Brandon Donnelly

Daily insights for city builders, delivered every morning at 6 AM ET. I’m Brandon Donnelly — a Toronto-based real estate developer and founder of Globizen. I’ve been writing here since 2013.

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Tag: design

  • Getting older

    Yesterday I promised that today’s post would be less sad. I am sticking to that promise, but I am also sticking with a somewhat similar theme: getting older.

    Fast Company recently published an interview with New York-based architect Matthias Hollwich. The topic is aging and the kinds of spaces that we have created for people as they age: retirement communities, nursing homes, and so on.

    The reason this is getting airtime right now is because Matthias has just published a book on the topic called, New Aging: Live smarter now to live better forever. 

    image

    But this isn’t a new focus. Matthias actually taught at the University of Pennsylvania while I was there and I remember his design studio being focused on this topic. (I wasn’t in his studio, unfortunately.)

    The sound bite that I really like from the interview is this one:

    “I think the biggest flaw is that it’s age segregation. You take all of the people who are above 75, 85, or 95, depending on what type of environment it is, and put them into one place. And then you’re just surrounded by old people, people who have social and physical challenges, and you’re not around the vibrancy of a multi-age environment, which is something that we experience all life long. I think that is something that society really has to rethink.”

    Not only do I agree with him, but I think it exemplifies one of the things that I love about architecture. The idea that the way things are done today is usually not some sort of universal truth. Instead, everything can be questioned, rethought, and reinvented for the better. It’s a very entrepreneurial way of operating and I don’t think that parallel, between entrepreneurs and architects, is drawn or leveraged nearly enough.

    I also don’t think we’ve given enough design consideration to this topic of aging. I mean, why can’t the spaces that people end their lives in be as (or more) sexy and enjoyable as (or than) the spaces they live the rest of their lives in? That’s what I want when I’m 95.

    So kudos to Mattias and the rest of the team at Hollwich Kushner (his firm) for caring about and working on this. 

    Book image from Matthias Hollwich’s Facebook.

  • Zaha Hadid dies at 65

    Today the world lost one of the most important architects of our time: Zaha Hadid. She was only 65.

    But the thing about architects, particularly famous “starchitects” such as Zaha Hadid, is that when they pass, they leave behind a rich legacy through their buildings. So probably the best way to write a sad post like this one is to just share her work. Courtesy of the Guardian (she was an Iraqi-British architect after all), here are: Zaha Hadid’s 10 best buildings in pictures.

    I did, however, want to add a few more thoughts. 

    When I found out about her death I was sitting in the St. Lawrence Market having lunch. I had my phone out and the news had completely flooded my social feeds. I immediately started messaging a few people because, well, she was Zaha Hadid – a figure you don’t go through architecture school not talking about. But it also hit me because she was only 65. This is the age that some people retire at. It’s the age that some people work their entire lives for.

    Whenever this happens I can’t help but think to myself: Why are we so afraid of risks? (I know that this is part of the reason.) And are we even focused on the right risks? So many of us are afraid of sticking our neck out and potentially failing, and yet we all have an expiry date, which means there’s the big risk of potentially dying without having done all the things we want to do. Logically, this should probably be the greater risk.

    I realize that this may sound a bit trite, but it feels appropriate. Zaha Hadid took big risks. Her architecture was way out there and that meant she struggled early on. Not only was she a female in a male dominated industry (she was the first woman to win the Pritzker Prize), but her work carved out an entirely new architectural language. She embedded technology into the world of architecture – something we talk a lot about on this blog.

    The sad thing about death – besides the obvious death part – is that it can take someone dying to remind you of the shortness of life. So to end, I’m going to leave you all with an excerpt from a recent essay by Paul Graham aptly called, Life is Short.

    “If life is short, we should expect its shortness to take us by surprise. And that is just what tends to happen. You take things for granted, and then they’re gone. You think you can always write that book, or climb that mountain, or whatever, and then you realize the window has closed. The saddest windows close when other people die. Their lives are short too. After my mother died, I wished I’d spent more time with her. I lived as if she’d always be there. And in her typical quiet way she encouraged that illusion. But an illusion it was. I think a lot of people make the same mistake I did.”

