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2011: Heritage Toronto Awards
The Continental Can Company Headquarters, located at the southwest corner of Bay Street and College Street, 790 Bay Street, is an architecturally significant work of the prominent Toronto architect, Peter Dickinson. This 11-storey building was completed in 1959 and now serves as one of the largest medical office buildings in Canada. The Continental Can building is designed in the International Style and can be recognized by the application of modern materials such as precast concrete and glass, as well as by the lack of surface ornamentation along all elevations.
The Continental Can Company was a prominent manufacturer of food storage products during the 1930s through to the 1970s. The Continental Can Company maintained a positive image in the Canadian manufacturing space and employed nearly 1000 Canadian workers during its peak. Surrounded by similar scale bank offices on opposite corners, the Continental Can building was one of several to introduce the Modern architectural style to the Bay and College area. Peter Dickinson, being a well-known Modernist architect at the time, played an important role in creating the modern built context that is so familiar in Toronto today. Dickinson spread his influence in the city through the construction of many high-profile buildings, including the former O’Keefe Centre (now Sony Centre), the Education Building on College Street, the Courthouse on Jarvis Street, and a significant portion of the Regent Park neighbourhood.
The Continental Can Building portrays several unique characteristics, including a second-storey parking garage with glazed walls that curve to follow the line of College Street. Commercial entrances on the east, north, and west elevations are inset beneath this parking garage, creating a small shaded band around the façade of the building. Other defining features of the building include the reinforced concrete frame with precast concrete spandrels, horizontal strip windows with a stainless steel sash, and vertical wall divisions constructed of precast concrete clad in stainless steel. The stone, steel, and glass detailing embrace the International Style and unify the Continental Can Building with the surrounding context, while confirming a departure from the architectural style of the previous era.
The lobby of 790 Bay Street was renovated prior to 2011 by Sievenpiper Architects, who later joined Farrow Partnership Architects in 2011. The 790 Bay Street lobby restoration by Sievenpiper Architects was nominated for a 2011 Heritage Toronto Award; specifically, the William Greer Architectural Conservation and Craftsmanship Category.
