Toronto the Good

every time i get back to Toronto, ready to unpack & do some laundry, i discover a new well-organized event that's got to be checked out immediately, clean clothes or no...so last night, instead of staying home with my luggage, i went off to Spacing Magazine's 4th annual "Toronto the Good" party, at my favourite Distillery party space, the Fermenting Cellar.
though mostly it was just a good party (incl. tasty salad bar, spacey backing tracks, beautiful postcards from the already-much-missed Ballenford Books), the space was also a great choice for its purported topic: does Toronto needs an urban centre, or, maybe more straight-forwardly, what's an urban centre for?
so...does Toronto need some kind of building that hosts events & exhibitions & collections about itself as a city--kind of like the Pavillion de l'Arsenal in Paris? i would say YES, absolutely. but if the Pavillion is anything to go by, the centre needs to be brilliantly-curated & accessible (in all the meanings of that term) or it will only interest a select few.

(nice roofbeams in the Fermenting space)

as in previous years, one far end wall was devoted to "the big map of Toronto" --unmarred by street names or park labels, just a plain map of the city with blue & yellow stickers available for people to sticker in their favourite secret place in the city, or the place which presents the greatest mystery to them. i didn't stay long enough for a complete survey, but around 9pm it sure looked like downtown had the most stickers, both blue & yellow. which i guess is no surprise.