    I promise that tomorrow’s post will be less sad.

  • Technology x Business x Design

    John Maeda – Design Partner at venture capital firm KPCB – recently
    published the second and 2016 edition of his #DesignInTech
    Report    . I shared his first one almost exactly a year ago.

    His core thesis is that we are heading towards a world where technology,
    business, and design become closely integrated – in school, in business, and so
    on. Throughout the report he looks at the increasing impact that design and
    designers are having within the startup ecosystem.

    Here are a few verbatim bullet points:

    – Design isn’t just about beauty; it’s about market relevance and meaningful
    results.

    – 36% of the top 25 funded startups are co-founded by
    designers, up from 20% in 2015.

    – The general word “design” will come to mean less as we
    will start to qualify the specific kind of design we mean.

    – Currently design education lags the technology industry’s
    needs for data-oriented, coding enabled graduates with business acumen.

    – We must consciously invest in education to develop a
    more hybrid perspective on creativity in the 21st century:
    Technology x Business x Design.

    – President Obama’s signing of ESSA (Every Student
    Succeeds Act) into law in 2015 is a positive sign: by turning STEM into STEAM (adding Art) in K-12 education as a US priority.

    As somebody who studied design (architecture), business,
    and computer science (briefly, before switching to architecture), I probably
    have a bit of a biased view here. But to the extent that I can be objective, I
    really see this as the future. I am a big supporter of the transformation from STEM to STEAM.

    Below is a quote that Maeda uses to end his report, which I will also use to end this post:

    “Engineers are efficient problem solvers. Business people think short term. Designer want things to be elegant and beautiful. All three need to create collaboration and harmony, and honor the value each other brings. There needs to be a new kind of ‘multi-dimensional’ approach to design that is yet to be invented.” –Linda Holliday

  • Fun Friday: Saltz, Zurich

    Earlier this month a new restaurant – called Saltz – opened up in Zurich’s historic Dolder Grand Hotel. (The building was originally built in the late 19th century, but an extension was added in 2008 by architecture firm Foster + Partners.) 

    Designed by artist Rolf Sachs, the 280 square meter restaurant is fitted out with an eclectic mix of unusual materials: neon, salt, rock, climbing rope, felt, and so on. And everything is intended to relate back to Swiss culture in some way.

    The interiors caught my attention as I was browsing through the press release this morning, so I have decided to post a few photos. All of the photography is by Nico Schaerer, courtesy of The Dolder Grand and artist Rolf Sachs.

  • Easier said than done

    Earlier this week I saw the Chief Planner of Toronto, Jennifer Keesmaat, tweet this out:

    //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    I responded with the below quote retweet because I figured I should probably devote a blog post to this topic and not just a tweet.

    //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Now, I don’t know for sure, but I am guessing that her tweet was in response to the criticism from architects and developers that Toronto’s design guidelines are creating homogenous architectural outcomes. Some people – and I’ve written about this before on ATC – believe they’re too prescriptive.

    So today I’d like to talk about why playing creatively within the guidelines/zoning envelope, particularly at the mid-rise scale, is a lot easier said than done.

    Generally speaking, the value of land is dependent on what you can do with it or, in this case, what you can build on it.

    If all you could do was plant things on it, then the value of the land would be correlated with crop yields. If on the other hand you could build a building, it would be correlated, at least in theory, with the amount of space you could build and the rents you could charge for that space.

    Of course, this isn’t a perfect science. That’s why I said “in theory.”

    Landowners obviously want to maximize the value of their asset when it comes time to sell. So they, along with their brokers, will naturally try and stretch what is possible with the land. Why else do you think the best neighborhoods seem to magically grow new boundaries?

    When you combine this with the fact that mid-rise buildings are inherently less efficient to build and with the fact that their smaller size creates diseconomies of scale, it can be exceptionally difficult to find development sites where the numbers make any sort of financial sense. That is, even if you “maximize the envelope” and push rents or sale prices.

