Place Ville-Marie by MagikUnicorn

Photography • Architecture • posted on Apr 19, 2012

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No AI - This artwork was created entirely by hand or with traditional digital tools.

Description

Place Ville Marie (PVM), formerly Royal Bank Tower taken from its anchor tenant, is a 188 m (617 ft) with 47-storey, cruciform office tower built in the International style in 1962, arguably the most distinctive building in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It was built in the 1960s as the headquarters of the Royal Bank of Canada. Along with an underground shopping mall, it forms the nexus of Montreal's Underground City, the world's largest, with indoor access to over 1,600 shops, restaurants, offices and businesses, as well several metro stations in Montreal, a suburban transportation terminal, and tunnels extending all over downtown. A rotating beacon on the rooftop (turning counter-clockwise) lights up at night, illuminating the surrounding sky with up to four white horizontal beams that can be seen as far as 50 km away. The name "Place Ville Marie" is often used to refer to the cruciform building only, but it also applies to four shorter office buildings which were built around it in 1963 and 1964, and to the urban plaza which lies on top of the largest section of the shopping promenade, and between the buildings. From a postal point of view the cruciform tower is "1, Place Ville Marie" and the lesser buildings around it are "2, Place Ville Marie" and so on. The buildings and the plaza have been given many facelifts over the years. In the latest facelift, much of the grey concrete and terrazzo of the plaza was covered with grass, flowers and shrubs. The complex has 2,700,000 square feet (250,838 m2) of space and parking for about 900 cars. There are about 70 tenants with 3,000 employees. Via Rail has its headquarters in "3, Place Ville Marie". Place Ville Marie was one of the first designs of Henry N. Cobb and I. M. Pei, who was later to become a famous master of Modernist architecture. His design was controversial from the start given its proximity to many Montreal landmarks and the vast changes it would bring to the downtown core. MORE INFORMATION >>> List of tallest buildings in Montreal Thanks Magik _________

Comments (52)

T.Rex

6:39AM | Fri, 20 April 2012

Ahhh.... memories! Thanks! How many times have I walked through the underground, shopped there, sat and eaten there, and the weather could be cold, windy, snowing like MAD, yet, all was light, nice, warm and comfortable inside. And the railroad headquarters are still there. Is the Royal Bank still headquartered there? At my last visit in 1992, there were several new sky scrapers in Montréal. Were Cobb and Pei involved in the design of any of those? There were some similarities to Place Ville Marie in some of them. Thanks for the link - I'll chaeck it as soon as I have time. Keep up the good work! :-)