Review: Shaping Canadian Modernity: Toronto's City Hall and Square Competition and Its Legacy

Abstract

Book Review| June 01 2016 Review: Shaping Canadian Modernity: Toronto's City Hall and Square Competition and Its Legacy Shaping Canadian Modernity: Toronto's City Hall and Square Competition and Its Legacy Paul H. Cocker Architecture Gallery, Ryerson University, Toronto 1 September–9 October 2015 Howard Shubert Howard Shubert Toronto Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians (2016) 75 (2): 241–243. https://doi.org/10.1525/jsah.2016.75.2.241 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Howard Shubert; Review: Shaping Canadian Modernity: Toronto's City Hall and Square Competition and Its Legacy. Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 1 June 2016; 75 (2): 241–243. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/jsah.2016.75.2.241 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentJournal of the Society of Architectural Historians Search It has become such an accustomed trope to view Viljo Revell's Toronto City Hall and vast, open civic square (1958–65) not only as the symbolic image by which Toronto is recognized but also as representative of its most cherished values that it is possible to forget how remarkable an accomplishment this is for any building and how unlikely an achievement it must have seemed for Toronto in 1958. Like a pair of long pants that a youth may wear upon maturity, Revell designed a city hall that the city might grow into. That Toronto would live up to the promise of its city hall was understood by the competition jurors, who envisioned that the building would mold the city around it even as future surrounding construction would serve as a rectilinear foil for its dynamic, curving forms. Today, Toronto is one of the world's most vibrant, multicultural cities. But in... You do not currently have access to this content.