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Moiya informed me that the Chambers building on Confederation Square is her favourite, and she told me why. “Judy Crawley, Major Bond and I had hands in saving it in the 1960s. Buyers (from Switzerland I think, ) wanted to tear it down and rebuild it. They also wanted to move their building forward, closer to the road. Thank goodness the government decided to buy the building. Inside, it was mostly a sorry sight. My husband and I started to clean up some of the old lady. The rest is another story.” She went on, after voicing her fears for the coming new entrance for the National Arts Centre, to say, “There are many condos that make me shudder, it is hard to pick; I could say the Metropole near Westboro is one I do not like. It is not really because it is ugly, but mainly because it sticks out like a sore thumb.” Parts of the city are all sore thumbs, such as the southeast corner of the Byward Market on Cumberland and Rideau. Yikes.

There were many nominations either way for condos. (I’m retiring the condos on LeBreton Flats from competition this year. No more hate mail about them, please.) The tower that got the most thumbs up was The Merit, the art-deco luxury condos at the back of City Hall. Hear, hear. I get a lift from the sheer fact of it when it catches my eye; a yacht in a sea of cargo vessels.

There were one or two calls for outright demolition of some monstrosities, including several of the more Soviet shoeboxes on Tunney’s Pasture. Likewise for the Palladium (selling naming rights only works if we agree to use them) which is, I was reminded, built on an ex-navigable waterway; it may undergo a shapeshift when the LeBreton Flats stadium opens, but I fear it is here to stay.

In the final tally, your favourite is the Château Laurier, a sculpture indeed set in a park and alongside a waterway, and the least favourite is the still under construction moonraker, the Icon condo, corner of Preston and Carling. One reader suggested tilting it slightly and putting a pizza parlour at the bottom. Get it?

Phil Jenkins is an Ottawa writer. Reach him at phil@philjenkins.ca