In The News

In other glamorous hotel news, Saudi billionaire Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal's Kingdom Holding investment group announced that it has purchased Four Seasons Toronto, for US$200 million.
 
"'The transaction was funded by a $130 million mortgage loan while $70 million came from (the company's) own resources,' Hazem al-Dosari, a Kingdom Holding Company spokesman, told AFP."
 
"The Four Seasons Toronto features 259 guest rooms, including 42 suites," reports Gulf News.
 
"The prince, in his late 50s, has holdings in Citibank and Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Forbes magazine listed him last year as the 26th richest person in the world with assets of $19.6 billion."
 
Read the full story here
Original source: Gulf News

Writing in Australia's Herald Sun newspaper, Brian Johnston took a tour of Toronto and liked what he saw, especially the Distillery District.
 
"Thoughtful renovations have made this an energetic place of art galleries and bars, boutique breweries and restaurants that's especially lively in summer, when outdoor fairs and farmers' markets take place here," writes Johnston. "Visitors will also want to spend plenty of time wandering around Harbourfront on the shores of Lake Ontario, once a shipping and warehouse terminus."
 
"Over the past 20 years, urban renewal has turned this into an agreeable district for culture and recreation where locals and tourists come to cycle, walk, shop, eat or simply pass the time. Queen's Quay Terminal now houses speciality shops and eateries and the Power Plant is a space for contemporary sculpture and art."
 
Read the full story here
Original source: Herald Sun

Tech website Mashable covered Toronto's Startup Weekend this month, a 54-hour competition to create a startup from scratch. The concept originated in Colorado five years ago; now the Toronto event is one of more than 350 startup weekends worldwide.
 
"Nearly 300 lanyard-clad entrepreneurs squeeze together on rows of plastic chairs to watch fellow hopefuls pitch their way to the top. Under the intense scrutiny of spotlights and judges, they present three days of blood, sweat and tech in just five minutes."
 
"'We have an amazing community here,' Chris Eben, Startup Weekend Toronto's lead organizer, told Mashable on Sunday. 'Just as far as activity's concerned, the way the ecosystem has exploded in the last few years has been amazing.'"
 
Read the full story here
Original source: Mashable

On the Indian news and analysis website DNA, Ahmedabad-based architect Yatin Pandya writes on how the Eaton Centre manages to overcome many of the problems—sterility, homogeneity—typically faced by malls.
 
"Toronto's Eaton Centre has proven to be one of the successful examples which has not only induced life within an indoor environment but has also been an interesting case in achieving public benefits from private development initiatives."
 
"The Eaton Centre case seems to offer evidence of how various interests i.e. citizen's, administrator's as well as that of developer's can be served without necessarily compromising on public objectives. The development of Eaton Centre has been a story of negotiations."
 
Pandya points out that, before it was built in the late 1970s, the area was known for its body shops and massage parlours, but has now "come to become the most visited landmark in Canada, surpassing even Niagara Falls and the CN Tower like attractions. When now we are emulating mall typologies in urban centres of Indiam can we derive our lessons from Eaton centre, to turn them into humane, participatory and pluralistic civic nodes rather than mega shop structures."
 
Read the full story here 
Original source: DNA

The casino industry south of the border has taken note of the proposal for a casino in downtown Toronto. The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports on the Ernst & Young study on the impact of a major casino here.
 
"'It was noted that several characteristics of Toronto would make the city an attractive locale for international high rollers including the lack of taxes levied on gambling wins, the number of direct flights from Asian countries and the local demographics and family connections to Asia,' Ernst & Young officials wrote in the executive summary of its Commercial Casino in Toronto Study, which was researched on behalf of the city."
 
"Singapore approved two casinos back in 2005, after much heated debate, as a means to drive tourism. Gaming was limited to a small portion of the two integrated resorts, but Singapore could surpass the Strip as the world's second-largest gaming market behind Macau by the end of this year. Toronto is following the Singapore model, and the debate is expected to be equally as furious. No casino will happen without the support of Toronto and its citizens."
 
Read the full story here
Source: Las Vegas Review-Journal

Toronto's handwringing over how to manage graffiti—some of it art, some of it an eyesore—has attracted attention from other jurisdictions dealing with the same problem.

The online edition of the UK's Art Newspaper reports on the creation of Toronto's five-member Graffiti Panel, which met for the first time on November 2.
 
"The first session was contentious but civil, with panel members facing off against property owners who were appealing notices of violation for 'markings' on their buildings. 'Even if it's Picasso, you're not allowed to paint on other people's walls,' says Elyse Parker, a city official who is leading Toronto's crackdown on graffiti."
 
"At the same time, the city has begun to open its eyes to street art, realising that there is something of merit in the best of it. Toronto's council has already given its blessing to what is known as Graffiti Alley, a series of colourful backstreets only a few blocks from City Hall. David Liss, the director of Toronto's Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, who also has some background in street art, applauds the move. 'Certainly the Queen West Alley has some great work, so I'm in favour of preservation,' he says. 'Maybe they could start marketing it as a tourist attraction.'"
 
