Renfrew Place sounds like a posh street but in actuality is a back alley. It’s located one block north of Queen Street West and runs between Simcoe Street and John Street:
An interesting and colourful segment of Renfrew Place is the small section between St. Patrick Street and McCaul Street, which is where I captured these images:
Crossing McCaul Street and moving toward John Street, the alley is a little bland at first but becomes more interesting and colourful as you progress further west:
The Green Glow of Renfrew Place
As I moved further west down Renfrew Place I became aware that everything was bathed in this odd green light. The green glow in these shots is from the setting sun reflecting off the green exterior of the Umbra building on the corner of Renfrew Place and John Street. It was late afternoon when I took these shots, so the slowly setting sun was strong, illuminating everything in the alley and turning it green:
More Elicser
If you’ve been following TO Cityscapes for a while you’ll find the occasional post about the very talented Toronto street artist Elicser. I’m a big fan of his urban art. His style is instantly identifiable and his murals can be found in so many interesting spots in the city. I was pleased to find some more of the man’s work in this alley.
If you’re interested in reading some of my previous posts featuring Elicser’s mural art, please check out the posts below:
The colours of these Elicser murals may seem a little odd but, again, the alley was bathed in a strong reflected light from the Umbra building on John Street:
And here is the very building which was casting the unusual green light on the alley
Renfrew Place terminates at John Street. Just before exiting the alley to John Street, a couple more Elicser murals can be found:
Looking back at Renfrew Place from Queen Street West, one more Elicser mural can be found atop the building. Note the Umbra building in the background, responsible for casting such an interesting green glow on the alley.
You’ve no doubt noticed the absence of TO Cityscapes recently. I’ve been at war with technology – my automated sending service just stopped sending posts, leaving me high and dry. I’ve spent untold hours over the past week trying to get Mailpoet to run again, but the tech gods have defeated me.
Not to be outdone, I am just getting started with a new provider and hoping to have things back on line shortly.
While working feverishly on my new site TO Utility Boxes (which is now complete by the way), I noticed a few utility boxes that could be grouped together thematically to portray Music and Dance in Toronto.
First, though, a shameless plug for my new site: TO Utility Boxes. If you’d like to take a look, it’s here.
With that out of the way, here are some Toronto utility boxes dedicated to music and dance in our city:
Jeff Healey Tribute
Utility box painted by artist Adrian Hayles, 2018 147 Tecumseth Street just south of Queen Street West
I had looked forward to photographing this box for some time. When I finally reached the site I was extremely disappointed to see the damage done by taggers and vandals since the piece was created in 2018.
The box artist comments on his work:
Jeff Healey is a profound member of our Rock and Roll Canadian history and his knowledge of jazz is unmatched. His part in the classic movie Road House will forever mar my memory. Jeff once owned a bar called “Healey’s” at the corner of Bathurst and Queen just a couple of blocks away from his freshly painted bell box. At first, like with most public projects, I was meet with very suspicious eyes as passers-by would question my reason for being there spraying. After about two hours, the piece started to take form and the compliments came pouring in.
Queen Street Vibe in the 80s
Utility box painted by artist Glen Guerin (aka Noxious), 2018 4 Markham Street, southwest corner of Markham Street and Willis Street
Ah yes, Carole Pope and Nash the Slash. So 80s, so Queen Street West back in the day. It was all about the look – shoulder pads, raccoon eyes and bandages.
The box artist comments on his work:
The theme given me was local musicians of the “Queen St. Days”. As a patron of the Gary’s Horseshoe days, then a regular on the “Queen St. scene of the 80’s” I thought of many, many artists I’d like to commemorate in a mural who inspired me as a young artist. Then it hit me, NASH THE SLASH! However, boxes are usually two panel, and who to compliment him, but his friend Carole Pope of Rough Trade. One guy in a car stopped and yelled out who they were, gave me a thumbs up and moved on. Another middle age woman with a thick accent told me she saw Rough Trade in Poland when she was younger (who knew?!). Others were curious and asked who they were and I explained the best I could. All in all, it was a fun and learning experience and I’d do it again any day.
Echo Beach, Far Away In Time
Utility Box painted by artist Julii McMillan, 2019 5 McCaul Street, northeast corner of Renfrew Place and McCaul Street
Continuing in an 80s Queen Street vibe, this box is an excellent tribute to Martha & The Muffins.
Gordon Lightfoot
Utility box painted by artist Adrian Hayles, 2021 6 Scollard Street, in the Frank Stollery Parkette
Gordon Lightfoot… a Canadian institution.
Tribute to Salome Bey, Canada’s Queen of the Blues
Utility box painted by Adrian Hayles, 2021 2 Grosvenor Street, northwest corner of Grosvenor Street and Yonge Street
Bell Box Murals comments on this box:
If the style looks familiar, this DJ/artist/muralist has done numerous murals in the City. In 2016, Adrian took 8 weeks to paint a 22 storey Downtown Yonge BIA music mural on the north wall of 423 Yonge Street, just south of College Street. The next year, he painted the south wall of the same building, continuing the musical theme. Adrian also painted a substantial mural on Reggae Lane in the Oakwood Avenue/Eglinton Avenue West area.
