Pride Weekend in Toronto is soon upon us. In preparation, this month an explosion of rainbows and inclusion messages from local business and merchants have been appearing in the downtown core. Here’s some of what I’ve come across in the last few weeks:
Eaton Centre
Rogers Headquarters, 333 Bloor Street East
Manulife Head Office, 250 Bloor Street East
OrangeTheory Fitness, 160 Bloor Street East
160 Bloor Street East
175 Bloor Street East
Circle K, 121 Bloor Street East
The Chartered Professional Accountants of Ontario (CPA)
RBC, 2 Bloor Street East
Holt Renfrew, 50 Bloor Street West
TD Canada Trust
Bay & Bloor StreetsBay & Bloor StreetsChurch & Wellesley Streets
A Pride Chicken at Nandos, 832 Bay Street
Ontario Nurses’ Association, 85 Grenville Street
Pride Bicycle Lock, Church Street
LCBO
Underneath Hudson Bay Centre, 2 Bloor Street EastUnderneath Hudson Bay Centre, 2 Bloor Street EastYonge & Wellesley Streets
Rexall, Church & Wellesley Streets
Scotiabank, Yonge & Wellesley Streets
Shopper’s Drug Mart, Yonge & Charles Streets
Jack Astor’s, Yonge & Bloor Streets
Toronto Public Library, Yorkville Branch
The Wine Rack, Church & Wellesley Streets
Dudley’s Hardware, Church Street
And, of course, the epicentre of it all: the corner of Church & Wellesley Streets
On Church Street there are “village gateways” which indicate the boundaries of the Church-Wellesley Business Improvement Area (BIA). The markers consist of two 22-foot signposts with swirling rainbow blades. At night, lights inside the markers illuminate writing on the cube base, which reads: Church-Wellesley Village. Each of the two markers is accompanied by a colourful utility box depicting caricatures of people living in and around the village.
The gateway markers were designed by architect Claudio Santo and installed during early 2013. Claudio Santon says the BIA gave him a fair amount of artistic freedom within certain design specifications. He says they wanted a representation of the rainbow flag, which is iconic of the Church-Wellesley Village. They also wanted the markers to convey a sense of inclusion, because everyone is welcome in the Village.
The South Gateway
The South Gateway is located at 484 Church Street, on the west side of Church Street between Wood and Alexander Streets. It accompanies the The Village utility box (left, in shot below):
The North Gateway
The North Gateway is located at 557 Church Street, outside Hasty Market, between Gloucester and Monteith Streets. It is also coupled with a fun and colourful depiction of village folks on a nearby utility box (right side, below):
It was another very busy Halloween night on Church Street once again this year. The weather was crisp and quite cool, but there was no rain to speak of. The turnout was massive, having a lot to do I’m sure with events re-energizing after COVID-19.
The mayhem ran from Carlton Street to Gloucester Street, and every inch of the street was packed with people. There were so many inventive and impressive costumes; people’s creativity never ceases to amaze me:
About 10 years ago, there was a successful and productive project called The Church Street Mural Project. The mural project adorned walls up and down Church Street, from the south-facing wall of The Marquis of Granby pub (now defunct) to the northernmost mural on the 519 Church Street Community Centre.
The Church Street Mural Project involved the participation of 25 artists and was a key part of the community’s preparation for the massive World Pride 2014 festivities that year. One of my favourite murals from that project is a massive piece entitled Ultra Church: 50 VIP Party People – 1948-2014, produced by artist Lily Butter of Butter Land Studio. The mural is 90-feet long and runs down a laneway (recently dubbed Dapper Lane) behind the jumble of stores at 568 Church Street. The mural contains dozens of portraits of people who have been integral in the LGBT party scene over the past 60 years.
The mural is still there at this location, but it is now very faded and fragmented, and soon (or so we’ve been told) this block of old stores will be pulled down to make way for more condos, taking the mural with it. I’m glad I took these shots when I did as the mural was still very vibrant then and still reflected the vibrancy of our community.
So much for the personal touch. Oh well, automation marches on, I guess.
Other RC Coffee locations in Toronto are at:
Toronto General Hospital, 200 Elizabeth Street Kensington Market, 160 Baldwin Street Little Italy, 550 College Street Lyndhurst Centre, 520 Sutherland Drive Dundas Station, 1 Dundas Street West St. Joseph’s Hospital, 30 The Queensway Bickle Centre, 130 Dunn Avenue
Well, the streets have been swept, the tourists have (mostly) gone and the village has settled back down to its everyday rhythm. Toronto Pride is over for another year but it left in its wake a lot of memories. For today’s TOcityscapes, I give you a small sampling of this past weekend’s mayhem (each image is clickable for a larger view).
