Metro Toronto writer Luke Simcoe asks “Why do condo towers in Toronto all look the same?”

The reason, says Daniels Faculty Lecturer and architectural historian and critic Hans Ibelings, who Simcoe spoke to in pursuit of an answer, has to do with the real estate market, which views condos as financial investments rather than homes.

Ibelings and Daniels Faculty Lecturer Alex Josephson, explored Toronto’s ubiquitous glass towers in their book Rise and Sprawl: The Condominiumization of Toronto.

Writes Simcoe:

Ibelings’s motto is that “there’s a solution to everything” and the latter half of the book lays out 11 options for adding diversity to Toronto’s skyline.

Among them are suggestions to eliminate condo balconies, add more public housing to condominiums, financial incentives for better design and a call to “play” with the podiums at the foot of tall buildings.
 

Read the full article in Metro Toronto.

For more information on Rise and Sprawl: The Condominiumization of Toronto, visit the architecture observer.

Ibelings is the author of a number of books, including European Architecture Since 1890 (2011), published in English, Dutch, German, and Russian, and Supermodernism: Architecture in the Age of Globalization (1998 and 2003), published in English, Dutch, Spanish, French, and Italian.