Well Toronto, we did it. We finally surpassed Chicago to become the 4th largest city by population in North America. Be honest, doesn’t it feel good up here at the…kind of top? Whatever, that’s not too important. What is important is that we’re pretty big, we’re also “pretty good” at some other things.
We’re often described as the “Chicago of the north” and we can see why, the two cities share similar features and personalities. But we’ve never been too keen on remaining equals, we need to make this 4th spot our own. We need to make Chicago “America’s Toronto”. So without further adieu, we’re pitting the two cities head to head in a totally not-biased battle. Chicago Vs. Toronto – The showdown for 4th.
There really isn’t anything better then diving nose-first into a good book. Last month we went a little sci-fi, but we’ll try to bring us back down to reality this month with these fiction titles. Warning – since this is the month of love and all, they’re heartbreakers.
Move over, Yonge st, you’re not the talk of the town anymore. Well you may be still, but you’re not our favourite. There, we said it.
One of the reasons we love Toronto so much is the diverse nature of each street. Be it culturally, economically, or demographically, each street has it’s own story from beginning to end. In our first entry to the series, we take a look at what is sometimes called “downtown south”. Or as we lovingly call it, “Jock Alley”. Come with us as we explain why Bremner Boulevard is one of our favourite streets in Toronto.
It was a a bit rainy the other day and we thought, what better day to make a visit to St. Lawrence Market? So we headed on down to the neighbourhood to check out the latest things the market has to offer!
We’d like to start off 2013 by doing something a bit different. Yes we will still have construction updates, amusing and hopefully, informative posts about Toronto and it’s history. But our resolution was to inject a little more…Culture into this blog.
As you’re probably aware, we at Context are avid readers – not just the classics though, we’re pretty up to date on some current books as well! Recently we got our “geek” on to check out some recent sci-fi novels. Head past the jump for Context book reviews of The Postmortal By Drew Magary and Ready, Player One by Ernest Cline.
So here we are, looks like the Mayans were right after all. Who had called that massive volcano to erupt and throw us out of orbit? Nobody? Wow. Oh well, what’s done is done and those of us alive are totally looking for something to pass the time. After all, we’re pretty sure we won’t have to go into work next week. So what is there to do?
Every month we take a look at the history of Library District‘s most famous neighbour; Fort York. This month in an interview with the foremost expert regarding the fort, Dr. Carl Benn, Dean of History at Ryerson University, our discussion will focus around the years immediately after the war and leading up to Canada’s independence.These years were influential in the development of Toronto and Canada as we know it exists today.
October is banned book week, this is where libraries and schools celebrate these great works of literature that have often been the subject of controversy, despite their status as literary classics. They are often introduced to people in schools as must-read material that challenges us as human beings to look internally at what drives us all. However, there are some places in the world where these books have been considered “obscene” or go against common teachings. We think you might be surprised by some of the books that are considered “banned”. See below for our top 5 banned books to check out this week.
Right beside our Library District construction site lies one of the most historically significant sites in Toronto, if not Canada. Fort York was built to protect the small colony of York from American threats in the later part of the 1700’s and has played a key role in the development of modern Toronto as we know it. In the following series we will sit down with one of the most foremost experts on Fort York, Carl Benn, PhD and Dean of History at Ryerson University to chat about the fort’s history and it’s role in shaping Toronto into the city it is today.
We recently, we came across a series of stunning infographics created by Mikell Fine Iles that refer to different parks of the world, and we thought it was worth sharing them with you.