There were…
Merchants & Vendors…
Dancing In The Street…
Pride Pups…
Lots of Love, Colour & Messages…
Random Oddities & Mayhem…
If I could put a thought bubble above this woman, it would say: “What the f…?!” I thought the same when I first saw this tree taking a cigarette break.
Coming home last night I spied this new mural on the northeast corner of Gloucester Street and Church Street. Very fitting, I thought, as we’re one week away from Pride:
The Toronto AIDS Memorial, designed by Patrick Fahn, is located in Barbara Hall Park (formerly Cawthra Square Park), on Church Street above Wellesley, next to The 519 Church Street Community Centre in the heart of Toronto’s gay community.
Michael Lynch (1944-1991) – a poet, journalist, professor of English at the University of Toronto and a man who was active in groups such as Gay Fathers of Toronto and the Toronto Centre for Lesbian and Gay Studies – had the idea to create an AIDS Memorial in Toronto. On Lesbian and Gay Pride Day in 1988 a temporary Memorial in Cawthra Square Park displayed about 200 names. I well remember that temporary Memorial and how moving it was that year.
A committee from the Community Centre, with one member of Toronto City Council added, began deliberations in 1988 and proposed that a permanent AIDS Memorial be created. Patrick Fahn won the competition for the design of the Memorial, and it was completed and dedicated during Pride Week 1993.
Once the permanent Memorial was built, the task of collecting names, arranging for engraving, and upkeep of the Memorial pillars, plaques and lighting, was delegated to The 519 Community Centre by the Committee. Since there are a limited number of panels, the font size was reduced in 1996, and older plaques are re-engraved periodically to create room.
Within a garden, 14 triangular precast concrete pillars, each 2.25 meters high, are placed 1.6 meters apart in a long, very gently rising arc, paralleled by a narrow stone path. A low triangular concrete podium is placed in front of the garden.
As planted trees and shrubs have grown, the Memorial pillars and path have become an increasingly private space. The pillars represent a connection between earth and the spiritual realm. At the foot of each pillar a Precambrian crystalline boulder is placed. Signifying steadfastness in the face of tragedy, the boulders complement the message of hope represented by the pillars.
Engraved on stainless-steel plaques affixed to the pillars are the names of those who have died from AIDS in a given year. There are currently 2700 names in total. Every year during Pride Toronto, names of persons who have died from AIDS that year are read out in a short ceremony, and have their names added to the plaque for that year. If new information comes in, names are also added to the plaques for earlier years. Requests for names to be engraved are accepted from spouses, friends and family members. Each year during June’s Pride Week, a committee representing AIDS Service Organizations presents the AIDS Candlelight Vigil.
AIDS Candlelight Vigil at the AIDS Memorial
The AIDS Memorial has a processional feel. Memorial ceremonies for individuals are held there, and flowers and keepsakes are left to be collected or cleaned up.
In 1995 this poem, by Shoshanna Jey Addley, was appended to the first pillar of the Memorial (photo below). It reads:
Circles of Stone:
To Those Unnamed
We stand at this place; among earth and stone, branch and birch-
In darkness and in light, through sun and storm, rain and trees,
leaves and breezes: Life and Death
Our strength, though withered and sapped, regenerates here.
Each name on each standing stone remarks thousand fold
upon those unremarked from sea to sea; pole to pole.
The earth would quake with the strength of our memories
flood with the loss of our tears, and in tandem; We exist.
How tall these stones have to grow?
How wide? How all-encompassing, how awesome?
To announce this radical interruption of humanity.
These standing stones might sprout like high rises,
watered by lovers left behind.
Further stones planted, the last meets the first; A circle is formed.
Its volume gains inhabitants. Admitting entrance without discrimination.
The world mourns while we embrace the lives and the times,
Whether a name is engraved in steel or sand, in heart or in mind;
In flesh or in form; we will remember.
And mark the day we have no further need for such
Circles of Stone.
The first pillar of the Memorial, containing the poems “Cry” and “Circles of Stone”Fourteen pillars in a gentle arc comprise the MemorialA flower in winter for remembranceMemorial stone of Dr. Edward KamskiLives lost in 1993, one of the worst years of the crisisCurrently the last pillar of the Memorial The deaths in the last few years are very few and far between, and there are no plaques beyond 2021
For me, a visit to the AIDS Memorial is a sombre, sobering experience, and causes me to remember times past. So very many young men lost in their prime; a whole generation wiped out. At least their names and lives will be forever remembered in this dignified Memorial.
This is such a lovely part of the city. I love how they fixed up that square and the fountain…