Heritage preservation and reconstruction

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by eastcoastal

LOL - we can always adopt the same naming conventions we do for bridges.

The Old Green Old House v. the New Green Old House

[eastcoastal]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

The purple one. It had begun to look pretty beat up, so I was pleasantly surprised to see it get such a thorough makeover.

Looks like the house next door (dark grey, towards north st) now has scaffolding up.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Cute article on the CBC about the Blue Jays logo carved into the art gallery (old customs house) building downtown:

Meet the artist who carved the Toronto Blue Jays logo into the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia

It was a mystery thought to be decades in the making.

But in fact, it was just one decade ago that a Toronto Blue Jays logo was carved into the sandstone of the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia in Halifax.

“It was just a great little fun project,” said Craig Potter, the artist behind the carving, which features the recognizable Blue Jays logo, with the face of a bird and a small maple leaf on the side.

Until Wednesday, the origins of the carved emblem had been a bit of a mystery.

It was initially believed that staff noticed the logo following a restoration of the building's exterior in the early 1990s, an era that coincided with the most successful period in the history of the Blue Jays, who won consecutive World Series titles in 1992 and 1993.

But that wasn’t the case, Potter said. He actually carved the logo into the south facade of the building in 2015, during a 3½-year restoration project where he repaired decorative elements.

And it wasn’t his idea.

He was actually asked to do it by his supervisor, a big Toronto Blue Jays fan, who had spotted another baseball-inspired carving on the north side of the art gallery — a Boston Red Sox cap with the team’s signature B.

“So it was sort of a friendly gesture, let’s say,” Potter said. It’s believed the Red Sox cap was carved into the building in the ‘90s.

Potter said it’s common practice for stonemasons to carve something small to mark their work on a building.

“People will put their personal marks on things and in this case, I was asked to do this by my supervisor,” he said with a smile.

Red Sox cap:


Blue Jays logo:

The Blue Jays logo is located on the southern facade of the building, on the fourth pillar, to the right of the third window.

A timely article as they play game 6 of the World Series tonight with a 3-2 series lead on the Dodgers. Go Jays!

[Keith P.]

Desecration! What will the Heritage Trust say?!?

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

Desecration! What will the Heritage Trust say?!?

That this has no significant effect on the heritage elements of the building and actually adds interest to the history of the structure?

[eastcoastal]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

Desecration! What will the Heritage Trust say?!?

brb: assembling pitchforks and torches

[someone123]

Just a short blog post but I thought he had good points:

https://deny.substack.com/p/dont-just-preserve-heritage-build

He talks about how the pro-heritage advocates often don't have a clearly articulated message, how important planning rules are, and how new character/heritage can be built.

I do think there are some good adaptive reuse projects, and some good small "boutique" heritage-style projects, but there aren't a lot of medium-scale heritage-style builds (3 or 4 storey wooden flats for example, which used to be common around inner Halifax), and the planning rules may not permit them.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by someone123

Just a short blog post but I thought he had good points:

https://deny.substack.com/p/dont-just-preserve-heritage-build

He talks about how the pro-heritage advocates often don't have a clearly articulated message, how important planning rules are, and how new character/heritage can be built.

I do think there are some good adaptive reuse projects, and some good small "boutique" heritage-style projects, but there aren't a lot of medium-scale heritage-style builds (3 or 4 storey wooden flats for example, which used to be common around inner Halifax), and the planning rules may not permit them.

Meh.

He could have left out the ageist judgement... "They’re old, and naturally resistant to change of any kind."... and simply said that we need better architecture in the city, that reflects similar values to heritage buildings that are valued by many. The rest was a mishmash of ideas that didn't seem to have much focus.

I could get into a discussion about how things were built back then to suit certain purposes, and things like building codes changing to prevent entire city blocks from burning down due to a single house fire, but no point.

Also thought it was a little strange to graph FAR for 1-4 unit buildings only, when we mostly don't build multi-units on the peninsula like that anymore. If he had graphed FAR for all construction by year, I'm certain that the 2010s-2020s would be towering (just like the buildings) over the rest of the graph. Do we even build SFH on the peninsula anymore?

Too bad he didn't get into the discussion of actually preserving heritage structures by adding a new multi-unit on the extra land (that he is complaining about) while preserving/restoring the old building that originally occupied the lot on its own.

Oh well, it's always interesting to read others' take on the planning/construction/"heritage preservation" side of things. Thanks for posting it.