Category Archives: Living Shangri-la Toronto

Glass balcony panel shatters on Shangri-La tower

Shangrila Toronto shattered balcony panel

A shattered glass panel is visible on a balcony at the Shangri-La Toronto hotel and condo tower on the northwest corner of Adelaide Street and University Avenue. This image is a screen capture from a video report on cp24.com.

 

 

More breakage: It has happened yet again — another balcony panel on the 66-storey Shangri-La Toronto hotel and condo tower has shattered, raining pieces of glass onto a major downtown street.

According to local news reports, no-one was injured when pieces of glass fell onto Adelaide Street when the balcony panel broke around 1.30 a.m. today. Police immediately closed the street to traffic so they could investigate the mishap. Adelaide Street was reopened to traffic around 10:30 a.m., the Toronto Star reported in its Sunday online edition.

Local news station CP24 posted a video of the scene on its website. The tape showed a shattered balcony panel on the Shangri-La tower’s southwest corner, about 20 storeys above Adelaide Street. The CP24 reporter noted that this marked the third time this year alone that a glass panel had shattered and fallen from the tower, which officially opened in October 2012.

The first instance occurred on a very cold day last January, at which time glass from a shattered panel fell onto Adelaide Street. The second event occurred last September. In that case, the CP24 reporter said, the falling glass injured a man on University Avenue. A Toronto Star report on the September incident said that a 53-year-old man was treated at hospital for the minor injuries he suffered when some of the glass struck his head.

Last night’s incident comes in the wake of the broadcast premier this past Thursday night of a documentary film entitled The Condo Game, which I previewed in a November 18 2013 post. That film, which examines the pitfalls and potential future problems posed by Toronto’s continuing condominium building boom, had been inspired by a series of balcony glass breakages at three downtown condo towers in the summer of 2011.

So far, there has been no word from Toronto police or City building inspectors as to what may have caused the balcony panel to break today.

 

Living Shangri-La Toronto hotel and condo tower

A CN Tower view of the Shangri-La Toronto hotel and condo tower on June 3 2013

 

Winter building pics: February 2013

Above is a link to my February 2013 Flickr album of building and construction photos I shot during walks in the downtown area. Click once on the image to view a small-format slideshow of the pictures, or click twice to access the album directly on Flickr and see full-size photos and captions.

 

TIFF crowd gets first look at Living Shangri-La as new 5-star hotel/condo tower nears completion

Living Shangri-la Toronto & Fairmont Royal York Hotel Toronto

August 22 2012: The city’s newest 5-star hotel, the Shangri-La Hotel Toronto, looms  to the northwest of the Fairmont Royal York, the grande dame of Toronto luxury hotels

 

Star attraction: The cachet of red carpets and Hollywood celebrities is giving a big pre-opening advertising boost to the Shangri-La Hotel Toronto as the city’s newest 5-star hotel & condo tower nears the end of construction.

It’s not officially open to the travelling public yet, but the Shangri-La is buzzing with energy and excitement as construction crews hurry to put finishing touches on the 202-room hotel at the same time as hordes of movie industry VIPs schmooze and conduct business in the building during the Toronto International Film Festival, which opened Thursday.

When I walked past the hotel yesterday morning, construction crews were scurrying on three sides of the building, especially around the western entrance off Simcoe Street where there was an almost chaotic array of activity underway. Construction tradesworkers weren’t the only people rushing in and out of the hotel; Simcoe and nearby Nelson Street were clogged with traffic as delivery trucks rushed everything from skids of building supplies to carts full of fresh fruit and vegetables into the Shangri-La. Contractors, cleaners and photographers were also streaming in and out of the Soho House Toronto, the private club for creative professionals which will occupy the restored Bishop’s Block heritage building on the southwest corner of the Shangri-La property.

 

 

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Living Shangri-la to unveil Zhang Huan sculpture

Living Shangrila hotel condo tower Toronto

May 4 2012: Rising, a dramatic sculpture by contemporary artist Zhang Huan, will be unveiled Saturday at this location outside the Living Shangri-la Toronto tower on University Avenue, between Richmond and Adelaide Streets

 

Living Shangrila hotel condo tower Toronto

May 4 2012: Workers prepare the giant sculpture for its official unveiling ceremony, scheduled for 1-2 pm tomorrow afternoon

 

Living Shangrila condo hotel tower Toronto

May 4 2012: The large-scale sculpture occupies a space at street level …

 

Living Shangrila condo hotel Toronto

… and soars above the glass ‘Ice Cube’ at the building’s NE corner …

 

Living Shangrila condo hotel Toronto

… seen here, from the University Avenue median to the east. This section of the building encloses a pool on the upper level, with a Momofuku restaurant on the floor below. The Momofuku Toronto is scheduled to open in August.

 

Taking flight: As construction of the 66-storey Living Shangri-la Toronto draws closer to completion, the building’s developer is set to unveil the dramatic sculpture it commissioned for the public art component of its project.

Full-page advertisements published in local newspapers this week announced that the art installation — Rising, by Shanghai and New York-based contemporary artist Zhang Huan — will be unveiled at a public ceremony Saturday afternoon from 1 – 2 p.m.

 

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