Lantern of Love and Peace

 

Location: Nathan Phillips Square

Date photo taken: 14 December 2023

This year the Cavalcade of Lights in Nathan Phillips Square includes a number of softly glowing Chinese lanterns. Most are large spheres adorned with flower patterns, like the ones pictured here, but there is also a much larger, more intricate dragon boat. The lanterns were hand crafted by artisans from Zigong in China’s Sichuan province. They're presented at City Hall thanks to a partnership with Woodside Square Shopping Centre in Scarborough. Last year they hosted a large outdoor Lantern Festival and they've brought it back this year. While you can visit during the day, the lanterns are lit from 4:30 to 9 pm daily. 

Metropolis

 

Location: City Hall

Date photo taken: 1 April 2015

Just inside the main doors of Toronto City Hall, on the east wall, is this large scale work by David Partridge. It's really worth a visit. This image shows the central portion, and it really doesn't do the piece justice. 

The winner of an art competition held in 1974, this "nailie", as it is sometimes called, is the artist's interpretation of a great city, or metropolis, with its central core, its ravines, and its suburbs. It's called a nailie because it's constructed of over 100,000 individual nails, made of different materials and hammered to differing depths. The effect elicits comparisons to both the topography of a city, and to the individuals that inhabit it. As an added bonus, the durable materials allow for perhaps greater interaction than a piece of public art would normally afford. William Denton, as part of "Listening to Art", even drops a coin down through the nails and records the sound as it pings its way to the bottom (jump to about 10:50 to catch the sound).

Nathan Phillips' sundial

 

Location: Nathan Phillips Square, north west corner

Date photo taken: 1 November 2019

While not immediately obvious, at least to me, this sculptural piece on the north west corner of Nathan Phillips Square is a sundial. Designed by engineer and geophysicist G.R. Johnson, it's six feet in diameter and made of brass. It was a gift to the people of the city from former mayor and namesake of the square, Nathan Phillips. He served the city as alderman for 28 years and then as mayor for eight more, from 1955 to 1962. The international design competition held for the new city hall, which sits adjacent to the Square, was undertaken during his tenure and he was still in office when construction began. Phillips wanted to show his gratitude for being allowed to serve, and he wanted his gift to be something that would be artistic, unusual, functional and permanent and this sundial was the result. It was presented in April 1969.

Snapshot - Queen Street, west of Yonge

Location: Queen Street, looking west from Yonge
Date photo taken: 21 December 2018

This short stretch of Queen Street West is seeing its fair share of changes lately. In addition to the dramatic new skybridge which opened in 2017 replacing the original one installed back in 1979, this image includes glimpses of two very different renovation projects. In the centre background is the 33-storey building formerly known as the Simpson Tower. Designed by John B. Parkin, a firm often referred to as legendary for its modernist designs, it was completed in 1969. The update has removed the original bronze-tinted glazing and thick concrete bands that ringed the building, updating the look along with the energy efficiency of the building and removing a distinctive piece of history from the city's skyline. 

In the right foreground of the picture is the construction scaffolding surrounding 2 Queen Street West, which is a very different renovation story. This building, which has been covered whole or in part by cladding since the 1960s is now being restored back to its 1885 glory. For more detail and some great pictures, check out this article.