Archives: architecture

One of my favourite places in Hamilton is Jackson Square’s rooftop. So I guess it shouldn’t have been a surprise (cause great minds think a like -right?) that it’d also be the chosen meeting place of Hamilton cheerleader and architectural lover Thomas Allen of Rebuild Hamilton. We met up on top of Jackson Square for an unusual evening gathering of likeminded folks.

We spent most of the night on various downtown rooftops talking about non other than our true love… Hamilton.

The best thing about it was grabbing a few of these shots (above) but also connecting with the likes of Forris Borris aka Sex Drugs and Hamont aka Taylor Heres (beautifully talented photographic aesthetic) and Matt Carson (creator of Exhale Music and Eternal Summer music series).

These gents are doing some pretty cool things in this city. Check their links and follow them on insta. You won’t be disappointed.

In the back of my mind I have this running list of places to check out in Hamilton and the surrounding area. There’s usually a reserve of ideas and places banked so that we don’t go and blow all our fun Hamilton adventures in one go.  That way there’ll always be some new #HamOnt gem to discover.

The Steam and Technology Museum was one of those destinations.

The drive down to the museum was pretty cool. We weaved our way through the industrial heart of Hamilton.

Neo: old factory I spotted on the way to the museum. I couldn’t resist that baby blue lettering. We pulled over so I could snap a picture.

 

I definitely would like to go back and take some more photos of these old buildings, and especially this weirdly out of place island of 60′s residential neighbourhoods smack right in the middle of this industrial tip. Since all the buildings and factories had a total mid-century feel it kinda made sense that the subdivisions were built to be the homes for the factory workers -perhaps?

The Steam and Technology Museum itself was pretty cool. They had a live miniature steam train that you could take a ride on for a little spin (only during their scheduled steamer days in the summer), plus a slew of other scheduled events, activities and things to explore.

The architecture alone was worth checking out.

The Hamilton Globe that collects methane gas from the City’s water treatment facility. A definite iconic Hamilton symbol from my youth while passing the industrial part of the city on the QEW Niagara. There was much talk last winter of the potentially for its dismantling or refurbishment (with a new paint job)?

 

To read more about what to see and do at the Steam and Technology Museum, check out my post here on Tourism Hamilton‘s #MyHamilton page where I write a regular feature of family friendly outings in the city.

Last week I saw the signage and insignia for Copps Coliseum being taken down. Its vintage orange lettering, which matched the stadium’s exterior underbelly, was faded and properly representative of its era of origin from the 80′s.

Some might say good riddance to the namesake Copps. Especially for those that argue that Victor Copps, (former Hamilton mayor, who had been known to some as an advocate for “urban renewal”) did nothing for the city but level the core of Hamilton’s downtown to make way for the giant modernist cement conglomerate we now know as Jackson Square.

Check out this great historic video done by the Hamilton Public Library to get a good perspective and history of the area that was torn down to make room for Jackson Square.

When I used to work in the North End I would sometimes bike between the Bennetto and Keith neighbourhoods crossing over the tracks at Victoria Avenue. Taking a few neighbourhood side streets, to avoid the industrial highway of Burlington Street East, I would always pass by a huge old abandoned factory. You would’ve seen it too if you’d ever driven down that way.

On Victoria Avenue North past the General Hospital and just before Burlington Street East you would’ve seen the old Studebaker factory. It’d be hard to miss. It was a 4 block monstrosity of a factory, where in all honesty at least 3 football fields could’ve fit inside its 7.5 acre lot. I used to marvel at it every time I passed by.

 

Like many of the older factory and industrial spaces tucked into Hamilton’s landscape this one too had been empty for some time. The last Studebaker to be rolled off the production line at this factory was in 1966.

 

 

Recently there was some talk of the space being repurposed as a film studio (would’ve been awesome). But as per the fate of many of these industrial relics, it is currently in the process of being torn down. A new industrial complex will be built in its spot. (for more info see an article from The Spec here).

Just last week I paid my respects to that old factory. It is currently being torn down to the ground into a rubble of red Hamilton bricks. I was able to snap some photos of whatever reminants of it that remained.

In its former industrial incarnations it housed production for everything from Otis elevators to the classic Studebaker -it was even used a weapons factory during World War I and II!

I was happy to note that the corner portion of the building will remain intact to be a repurposed as part of the new industrial development.

Not to mention, I was pleased to see that it wouldn’t end up as just another brown field like the one directly across the street from the Studebaker lot.

 

Hamilton, the times they are a changing.

 

 

 

What is up with all the downtown Hamilton schools that have been sold off, boarded up, and demolished?  It seems like there are more schools sold and closed than I can count on my two hands.  There’s the Stinson Street School, coincidently bought and recently redeveloped by Harry Stinson, who by the way developed the infamous Candy Factory Lofts, which spearheaded the urban revitalization on Queen west in Toronto way back in 1993.  For the most part I’m happy to see when gorgeous buildings in Hamilton, like the Stinson School, remain intact and are simply refurbished for their new life as lofty living spaces.

Of the downtown Hamilton schools that have closed there’s Scott Park, 220 Dundurn, Allenby, Tweedsmuir, Robert Land, Gibson,  and Fairfield schools, all of which were sold by the public board since amalgamation in 1998 (and those are just the ones downtown!).  I know that this partially reflects the declining enrollment that many school boards across Ontario are seeing, but I also think it has something to say about the expansion of new subdivision continued urban sprawl, and flight to the suburbs, which are now all part of the larger amalgamated Hamilton.

I’ve had the pleasure of visiting a few of these schools after their sale from the board, while they’ve been in transition between owners.

One rainy day I visited the old Gibson school.  It was a little eerie walking into all the empty classrooms, many of which had little reminders and remnants of its former life as a full on school.

I love the old school buildings in Hamilton.  I have a sentimental feeling associated with them, mostly because they are beautiful but also because I feel like they just don’t make buildings as grand anymore.

It can be really sad to see such beautiful old schools emptied, abandoned and boarded up.  I really hope that this school gets put to good use, and some life gets put back into it.  Smashed and boarded up windows really does nothing for the moral of a neighbourhood and city.

*Old Gibson School, 601 Barton St. east, Hamilton