Architecture & Design
One Bloor West, by Foster + Partners.
The Structure
The structure, worn on the outside.
Foster + Partners carries the load on the exterior — the same exoskeletal logic that gave London its Gherkin. Mega-columns climb unbroken from street to crown, braced at the corners by expressed diagonals. The reward is felt within: interiors freed of structure, opening to full-height glass and light that reaches deep into every residence.
The Material
Clad in champagne bronze.
The frame is no quiet thing. Vertical, horizontal and diagonal members are drawn across all four façades and finished in champagne bronze — a warm metal that catches the long light and gives the tower its identity from a mile off. This is craft made legible: the building’s structure is also its ornament.
The Crown
The view from the summit.
At the summit, a series of duplex penthouses opens to sweeping views across Lake Ontario and beyond — the rarest address in the country, held at the very top of it. To live here is to look out from the highest residential vantage Canada has ever offered.
1883, Kept
A century at the base of the future.
At street level, the brick of the William Luke Buildings — raised in 1883 — is preserved and woven into the new. The supertall does not erase its corner; it remembers it. A base with the patina of a century, beneath a tower with none of its weight.
The Life Within
Restraint, at altitude.
A collection of larger luxury residences is served by a sky lobby conceived for the way a few choose to live — spa and fitness, a library, formal rooms for entertaining, and a south-facing terrace open to the city. A five-star hotel occupies the lower floors, its service a presence felt rather than seen.
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