling it one of the most beautiful buildings going up in Toronto today. Judging from the responses, most people seem to be in agreement, but a few people questioned the practicality of balconies like this. Namely how private and usable they will be. I don't disagree, but I still think it's fine looking building.
What do you think?

Balconies are a never ending debate here in Toronto (and in many other places). In some cities, like New York, they don't seem to matter for new housing. Residents seem to be generally content without them. But here in Toronto, we have typically included them in new high-rise housing and there has been a lot of debate and criticism around both their utility (high up in buildings) and their impact to overall energy performance.
I have noticed that we are starting to see fewer balconies on new buildings, and I suspect this might increase with the way that costs are right now. And for some people and some (sub)markets, this will be just fine. But I happen to be a huge fan of outside. As my tanned dad likes to say when asked about the value of outdoor spaces in multi-family housing, "you don't get this dark by staying inside." He is pretty tanned.
I also believe that great outdoor spaces are an important ingredient in shaking off the deep-rooted cultural biases that this city has toward low-rise housing. Since pretty much the beginning, low-rises houses with backyards have been seen as noble, whereas apartment buildings have been viewed as disease-breeding tenements liable to morally corrupt even the best of intentions.
This is one of the reasons why we created the two-storey House Collection of suites at Junction House and why One Delisle is almost entirely formed by its outdoor spaces (both balconies and terraces). We wanted to celebrate multi-family living.
At the same time, I really like this adaptive reuse proposal by Peter Song over at BDP Quadrangle. The idea is to allow people to infill their balconies with more interior space so that our existing stock of housing can become more flexible
https://vimeo.com/329987418
The 2021 Pritzker Prize was just awarded to French architects Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal. One of the most notable aspects of their work is their appreciation for and reuse of existing structures, which, as many of you will know, is far more sustainable than building new. A good example of this approach is their Grand Parc project in Bordeaux, where they transformed three existing tower blocks and 530 dwellings.
What's fascinating about this project is how they added balconies and winter gardens to structures that previously didn't have any. I also like how there are two layers of outdoors spaces. There's the more enclosed winter garden portion and then there's an open air balcony-type component, which also happens to be a more public-facing space where you might actually run into some of your neighbors.
If you can't see the video above, click here. Once you've had a chance to watch the video, I would be curious to know: Are these spaces that you would like to live in?
On Saturday, I went on a bike ride all around Toronto. We cut across midtown (checking in on One Delisle), stopped at the Chester Hill Lookout (which if you grew up in the east end is where you probably went as a teenager to make out), shot down the Don Valley, and then turned west along the waterfront. The weather was perfect.

As we were going along the waterfront, we passed the new Aqualuna building that is under construction on Queens Quay East, near Parliament Street. Being the architecture nerd that I am, I immediately noticed that as you pass by -- at the speed of a bike -- the balconies create this really nice cinematic effect.
So I stopped to take these photos (I probably should have taken a video now that I think of it):

I then tweeted a tweet calling it one of the most beautiful buildings going up in Toronto today. Judging from the responses, most people seem to be in agreement, but a few people questioned the practicality of balconies like this. Namely how private and usable they will be. I don't disagree, but I still think it's fine looking building.
What do you think?

Balconies are a never ending debate here in Toronto (and in many other places). In some cities, like New York, they don't seem to matter for new housing. Residents seem to be generally content without them. But here in Toronto, we have typically included them in new high-rise housing and there has been a lot of debate and criticism around both their utility (high up in buildings) and their impact to overall energy performance.
I have noticed that we are starting to see fewer balconies on new buildings, and I suspect this might increase with the way that costs are right now. And for some people and some (sub)markets, this will be just fine. But I happen to be a huge fan of outside. As my tanned dad likes to say when asked about the value of outdoor spaces in multi-family housing, "you don't get this dark by staying inside." He is pretty tanned.
I also believe that great outdoor spaces are an important ingredient in shaking off the deep-rooted cultural biases that this city has toward low-rise housing. Since pretty much the beginning, low-rises houses with backyards have been seen as noble, whereas apartment buildings have been viewed as disease-breeding tenements liable to morally corrupt even the best of intentions.
This is one of the reasons why we created the two-storey House Collection of suites at Junction House and why One Delisle is almost entirely formed by its outdoor spaces (both balconies and terraces). We wanted to celebrate multi-family living.
At the same time, I really like this adaptive reuse proposal by Peter Song over at BDP Quadrangle. The idea is to allow people to infill their balconies with more interior space so that our existing stock of housing can become more flexible
https://vimeo.com/329987418
The 2021 Pritzker Prize was just awarded to French architects Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal. One of the most notable aspects of their work is their appreciation for and reuse of existing structures, which, as many of you will know, is far more sustainable than building new. A good example of this approach is their Grand Parc project in Bordeaux, where they transformed three existing tower blocks and 530 dwellings.
What's fascinating about this project is how they added balconies and winter gardens to structures that previously didn't have any. I also like how there are two layers of outdoors spaces. There's the more enclosed winter garden portion and then there's an open air balcony-type component, which also happens to be a more public-facing space where you might actually run into some of your neighbors.
If you can't see the video above, click here. Once you've had a chance to watch the video, I would be curious to know: Are these spaces that you would like to live in?

It would be a great way to capture additional space within our existing stock of buildings, and I think it would be pretty interesting to see what people ultimately choose when given a binary option: more interior space or more outdoor space. Maybe it would help provide some clarity to the great balcony debate.
Technically, it is my understanding that this is entirely doable.
In the middle of writing this post I shot an email over to one of the best structural engineers in the city (James Cranford, Principal at Stephenson Engineering), and he confirmed that strength is no problem. Typically balconies are designed to accommodate more load than the suites. The thing we'd have to look at is slab deflection, since this is not usually limited on balconies.
The greater challenge is likely to be the overall coordination.
In some cities this sort of thing happens all the time on an ad hoc basis. People just do it and the end result is likely more functional, but the building elevations end up looking pretty schizophrenic. Here you'd need each condominium corporation to bless the change (since the envelope is a common element). And people would also need to agree on what design(s) should be used across the building.
It would require some work, but I think Peter's idea is a really good one. What do you think?

It would be a great way to capture additional space within our existing stock of buildings, and I think it would be pretty interesting to see what people ultimately choose when given a binary option: more interior space or more outdoor space. Maybe it would help provide some clarity to the great balcony debate.
Technically, it is my understanding that this is entirely doable.
In the middle of writing this post I shot an email over to one of the best structural engineers in the city (James Cranford, Principal at Stephenson Engineering), and he confirmed that strength is no problem. Typically balconies are designed to accommodate more load than the suites. The thing we'd have to look at is slab deflection, since this is not usually limited on balconies.
The greater challenge is likely to be the overall coordination.
In some cities this sort of thing happens all the time on an ad hoc basis. People just do it and the end result is likely more functional, but the building elevations end up looking pretty schizophrenic. Here you'd need each condominium corporation to bless the change (since the envelope is a common element). And people would also need to agree on what design(s) should be used across the building.
It would require some work, but I think Peter's idea is a really good one. What do you think?
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