03-18-2021, 11:42 AM
(03-18-2021, 10:42 AM)ac3r Wrote:To each there own, I will have to disagree on with you on this one. There are countless other John Lingwood structures across the region that can be preserved to celebrate his work. Market square should not be one of them. It is a complete failure of a urban built form. It represents the destruction of Kitchener city hall and the original market. It is a mass of red brick and green glass that interacts poorly at all three streets it interacts with. It is easily my least favorite part of king to walk down. In my opinion It will never be a viable retail space again and it takes up one of the largest city blocks in downtown Kitchener. If the clocktower was enough to pay homage to the old city hall, then the new Fredrick Station mimic the green glass that is enough to pay homage to this building.(03-17-2021, 01:03 PM)westwardloo Wrote: I am sure a phased redevelopment could be implemented. First demolition the record office space and the dead mall. Then build multi-use towers where the record building is. Conestoga college can move into the podium of one of the new buildings then demolish the parking structure and where the college is located and redevelop with mixed use buildings. Connect market lane with goudies lane and possibly a new road between scott and frederick. Maybe even include an urban square/park at the corner of king and frederick where the mall is in memory of the old city hall that once stood there. Pure fantasy I know, just trying to think how this news could be positive for the region and the downtown.
No thanks. Market Square is one of John Lingwood's largest and most iconic modernist architectural works. I would hate to see it demolished just to build a couple generic office towers. That building and its neighbouring office tower have been an iconic part of downtown Kitchener for decades both visually (it was like our very own Frank Lloyd Wright. The clocktower was added to pay homage to the clocktower of the former city hall and the new Frederick Station was designed to mimic the green glass Lingwood used across his project) and also in terms of its function as a market and mall. You tear it down and it's gone...forever. You don't get that original architecture back, which we unfortunately witnessed when they painted the accompanying office tower Soviet Grey.
This complex has a very interesting history as well and it helped shape - for better or for worse - downtown Kitchener as we know it today. Here is a great essay on the building and our "adventure with modernity", aptly describing it in the opening paragraph as a ruin, but which we have witnessed become college campus and for a long time housed our local paper. It's definitely worth a read for some insight not only into the building itself, but the failures in our urban planning at the time: http://numerocinqmagazine.com/2011/11/22...-storring/
It helped shape downtown into what it is today, but represents a complete failure in urban revitalization. Time to tear this building down and let somethin new help shape the future of DTK.