Read the full story here
Original source: The Art Newspaper

This month, in conjunction with a focus on Canadian music in its November paper edition, the website of UK-based DIY magazine interviews Kieran Roy. The co-owner of the record label, Arts & Crafts, home to artists like Stars, Feist and Broken Social Scene, Roy talks about how being a great Canadian label is about being a great international label.
 
"Is being perceived as being a Canadian label something that's important to you?"
"On one hand, we've very very proud of our heritage, it's maybe less so about being specifically Canadian—there's a great scene that's been established here in Toronto and we're very very proud to be part of that. And we do go over and above to service home based music. That said, from day one, we said, how can we be the best Canadian label? And that's by being the best international label. Our artists are finding audiences around the world, which was a really differentiator from some of the other Canadian labels at the time."
 
Read the full story here 
Original source: Thisisfakediy.co.uk

In the UK's Financial Times last month, Tyler Brûlé, editor-in-chief of Monocle magazine and founder of Wallpaper* magazine, wrote about Toronto's current identity crisis.
 
"Last week marked something of a homecoming when I touched down in Toronto to open a new bureau and shop for Monocle, and an office for my branding agency," writes Brûlé. "While I've been back to Toronto often (two trips a year on average) since I packed up and headed to Britain, the signing of a lease, hiring staff and hosting a party all signalled that I'd somehow 'come home.'"
 
Taking note of downtown's many new condo towers, as well as the sprawling suburbs, Brûlé wondered if it was time for Toronto to measure itself against something other than its U.S. peers.  
 
"For the moment, Toronto doesn't want to focus on any single direction. There's much talk of being world class but, as with any city, the proof is on the street. Fortunately, there's plenty going on at pavement level—particularly with small-scale start-ups, well-designed cafés and tasty restaurants. The city has the good fortune of being one of the few North American cities that not only boasts a vibrant downtown but also has lively neighbourhoods. Off busy boulevards with low-rise commercial buildings are hundreds of tree-lined residential streets with higgledy-piggledy architecture and front lawns. There are walkable neighbourhoods connected by buses and streetcars. There are lots of independent shops and, most importantly, there is real life on the street. It was this dense, green and well-serviced vision of Toronto that first attracted urbanist Jane Jacobs, and it's still one of the city's strongest calling cards."
 
Read the full story here
Original source: Financial Times

This month Bloomberg Businessweek magazine followed Mississauga wunderkind Yoonseo Kang along on a trip to  Maysville, Missouri, where Kang is participating in a Thiel Fellowship.
 
"When Yoonseo Kang left home at 18 earlier this year, his hometown paper in Mississauga, Ontario, wrote a story about the event. Kang had not accomplished something significant as a young go-getter. Far from it. He had simply decided to skip going to college—a move that baffled his family and townsfolk."
 
"Kang is a Thiel Fellow, which means that the foundation of Peter Thiel, the billionaire co-founder of PayPal (eBay) and prominent Silicon Valley investor, will pay him $100,000 over the next two years to avoid college. Thiel loves to challenge the status quo and has funded 20 Fellows, betting that the group of brainy kids will go out into the world and do big things."
 
It turns out that Kang is now on a farm in rural Missouri. The compound—known as the Factor e Farm—is the subject of a feature story I wrote this week for Bloomberg Businessweek. Kang, along with a dozen or so like-minded people, has set to work building 50 tools that man would need to start a civilization from the ground up. So they're working on such things as bread ovens, brick presses, saws, tractors, and bulldozers and then posting videos and schematics online about how to build these objects. The end goal is sort of an open-source attack on the traditional companies that manufacture our fundamental machines."
 
Read the full story here 
Original source: Bloomberg Businessweek

Whatever you think of Conrad Black's guilt or innocence, his humility or hubris, his Canadian-ness or his renunciation of his country of origin, the disgraced media baron certainly knows how to get people talking. He remains one of Toronto's best known global citizens.
 
In the UK's The Guardian, writer Tom Bower is not convinced by all of Black's blustering.
 
"Black earned early remission from a Florida jail for good conduct and returned at the beginning of this year to his only remaining home in Toronto—he previously had four," writes Bower. "Now he yearns to resume his life in London—not least because Canadians have shown loathing for the man who churlishly gave up his Canadian citizenship to accept a British peerage, and most are outraged that a British crook should be allowed to resume life in his Toronto mansion."
 
Bower suggests that the evidence against Black outweighs his protestations. (During one round of defensiveness, Black called a British TV host a "priggish, gullible British fool.")
 