The Dance
Utility box painted by artist Keight MacLean, 2017 230 College Street, northeast corner of Huron and College Streets
The box artist comments on their work:
‘The Dance’ celebrates Toronto’s communities, past and present, as a literal dance. Everyone holding hands in a continuous circle around the box, jumping and dancing barefoot and smiling and laughing. Bright fluorescent splashes of colour weave in and out of the dancing group to further highlight how people come together in Toronto to form a unique tapestry.
Dancer
Utility box painted by artist Louise Reimer, 2017 542 College Street, northwest corner of College Street and Euclid Avenue
The box artist comments on their work:
The design is an homage to dancer. In our current world, where most people work at highly sedentary jobs, it is important to promote movement and an active lifestyle. Dance is not only exercise, but expressive, non competitive, and joyful. All cultures have some form of dance, which brings people together and allows for joy and expression. Contemporary dance is the result of a lot of work done by pioneering women, and especially queer people, and people of colour, which deserves to be honoured. These groups of people are all cultural producers in Toronto who still struggle for space and recognition within the art world.
Parkdale Social Club
Utility box painted by artist Cesar Rodriguez, 2017 2 O’Hara Avenue, northeast corner of O’Hara Avenue & Queen Street West
The box artist comments on their work:
‘Parkdale Social Club’ pays tribute to the history of vibrant music and arts communities in Parkdale. It was a great experience. I met many interesting people and met some friends who happened to live and work around the neighbourhood. Some people brought me gifts and others were interested in commission some of my work as well. I was not expecting that. Even a guy who seemed homeless said he had money and would love to get some of my art.
Piano Hands
Utility box painted by Jerry Silverberg, 2013 244 Bloor Street West, northeast corner of Bedford Road & Bloor Street West
Outside The Box comments on the work:
Jerry Silverberg’s box is located across from the Royal Conservatory of Music. He chose to depict hands playing piano to acknowledge the presence of the conservatory and create synergy between the two.
Sams + A&A Records
Artist and date unknown 189 Mutual Street, northeast corner of Mutual Street & Gerrard Street East
This box is a bit of a mystery; the only ID on the box is the artist’s email address: myyummyart@gmail.com. I appreciate the throwback touch, though, to when record stores at Yonge and Dundas ruled that stretch of Yonge Street.
All this inclement weather lately has put me in mind of the infamous Toronto ice storm in late December 2013. This happened 11 years ago now, so I guess it qualifies for one of my so-called From The Vaults posts (i.e. Toronto events and photos from several years past).
At the time of the storm I took a little walk around the neighbourhood to see everything more or less encased in ice:
The massive ice storm began on December 19, 2013 and dispersed on December 23, 2013. In addition to hitting Ontario the storm also reached Quebec, Atlantic Canada, Maine, New England, New York, Michigan and even Arkansas. In Toronto, the ice was so heavy it resulted in damaged hydro lines and trees weighing down onto roads and vehicles.
The 2013 ice storm consisted of 40-plus hours of freezing rain and more than 30 millimetres of ice, leaving 416,000 customers without power, 500 wires down and two million trees damaged. During the ice storm, Toronto Hydro said 73,000 metres of service wire and 80,000 pieces of hardware had to be replaced. The storm had a total cost of $200 million.1
The storm killed 27 people, particularly from carbon monoxide poisoning in enclosed and poorly ventilated areas as people attempted to keep warm and cook with gas generators and charcoal stoves.
Streets And Cars Were Shrouded In Ice…
An Icy Allan Gardens
Lots Of Broken Trees…
At the time I remember thinking how weird everything felt; the city had mostly came to a halt throughout the storm. The ice storm of 2013 remains yet another Toronto vignette I will never forget.
Below the main platform of Bay subway station there is an additional platform which has long since been abandoned. The platform was used for only six months in 1966 when the TTC experimentally ran trains whose routes included portions of both the Yonge–University and Bloor–Danforth lines.
This abandoned platform is sometimes referred to as “Lower Bay” by the general public or “Bay Lower” by the TTC.
A few years ago the station was opened to the public during the Toronto Doors Open event, and there were a ton of interested people – myself included – exploring the station.
At the entrance to Lower Bay Station
Heading down into Lower Bay station
The platform was in service from February to September 1966, after which time it was shelved. The experiment (called “interlining” in transit-speak) was deemed a failure, largely because delays anywhere on the subway line quickly cascaded to affect the entire system. Also, as the stations had not been laid out effectively for cross-platform interchange, trains travelling east from St. George and west from Yonge alternated between the two levels, leading passengers to wait on the stairs in-between the levels, since they were unable to tell which platform would receive the next train.1
A Second Life As A Film Set
Lower Bay and the tracks leading to it still exist and are now used to train new operators, to move trains between the two current lines, for platform-surface experiments, and to allow filming in the subway without disrupting public service. For film sets, the station has been modified several times to make it look like a regular North American subway station.