    So, with all due respect, not maximizing the envelope is almost unthinkable, unless you somehow managed to get a bargain on the land.

    Many of you will likely respond in the comments saying that all of this is simply a result of real estate developers being greedy capitalist pigs. But what we are talking about is no different than in any other competitive business environment. 

    Developers rent and sell products – albeit products that take an incredibly long time to make and bring to market. To make those products, there are a many costs, ranging from the cost of land to the cost of drawings. But hopefully within all of those numbers sits a profit margin that makes sense given the amount of work and risk that the developer has taken on. 

    Put differently, telling developers not to maximize the envelope is like telling a pizza maker to throw out 10-15% of her dough before she makes every pizza – even though she already (over)paid in full for the dough.

    If you’ve ever created a development pro forma, you’ll know that it’s not easy getting the numbers to work when you’re operating in a competitive market. This is not a knock against creative design. Trust me, I am a design snob. This is just business.

  • NO TOWER on Commercial Drive

    For the past week or so I’ve been seeing the proposed Kettle Boffo Project in Vancouver make the rounds online. Here’s a rendering of the project, which is located at Commercial Drive and Venables Street:

    image

    The reason it has been making the rounds is that a community group called NO TOWER (written in all caps) has come out in fierce opposition of the 5 to 12-storey building. They have over 3,500 signatures.

    As an outsider looking in, this is surprising. The scale of the project seems appropriate. The height roughly matches the existing building shown above to the right. It may even be lower. And the project will provide somewhere around 30 social housing units, as well as additional space for the Kettle Friendship Society non-profit, who are currently on the site. (Note: An application to the city hasn’t yet been made.)

    What this has me thinking about is the push and pull between bottom-up and top-down planning. 

    When architect Bjarke Ingels talks about his Dryline project in New York, he likes to refer to it as the love child of Robert Moses (top-down planning) and Jane Jacobs (bottom-up planning). In the case of this project, it’s because it’s a large infrastructure project that they are trying to root into the local neighborhoods. Makes sense.

    But this same thinking could also apply to overall city building. Local communities rightly have their own wants. But at the same time, cities need to be thinking about the overall. The challenge is finding that right balance.

    I would be curious to hear your thoughts on the Kettle Boffo Project in the comment section below – especially if you’re from Vancouver.

  • How things could be

    I have about 15 minutes before I need to head out for dinner, so I’m afraid that there won’t be much of an ATC post today. It has been a busy week.

    But given that this week was Bjarke Ingels’ talk in Toronto and many of us are pretty excited about his King West project, I thought I would share a video where he sketches and talks about architecture. Click here if you can’t see it below.

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIsIKv1lFZw?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

    I love the idea that architecture is about imagining how things could be. That’s how I feel about both architecture and real estate development.

  • The advantages of disadvantages in business and entrepreneurship

    This morning I stumbled upon an interesting book by Claudia Kalb called Andy Warhol Was a Hoarder: Inside the Minds of History’s Great Personalities. 

    I obviously haven’t read it yet, but I like the premise. The book examines 12 famous figures and makes the argument that each of them had some sort of mental health condition that aided them in their success. 

    Here is an excerpt from a recent Harvard Business Review interview with the author:

    “The most common one may be narcissism. Frank Lloyd Wright is a good example. He had classic narcissistic qualities — a sense of grandiosity, superiority, a huge and complete belief in his aesthetic sensibility, and disregard for architecture that did not live up to his standard. Narcissists also have an ability to be charming, and to lure people into their orbit. That’s obviously useful for an entrepreneur. The issue is that while these qualities may make you a good leader, they may not make you a winning boss. Employees often feel that narcissistic bosses are ruthless or lacking in empathy. Also, unlike people with depression or anxiety disorders, narcissists don’t suffer as much personally from their condition — but the way they behave can be much harder on the people around them.”

    Related to this topic is an emergent body of research that, more specifically, looks at the relationship between mental illness and entrepreneurship. And according to work done by professor Michael A. Freeman of UC-San Francisco and professor Sheri Johnson of Berkeley, there’s a significant relationship. 

