If you go to the south end of the Eaton Centre, on levels 2 or 3, you'll already be able to catch a glimpse of what the new Eaton Centre will look like once it's completed in the spring of 2012.
If you haven't totally succumbed to the
Gruen transfer by the time you make it up there, you'll notice the new swirled floors, the glass handrails with stainless steel finials, and the new tiling on the columns.
Anyone who's been to the 33-year-old mall since Canada Day will have noticed the scaffolding, the closure of the north food court and, as of last Thursday, the big new
Victoria's Secret shop, the first of several new tenants the Eaton Centre has signed, including
Richtree, which will take over the south food court and turn it into a single restaurant.
The galleria -- or the main open space in the mall presided over by
Michael Snow's geese -- will be getting a comprehensive overhaul, "literally from top to bottom," according to the mall's general manager, Cadillac Fairview's Susan Allen. "Floors, washrooms, existing handrails, upgrading all elevators and escalators, and a new retail lobby entrance for the 250 Yonge office tower." She says that bit of the three-phase operation will be completed by October, 2011, a month after the new north food court -- which will no longer be called a food court and will include non-disposable plates, glasses and cutlery. The sole independent food court tenant, Sweet Rosie's, will not be returning after the re-design.
The new Richtree is slated to be finished by the spring of 2012.
The whole two-year project will cost $120 million. The lead architects are Q2, with
Giannone Petricone and
Gervais Harding working on the space formerly known as the north food court.
And in case you were concerned: "The geese are staying," Allen says. "
We're not touching the geese."
Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Susan Allen
Renderings: Giannone Petricone Associates (common area) and GHA Design Studio (food court).
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