an urban park with rural and industrial roots Massey Harris Park | Brown+Storey Architects Paul Whelan m assey Harris Park occupies former
The park is defined by a series of parallel undulating strips of terrain running in an east-west direction across the width of the site to emphasise length over width. The irregular spaces between these strips are reserved for trees and other planting: a nod to the rural landscape created by mechanized farming where between the easily-ploughed fields were left-over spaces, not accessible to machinery, that became colonised by trees and shrubs. The strips provide a wide range of surfaces and spaces for the park including grass, paved, wood boardwalk and limestone screening.
At the west end of the park a large steel trellis floats over the strips and establishes a more sheltered space for activities. It will sup- port climbing plants and lighting devices for night time events. The trellis, developed in collaboration with artist James McLeod, has been conceived as an industrial urban ruin ac- knowledging the vast steel-framed industrial structures that once occupied the site. Overlaying the strips are curved pathways that meet tangentially to provide access between the strips and to encourage meandering routes through the space. To reinforce the path as route as well as spatial opportu-
industrial land in a fast-growing downtown residential neighbourhood. The relatively small site is on the land previously occupied by the Massey Harris Company, once the world’s largest maker of farm equipment. Massey Harris’ factories were the manufac- turing centre of Toronto and created the farm machinery that changed the shape of rural Canada. In a deft twist of Canada’s rural and urban history, the new park simultane- ously references the distant rural landscapes shaped by Massey Harris and the immediate post-industrial ruins left by the closure of the manufacturing plants in Toronto.
on |site 14 25
architecture and land
Made with FlippingBook interactive PDF creator