    Below are two excerpts from a Washington Post article published last year.

    “Forty-nine percent of entrepreneurs surveyed reported at least one mental health condition. Nearly a third reported having two or more mental health issues, such as ADHD, bipolar disorder, depression, anxiety or substance use conditions. And half of the entrepreneurs who reported no mental-health conditions identified themselves as coming from families with a history of mental illness.”

    Why would these conditions be of any benefit to entrepreneurs?

    “For all of its ills, depression also brings empathy and creativity. Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi attempted suicide as teenagers. Uncommon levels of empathy can allow a businessman to better understand a customer’s need. And a creative mind won’t be satisfied on the corporate ladder, but instead in a fast-moving start-up where he or she can unfurl ideas and dreams.

    Individuals with ADHD naturally make decisions faster, are comfortable working independently and are more creative, necessary skills at a start-up. They’re likely to be bored working for someone else.”

    From a city building standpoint, all of this is quite relevant. Because for all of the focus on promoting innovation and entrepreneurship, we don’t seem to be talking about healthcare and mental health systems. And there’s clearly an argument to be made that the two are connected.

  • Ziggurats and gondolas

    Yesterday was an exciting day for Toronto city building announcements. 

    Firstly, Alex Bozikovic of the Globe and Mail published an exclusive preview of architect Bjarke Ingel’s plan for King Street West. Here’s a photo of the architectural model (it’s by Landon Speers):

    My favorite quote from the article is this one from Bjarke:

    “It would be sad if the most diverse city in the world had the most homogenous real estate.”

    It’s true.

    For those of you who emailed me about the details of his talk next week (there were a lot of you!), I believe I emailed you all back. But in case I missed some of you, you can click here for the event details. I should have included it in my original post about BIG, but I thought the event was already oversubscribed.

    Secondly, a private company called Bullwheel International Cable Car Corp. has just proposed to build a $20 to $25 million gondola running from Danforth Avenue (near Broadview subway station) to the Evergreen Brickworks. The total length would be almost 1 km and it, allegedly, wouldn’t require any public money. Here is their website.

    The timing of this proposal feels a bit serendipitous to me. When I was in Park City, Utah a few weeks ago, snowboarding right into the town and then taking their “town lifts” back up to traverse the mountain, I remember thinking to myself: what a wonderful form of transportation this is.

    Of course, Park City has giant mountains and Toronto, unfortunately, does not. But we do have spectacular ravines and a spectacular institution known as the Evergreen Brickworks.

    But one of the challenges with our ravines is that they can be a bit hidden – particularly for visitors to the city. Part of this is because we are trying to figure out the right balance between natural preservation and active use. But that’s one of the things that makes this proposal so intriguing. It’s a way to celebrate our ravines and natural landscape, without physically encroaching it.

    Here’s a map of the proposed gondola path:

    What do you think about these announcements?

  • For Sale: Breuer House II

    image

    Breuer House II is currently on the market in New Canaan, Connecticut for $5.85 million. The house has 4 bedrooms, 4 full bathrooms, and 2 half bathrooms. It is 4,777 square feet and sits on 3.11 acres of land.

    Originally built in 1951, the house was designed by the Hungarian-born, Bauhaus-trained, and Harvard-teaching modernist architect, Marcel Breuer. It served as their family home until 1975, after which time it was sold and almost demolished. Thankfully it was instead purchased, restored, and expanded (by another Harvard architect).

    Marcel Breuer was a member of what is known as the Harvard Five. They were a group of five architects who either taught at or went to the Harvard Graduate School of Design and who had moved out to New Canaan to build experimental modern homes starting in the 1940s. Homes like Philip Johnson’s Glass House.

    Seeing the Breuer House II listed for sale this morning reminded me of how cool it must have been at the time for a bunch of radical architects to move out to a sleepy New England town and start building modernist boxes. I’m sure it pissed off more than a few people.

    Does anyone know of anything similar to this happening today? 🙂

    Image from Modern Homes Survey