Toronto-Dominion Centre

The Toronto-Dominion Centre is a large cluster of buildings in downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is home to the Toronto-Dominion Bank, as well as many other businesses. 21,000 people work in the complex, making it the largest in Canada.

Amenities

Incorporated into the lower levels of the project is a large underground shopping mall. Fitted in the same black aluminum and travertine marble as the main lobbies above, this mall was the genesis of Toronto's PATH system, which now consists of 27 kilometers of underground shopping and passages. Also extending to this area was Mies van der Rohe's strict design sense. To maintain the clean-lined and ordered aesthetic of the environment, Mies stipulated, with the backing of Phyllis Lambert and Alan Lamport, that store fronts must consist only of the glass panels and black aluminum that he specified. Even signage was restricted to only white back-lit letters within a black aluminum panel, and only in the specific font that Mies had designed for the T-D Centre. Renovations to the underground mall, beginning in the late 1990s, have caused some controversy within the Toronto architectural community as the building management, under pressure from their tenants who wish to have greater visibility to increase business, have let the strict design guidelines slip and more and more individual signage has appeared throughout the mall. As well, ceilings have been renovated from the original flat drywall planes with recessed pot-lights to coffered ceilings.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

A 660 seat movie theatre was originally included within the underground mall, but, though the space still exists, it was closed in 1978 due to it becoming too small and technologically out-of-date compared to newer theatres opening throughout the city. (See The Cinema At The Toronto Dominion Centre])

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

At the opposite end of the site, the top-most accessible floor of the Toronto-Dominion Bank Tower was a large indoor observation platform, which, as the tower was the largest in the city by far, allowed uninterrupted views of the then quickly developing city and Lake Ontario to the south. One level below was a restaurant on the south side, and the Toronto-Dominion Bank corporate offices and boardroom on the north. The interiors of the corporate area were also designed by Mies van der Rohe, and included his signature broad planes of unadorned but rich wood paneling, freestanding cabinets as partitions, wood slab desks, and some of his furniture pieces including the Barcelona chair, Barcelona ottoman, and Brno Chair. Within the main board room, at the north-east corner of the floor-plate, service areas are concealed within the wood paneled walls behind 'secret panels.' While the Toronto-Dominion corporate offices and boardroom exist in their original form today, and the restaurant and bar (though with different tenants and decor) is still in place, the observation platform has become leased office space.

Related Topics:
Lake Ontario - Barcelona chair

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~