Composite Cast Steel Nodes Suspend 11-Story Office Building above Two Heritage Structures

Although the Queen Richmond Centre West (Figure 1) in Toronto offers a brilliant example of adaptive re-use through its integration of two existing heritage buildings into the construction of a new 11-story office building, it’s the fact that the 11-story tower springs from above both existing buildings that makes Phase One of this development a truly unique structure. Critical to the realization of the design from both a structural and architectural perspective is the use of elegantly shaped 31,500-pound cast steel nodes in the architecturally exposed structural steel framework supporting the building. …