Lux­ury condo–hotel mar­ries five-star com­fort with engi­neer­ing achievements

Excerpt from an arti­cle by Stephen Weir – Toronto Star

Richard Tucker, now a well-known Toronto archi­tect and mas­ter of con­struc­tion, has indeed been look­ing up. Since grad­u­at­ing from MIT in archi­tec­ture and the Lon­don School of Busi­ness, he has joined the very exclu­sive club of pro­fes­sion­als who build big and tall buildings.

Now, Tucker is the direc­tor of con­struc­tion for Gray­wood Devel­op­ments Ltd., the com­pany that broke ground Nov. 30 for the Ritz Carl­ton and The Res­i­dences At the Ritz-Carlton.

Located next to the CBC head­quar­ters on Welling­ton St. (near Roy Thom­son Hall), the project will include a five-star hotel and high-priced condo suites in an all-glass, 53-storey trib­ute to unbri­dled luxury.

“It is time that Toronto had this,” says Tucker. “There are a few nice hotels in the city, but, no true five-star estab­lish­ments. The Ritz-Carlton will be that and more. And, of course, that holds true for the 35 floors of pri­vate lounges, meet­ing rooms and con­do­mini­ums that are on top of the hotel.

Condo own­ers won’t have to walk through the hotel lobby, no mat­ter how exclu­sive it is. Instead, they have their own side entrance, 24-hour concierge and two pri­vate ele­va­tors to carry them to the 21^st floor and a bank of condo–only ele­va­tors.

The Upstairs Down­stairs approach to ser­vice will affect how the build­ing is con­structed. The site is very small — only about a half-hectare. At the same time, the style of the hotel and con­do­minium requires that more space be ded­i­cated to keep­ing guests, own­ers and staff at arm’s length.

Pri­vate entrances, quiet ele­va­tors, out-of-sight ser­vice lifts and redun­dant power sources (to ensure the build­ing is never with­out elec­tric­ity) cost more and take up space. But since even the small­est condo will cost more than $1 mil­lion, the added costs won’t be a prob­lem for the developer.

The Ritz has also worked out an arrange­ment with the Royal Bank, which is right next door. The two build­ings will share a com­mon load­ing dock and freight entrance on the bank property.

Tucker will be over­see­ing con­struc­tion of the 153 lux­ury condo suites, each with a min­i­mum of 36 metres of floor-to-ceiling glass — a curtain-maker’s dream come true.

Wind tun­nel mod­el­ling was used to ensure the 53 storeys of glass can with­stand the high winds that often buf­fet the down­town core. A sec­ond envi­ron­men­tal con­cern was also addressed: how to pro­tect pedes­tri­ans on Welling­ton from falling icicles.

The suites will be over­built as befits the Ritz. Redun­dant power gen­er­a­tors mean the tower will stay cool, water pumps will func­tion and the ele­va­tors will work even dur­ing black­outs. The build­ing will be cooled with Enwave — a sys­tem that uses Lake Ontario water as a giant heat exchange unit.”If a per­son can afford a suite in the Ritz, they can afford a place in France, an apart­ment in New York or Hong Kong and a win­ter retreat in Palm Beach,” says Tucker.

Read the full article

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