? Under the General's Orders (Huang Fei Hong theme) | Main | My Mythos ?
August 15, 2006
38-23-36
Danwei TV's Jeremy Goldkorn and his hard-hitting hard-hat interview up-and-coming Chinese architect, Ma Yansong. Formerly with Zaha Hadid, Ma Yansong now works through his own design practice, MAD Ltd.. While his name has yet to develop Hadid's cache, his work is already familiar to Toronto-based Flea-readers through his winning design for Toronto's Absolute Tower project. His forthcoming "Marilyn Monroe Building" is set to make Mississauga much more interesting than it has any right to be.
Ma Yansong has an Alex McQueen earnestness about him. Great shoes, too.
Posted by Ghost of a flea at August 15, 2006 08:44 AM
Comments
Welllllll... one nice-looking condo tower is not going to suddenly reverse decades of entirely conventional (and ridiculously fugly) urban planning. They would need about twelve of those towers to make on forget the horror that is the Mississauga City Hall / Maximum-Security Penitentiary. And let's not even get into the aesthetic crapulence of the tightly-knit condo-cluster that huddles around the abomination that is Square One.
Posted by: Chris Taylor ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.ghostofaflea.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at August 15, 2006 11:04 AM
I could not agree more. Ma Yansong and his team apparently found out about the design contest on-line; I would be astonished if any of them had heard of the place beforehand. I suppose there is a vague hope this tower will act as a catalyst for 905 architecture but I will not be holding my breath.
That said, I was cycling up the Don and around East York Town Centre over the weekend. I quite like the cyclopean aspect of the towers over the valley. There is a definite Logan's Run surreality to the place. Also, Tim Horton's.
Posted by: Ghost of a flea at August 15, 2006 01:19 PM
I am going to miss the Don Valley trail system when I move to the west end at the end of the month. It's a nice little scenic expressway to downtown for east-end cyclists, but a bit of a distance from the High Park area.
Posted by: Chris Taylor at August 15, 2006 02:37 PM
High Park should be some compensation. The Annex is not terribly convenient to either trail system so it is always a bit of an adventure just getting to the start of my ride.
Posted by: Ghost of a flea at August 15, 2006 05:44 PM
Actually the Annex is my ultimate destination, someday. It has those retro-cool luxury Georgian townhomes (200-300 Walmer and 300-400 Spadina). Those babies scream "Hello REGENCY!"; I would kill to live in one. They are probably the coolest residential architecture in the city.
Unfortunately they cost just shy of a million bucks, but they do sport 2500 sq ft. I'm trying to think of a get-rich-quick scheme so that I can buy one before I'm 80.
Posted by: Chris Taylor at August 16, 2006 09:49 AM
And talk about handy for the Toronto Archives!
Posted by: Ghost of a flea at August 16, 2006 09:50 AM
Post a comment
Thanks for signing in. Now you can comment. (sign out)
(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)
