The modernist former Fabergé Perfumes Canada Ltd. factory in Toronto, designed by architect John C. Parkin, is now home to the Great Lakes Brewery.Dave LeBlanc/The Globe and Mail/Supplied
Unlike Americans, Canadians don’t deify our architects. While some names might come to mind for the casual aficionado – a Vancouverite might think of Arthur Erickson and E.J. Lennox might pop into the head of a Torontonian – the existence of a force such as Frank Lloyd Wright has eluded us.
In my two decades with the Globe, I’ve tried, like my hero Adele Freedman before me, to boost the names of the city’s postwar modernists, especially since many of their creations have hit an age where systems fail and windows leak. Two names, in particular, have come up more than others over the years: John C. Parkin and Peter Dickinson.
It has been said (probably by Ms. Freedman) that, as a young architecture graduate in the 1950s or 60s, John B. Parkin Associates and Page and Steele/Peter Dickinson Associates topped the list of places for architects looking for work. Indeed, Mr. Dickinson (1925-1961), who came from England in 1950 to head the design department at Page and Steele, and the England-born, Manitoba-raised Mr. Parkin (1922-1988), who joined with John B. Parkin (no relation) in 1947 as head designer, were passionate proponents of the International Style. Even as early as the mid-fifties, their output of game-changing designs was massive, transformative, and award-winning.
Here are two examples from each office that are still in use, fully or somewhat accessible to the public, and small enough in scale so as not to overwhelm the senses.
Fabergé Perfumes Canada Ltd.
30 Queen Elizabeth Blvd.; John B. Parkin Associates, 1950
To understand just how new Mr. Parkin’s architecture was, one need look only to the inaugural Massey Medal competition of 1950. Two of the winners, both awarded silver, were Mr. Parkin’s modernist Fabergé building, and the very art moderne Garden Court Apartment complex from Page and Steele, built between 1939 and 1946.
Occupied by Fabergé until 1965, the building is a sleek office and factory complex sporting buff brick and banded windows with exterior posts to keep interiors clear for machinery. Inside, the office portion was (and still is) a glorious open-tread terrazzo staircase and a wavy “crinkle crankle” wall that no longer exists.
The building was a machine shop when Peter Bulut Sr. leased the building in 1991 for his Great Lakes Brewery, and by 1993 he owned it.
“We started brewing here in January, 1992,” says his son, Peter Bulut Jr., who is surrounded by massive steel tanks. “This room, before we renovated, we think this was where they were doing perfume blending, because, for I don’t know how many years, you could smell fragrance in this room. It just didn’t go away.”
Today, while a few doors have been added and the office lobby is now a busy taproom and retail store, Great Lakes has left much of the original features intact, such as the staircase or portions of the “up and down” windows. And, unlike some companies, they know the history of their building.
The building's original open-tread terrazzo staircase remains intact after renovations.
The building is a sleek office and factory complex sporting buff brick and banded windows with exterior posts to keep interiors clear for machinery.Great Lakes Brewing/handout/Supplied
Ontario Association of Architects Headquarters
50 Park Rd.; John C. Parkin, 1954.
When the Ontario Association of Architects (OAA) decided to build their first permanent headquarters, they wisely held an open competition – and it’s doubtful anyone was surprised when John C. Parkin’s design took the crown. For an architectural association, the new building said, in bricks and mortar, everything a progressive 1950s organization wanted to say: we are at the vanguard of technology; we are clear-thinking and open; we are friendly and wise and can help.
Perched on a hill, the building presents itself as a one-storey at the entrance, then as a two-storey that effortlessly floats over Lawren Harris Park. This is partly because portions of the second storey are cantilevered, but also because the grid of tall windows and white-painted structural frame seem to defy the natural world that surrounds it. But walk inside and the reverse is true: the building drinks in nature and defers to its beauty.
While the OAA renovated the building a few times before moving out in 1992, the architecture firm DTAH has re-renovated it back to an open, progressive space. It was designed a heritage building in 1991.
Parkin's 1954 design for the headquarters of the Ontario Association of Architects presents the building as one-storey at the front entrance.
Going beyond its one-storey entrance, the two-storey building overlooks Toronto's Lawren Harris Park.
Mr. Parkin's design was selected from an open competition.courtesy of DTAH//Supplied
Juvenile and Family Court
311 Jarvis St.; Peter Dickinson, Page and Steele, 1955.
It’s hard to believe this swooping, futuristic stunner, which is now the Ontario Court of Justice, is not on the City of Toronto’s inventory of heritage properties. Designed by Mr. Dickinson in 1954, the building’s checkerboard of 411 tiny windows on a concave, Queenston limestone wall never fails to impress on architectural walking tours.
Mr. Dickinson had won third prize for a 300-foot steel and concrete column that was, in the words of Chris Bateman writing for Spacing, “capable of spraying coloured jets of smoke” for the 1951 Festival of Britain. He continued incorporating that sort of exuberance into his Canadian designs; in addition to the curved wall of this courthouse, Mr. Dickinson added an upswept, zoomy canopy over the front door of his courthouse.
For architourists who aren’t satisfied with a walk-by, the court is a public building and people are allowed inside. However, to really explore the checkerboard windows or the mural by Kitchener-born Jane Lippert Birchall, one will have to go through a security check. And remember: photographs are not allowed.
The Ontario Court of Justice building on Toronto's Jarvis Street designed by Peter Dickinson in 1954. The building’s checkerboard front of 411 tiny windows on a concave, Queenston limestone wall never fails to impress on architectural walking tours.
Dickinson's design included an upswept canopy over the front door.Dave LeBlanc/The Globe and Mail/Supplied
Windsor House and Lancaster House Apartments
150 The Donway West and 4 Overland Dr.; Peter Dickinson, Page and Steele, 1955.
The next time you visit Don Mills, tear yourself away from the splendour of the single-family homes – all modernist and all approved by Macklin Hancock or Douglas Lee – and take a gander at Mr. Dickinson’s duo of apartments on the Donway.
There are six storeys on the busy Donway, and then, after some parking and verdant space, a second building of four storeys behind relates to those single-family houses. Both buildings are crisp, geometric and exquisitely detailed: banded windows are flush with the buff brick façade; the black I-beams are set into the façade so as not to take centre stage; slim balcony floors are minimalist and elegant. Inside, there is a wall of ultramarine Bisazza tile, a floating planter-box across the big window, and a shoji screen-type divider that separates tenant mailboxes from the room. It is, however, a private property.
The apartments at 4 Overland Cres. are one of two residential buildings in the Donway that were designed by Dickinson.
The building's banded windows are flush with the buff brick façade, while the slim balcony floors are minimalist and elegant.Dave LeBlanc/The Globe and Mail/Supplied