80 Book

The History, Present, and Future of 80 Bloor St. West

Introduction by Larry Wayne Richards

WHY 80?

Assembling this book on the 18-storey office tower at 80 Bloor Street West in Toronto's Yorkville district has been a pleasure. The site and the building have fascinating histories, the understated architecture commands respect, and the place as a whole presents an engaging palette for speculating on the future. As contributor Ted Kesik later reveals, this 37-year-old commercial building is facing various aesthetic and performance challenges, and it seems predictable that 80 will change significantly during the next decade. A key intention of this book is to provide an informed framework for discussion about imaginative, viable next steps.

My involvement with 80 started in 2007 when Hong Kong-based Kin Yeung, whose family owns the property, encouraged me to use the site and building as the context for a graduate level architectural design course that I was teaching at the University of Toronto. Using 80 as the subject matter for the course caused me to want to learn more about the history of the site and the building's life over nearly four decades. All of this was reinforced when Kin Yeung offered me the opportunity in 2009 to establish an "East meets West" experimental design centre and gallery at 80. Called WORKshop, the centre is one of my "homes", and I have come to feel very much a part of the lively and diverse 80 community.

These rewarding academic and professional encounters with 80 are circumscribed by a more general set of preoccupations related to the particular property: the legacy of architect Mies van der Rohe, the importance of making great streets, and the ongoing generation of "idea-places."

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