"Throughout his life, Black has fought his critics. First, when he stole and sold exam papers at school. Then when he bought Argus, Canada's biggest conglomerate, and was accused of mismanaging the pension fund. And more recently for his conduct during a takeover bid for an American mining company that a US judge declared to be dishonest."
…
 
"After each case, Black cursed his critics as malicious and defended himself as a pillar of probity. His visit to London is just the latest in the familiar Black roadshow: 'Trust Honest Conrad—the scion of respectability.' The fireworks and his Wagnerian damnation of his critics is a familiar accompaniment to a tested performance."
 
Read the full story here
Original source: The Guardian

In a city so full of construction, a pedestrian has to wonder: Do construction sites have to be ugly, uncomfortable places to walk by?
 
While it erects its new student learning centre, Ryerson University has decided to use a new, prettier kind of scaffolding, made of recycled steel and resembling an unfurling umbrella, reports British Columbia's Tyee website.
 
"Designer Young Choi, architect Andres Cortes and Canadian structural engineer Sarrah Khan invented a design to maximize sidewalk space while beautifying the construction site."
 
"Arching struts hold the structure up while translucent plastic panels allow for 90 per cent of natural light onto the sidewalk, the inventors say."
 
"The structure has vertical poles on either side holding it up, which leaves plenty of open space in between, unlike the criss-crossing metal poles used in conventional scaffolding."
 
"The idea to introduce Urban Umbrella to Toronto came from Coun. Kristyn Wong-Tam, who first saw the design in an architecture magazine."
 
Read the full story here
Original source: The Tyee

Toronto's waterfront has been named as one of the 21 Smart Communities of the Year and selected as semi-finalist for the 2013 Intelligent Community of the Year award, reports the Daily Commercial News and Construction Record website.
 
"Presented by the Intelligent Community Forum (ICF), the Smart21 Community recognition is the first step in the international 2013 Intelligent Community of the Year award process honouring communities or regions with a documented strategy for creating a local prosperity and inclusion using broadband and information technology to attract leading-edge businesses, build skills, generate economic growth, and improve the delivery of government services. This year the ICF is focusing on the relationship between employment and innovation."
…
 
"Toronto's designated waterfront was selected largely as the result of the leadership demonstrated by Waterfront Toronto's intelligent community initiative. This program will transform new waterfront neighbourhoods into intelligent communities that revolutionize how residents receive services, promote economic growth and development, and enable innovation through an advanced telecommunications network."
 
Read the full story here
Original source: Daily Commercial News and Construction Record

The Winnipeg Free Press writes about the unusual way the work of painter Frida Kahlo and her husband Diego Rivera are displayed at the new exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario. In Frida and Diego: Passion, Politics and Painting, the curators mixed the couple's work together—80 pieces in all—and included photos, making sure the show told a clear narrative about the couple.
 
"Carlos Phillips Olmedo, director of the Museo Dolores Olmedo Patino in Mexico City, which has a large collection of works by Kahlo and Rivera, noted he had never seen their paintings arranged in such a way."
 
"'It's funny Carlos would say it's unusual to mingle them because I can't really imagine how you'd tell their story without doing so,' says Teitelbaum."
 
"'I guess the more conventional way is to say, "Here's Diego in Paris, here's Frida's self-portraits, here's Diego's images of workers" and separate them that way. We thought it was more interesting to have the (works) talk to each other about their ideas, in particular the moments in their evolution.'"
 
Read the whole story here
Original source: Winnipeg Free Press

This month, MyETVmedia.com interviewed starchitect Daniel Libeskind, who was in town for the topping off of his 205-metre-tall LTower.
 
"To design a successful tower, it's not just to design a tall tower—and this happens to be a very, very tall tower—it's really to create a sustainable tower," says Libeskind. "Which means how it deals with energy consumption, what materials you use. Of course, Toronto has wide ranges of weather from very, very cold to very, very warm. How do you use the right materials for such a building? But beyond that, it is a building that also has to have an identity. It's not just a picture postcard view of a tall building from a distance. How does the building feel from the ground level? What kind of amenities does it offer to the public?"
 
Watch the whole interview here
Original source: Myetvmedia.com on YouTube

New York magazine visited Toronto as one of its 2012 winter getaways. It was like they never left the five boroughs. 
 
"Toronto is fast becoming a mini–New York: Trump opened a hotel there, and a new Four Seasons with a Daniel Boulud restaurant debuted earlier this month. David Chang also joined the fun—introducing not one but four restaurants inside a giant glass cube. There’s even a new fashion week and a Soho House in a city with no Soho to speak of, plus plenty of microneighborhoods (five Chinatowns!) and amusement-packed day trips (like Niagara Falls, for starters) just a short car ride away."
 
For activities, the editors suggested the trampoline-floored-and-walled Sky Zone and the CN Tower's EdgeWalk, as well as buying a six-pack of Pilsner from Steam Whistle Brewing, "a twelve-year-old brewery whose output rivals that of craft-obsessed Brooklyn."

Read the full story here
Original source: New York magazine