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We are bringing you a pair of stories today about one of Toronto's most prominent new developments, Ïce Condos by Lanterra Developments, currently under construction at York Street and the Gardiner Expressway in the heart of the city's new Southcore area. We started out here at the bottom of the development, and in this article we are going up top.
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One of the projects being most closely followed on UrbanToronto at the moment is Ïce, the two-tower condominium complex at York Street and Bremner Boulevard in the city's growing Southcore area. The Lanterra Developments project features two of the sleekest, slenderest towers ever to rise in this city. Inspired by minimalist but fluid Scandinavian design gestures, the sibling buildings by architectsAlliance have curving, reflective exteriors which sheathe off-circular floorplates, the south tower rising to 57 storeys and the north tower rising to 67. We've been admiring these buildings from the ground for a long time now, but today we want to take you up top the get a look at how the remarkable roofs are being built.
The south tower started construction first. Ten floors shorter than the north tower, the south tower's residential floors have all be poured, as has the concrete for the mechanical penthouse above. When we visited in September, all that was left for concrete work at that time was to pour the cantilevered roof. Designed in a way that's been likened to Swiss cheese, with skylight holes that poke through, the roof brings the buildings' circular theme to the very top of the tower.
Just recently, photos were posted on the UrbanToronto forum of what the roof, now poured, actually looks like: you'll see that at the end of this article. Our September visit means that we can show you first how it was done.
The first shot below, is from the 61st storey of the north tower. Glass rises to the 56th storey of the south tower. The 57th storey will contain extra-high floor penthouse units. Above that is the mechanical penthouse. That's the area behind the steel framework, seen below. The crews refer to the framework as the ribcage. It will be sheathed in glass when finished, and have a soft glow emanating from it in the evening. Above that you see shoring for forms to complete the roof.
The roof will have a different shape than the floorplates below, cantilevering out from the edge of the building in places. This means that the forms to create the concrete roof are having to be cantilevered themselves. Shot from another five floors higher in the north tower, the next images provide you with a better vantage point of what's was going on at the top of the south tower, with work at the time progressing to different degrees on different parts of the roof.
At the south end of the roof you can see the steel supports that will hold the roof over the top of the mechanical penthouse. As mentioned in today's story on the development's lower floors, these supports are being referred to as 'Christmas Trees' by the crews.
The pegs at the top of each steel support will be embedded in the roof's concrete, holding it tightly in place. You can see conduits protruding from one of the supports below: those will carry electric wiring to the roof.
You can see holes in the middle of some of the other supports in the image below. Those will drain rainwater from the roof.
The north half of the roof work was further along. Beams wait to hold plywood sheets at the top of the image below, while form edges will be the next step at the bottom of the photo where the plywood is now in place.
In the shot below you can see one of the pegged support tops, around which concrete will soon be poured.
From below, the shoring to hold up the roof form is a mass of yellow and deep-orange supports.
So, that was September. Now in early November, the work to pour the roof is done, and the forms are coming down. This pair of shots from east of the Ïce come to us courtesy of UrbanToronto member wmedia.
We hope to be back to show you further progress as Ïce moves towards completion. Want to know more about Ïce Condominiums now? You can view our dataBase file, linked below, for piles of renderings and lots of information. Want to get in on the discussion? Choose one of the associated Forum thread links, or leave your comment in the space provided on this page.