Notable movies shot at Lower Bay include The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, Don’t Say A Word, Johnny Mnemonic, Bulletproof Monk, Mimic, End of the Line, The Recruit, and The Sound. The sandwich boards for the movies shot at the station were prominently on display that day:
Lower Bay did not look terribly different from the regular, upper platform, but it was an interesting experience nonetheless.
I thought I’d start the year by introducing a new site I’ve been working on for the past couple of months. Actually, it’s more of an addition or adjunct to TOcityscapes. Enter…. TO Utility Boxes! (OK, not the most exciting/glamorous topic or website on the planet, but some may find it interesting….).
For about 10 years now I’ve been capturing shots of those painted utility boxes you see scattered around Toronto – they exist either to control the traffic lights or house Bell Canada’s telecommunication lines.
There’s been a movement for some time now to turn these grey, ugly, utilitarian boxes into something a little more attractive in the urban landscape. Local artists have transformed hundreds of these boxes into their own personal masterpieces. Viewing these boxes over the last few years it’s obvious there are some extremely talented people out there.
This is my first site off-shoot from TOcityscapes. I have two other urban photo projects which I plan to launch sometime later this year, time and energy permitting. In addition to TO Utility Boxes, eventually you will see TO Sculptures and TO Murals as part of TOcityscapes.
OK, so how exactly do you check out this hot new site? Simple – you can either click on the link TO Photo Projects > TO Utility Boxes on the top TOcityscapes website menu above, or click on the big button below.
As I mention on my TO Utility Boxes site, it – like TOcityscapes – is a constant work in progress, and I will be adding to it on an ongoing basis.
This mural at 20 Charles Street East – on the west side of the Green P parking garage – was conceptualized and painted over six days by Becker from Frankfurt, Germany, with support from local artists Alexander Bacon, Quentin Rockford, Christina Mazzulla and Kyla Buium.
The piece is entitled Toronto & Stadt Frankfurt Am Main. The landscape of Toronto and Frankfurt appear in the reflection of the glasses on the mural and illustrates the special friendship the two cities have shared for the past 30 years.
The space at 20 Charles Street East was provided by the Toronto Parking Authority.
Diversity is what Frankfurt and Toronto hold in common, and that very much influenced my concept. The vibrant and colourful pallet represents the diversity of people in Toronto and the fingerprint represents the idea that each one of us has an impact in our society.
Well, it is a black and rainy Christmas this year in Toronto. Regardless, I took a little photo-spin yesterday to see how the city is setting up for the season.
There are some much-loved (at least by me) Toronto traditions missing this year: unfortunately no festive windows at The Bay on Queen and Yonge (due to the massive construction of the new subway on Queen Street). The Flower Show at the Allan Gardens conservatory is extremely scaled back due to the renovation of the Palm House, and “Holiday Fair”, normally held at City Hall, was moved to Mel Lastman Square in North York (I suspect, again, due to the mess caused by the Queen Street subway project). Despite these, it is still Christmas in the city… a special time. Here is a bit of what I encountered yesterday:
Allan Gardens Christmas Flower Show
I wish I had more shots to post here, but the few below were the extent of the Flower Show this year:
“Winter Glow” at Yonge-Dundas Square
Yonge-Dundas Square had a mini-festival going on, although I only saw a couple of people there. There were carnival rides, a 45-foot-tall Ferris Wheel, the “Great Canadian Carousel” and a few midway games.
On the Yonge Street side there was a 40-foot “Remembrance Tree”, sponsored by the Rotary Club. Visitors make a donation to the cause, then receive a yellow ribbon on which to write a message to a loved one who has passed.
Eaton Centre
As usual, the Eaton Centre was abuzz with people, a massive Christmas tree (114-foot high, said to be the tallest in North America) and giant glittering reindeer:
Finding a few dry moments from the incessant rain of late, I took a little spin last night to see some of the Christmas lights in Rosedale and on Bloor Street East.
Rosedale
The owners of this Rosedale home went to some *serious* effort to recreate The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, along with a miniature Whoville:
Moving on to Bloor Street East:
Allegedly, there are 138 lit Christmas trees along Bloor Street this Christmas; I never stopped to count…
Dream Ballet by Hamilton native Harley Valentine sits at the southeast corner of Yonge Street and Front Street East, outside Meridian Hall (formerly the Sony Centre for the Performing Arts). Installed in 2016, the three metal abstract sculptures are 5.4-metres (18 feet) high.
The three towering figures are abstract representations of dancers and pay homage to the Meridian Hall’s former tenants, the National Ballet of Canada. The sculptor has remarked that if kids want to skateboard around the pieces, that’s fine with him; Valentine views skateboarding as a type of dance, and dance as a form of kinetic sculpting,
Sculptor Harley Valentine, with a model of his installation “Dream Ballet”
Harley Valentine has public art installations in several places in the Toronto area — including the Barbarians at the Gate exhibition at Campbell House on Queen Street West, a sculpture park in Scarborough, a permanent piece outside Humber College and a temporary installation in the Yorkville area. He’s also bidding on other projects in Palm Desert, California, New York and Detroit.
Yes, it needed To go. I lived nearby and would pass this hospital many times over the years. Looking forward…