Old in new by Andrew Johnston on 500px

I was out for lunch with a colleague of mine yesterday afternoon and he said to me: “Brandon, I’m really surprised that you’re so interested in technology. It just seems so different compared to real estate and architecture.”

And I’ve certainly heard that exact same comment from a number of people before. But I don’t see it that way and here are a few reasons why.

The common thread for me between architecture, real estate development, and technology is that in all of these cases it is about imagining the way things could be in the future and then creating it. It’s about change. It’s about growth. It’s about creation. And I consider myself a builder in practically every sense of the word.

At the same time, each of these disciplines is about creating engaging spaces for people. Architects and real estate developers do it in the physical world, but many technology products strive to do exactly the same thing in the online world.

In fact, a couple of years ago I was fascinated to learn that Facebook has and continues to draw inspiration from many of the same books and philosophies that architects, planners, and developers rely on when it comes to creating engaging communities. The medium might be different, but it’s still about people.

Finally, as I’ve said many times before here on Architect This City, I think that the distinction between tech and non-tech companies and industries is quickly evaporating. Is Airbnb a tech company or a hospitality company? Is Uber a tech company or a taxi company? Pretty soon we’ll be saying that about many other industries.

Maybe it’s because I’ve always been interested in wading through the overlaps between disciplines, but this is just the way I see it.

Community by Evgeny Tchebotarev on 500px

Toronto is the condo capital of North America. For a number of years now, there have been more condos under construction in this city compared to any other in North America, including New York.

But recently the real estate community has become incredibly interested in building multi-family apartments (also known as purpose-built rental buildings). Which is why about 7 months ago I wrote a post called, Rise of rental.

It has been decades since Toronto built rental apartment buildings at any sort of scale. That means that our existing stock is generally pretty old and that condominiums – rented out by individual investors – have been almost exclusively fulfilling the need for rental apartments in this city.

But given that purpose-built rental apartments are on the rise, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about them and about the consumer perspective. 

And so here’s my question to you:

If you were looking for a place to rent, would it make a difference whether it was a condominium (rented out by an individual investor) or whether it was a professionally managed apartment building? You can assume that the suite itself is identical.

There are obviously many differences between both forms of tenure, but I’m curious to what extent that factors into the decision making process for consumers. It hasn’t really been an option in recent years, but that seems destined to change.

I hope we can have a discussion in the comment section below.

Here’s a stunning time-lapse video of Rio de Janeiro that was shot with an 80 megapixel camera. It was done by LA-based photographer Joe Capra.

[vimeo 119343870 w=500 h=281]

10328x7760 - A 10K Timelapse Demo from SCIENTIFANTASTIC on Vimeo.

Make sure you watch it full screen.

As far as videos and photos go, it’s probably as close as you’re going to get to actually being there. And if you’ve never been to Rio de Janeiro (which I haven’t), it’s a great way to see and understand the city’s built environment. I loved looking at all of the details.