Excerpt from www1.toronto.ca:
The Toronto Dominion Centre – TD Waterhouse Tower: 76 Wellington Street
Era: Post-War
Style: High Modern
The original TD-Centre remains one of the finest examples of the work of Mies van der Rohe, and one of the city’s greatest architectural landmarks. After the success of the two original towers of the TD-Centre of 1967, several subsequent towers were developed. Currently, there are seven towers under the umbrella of the ‘Toronto Dominion Centre’, five of which follow the ‘Miesian’ aesthetic.
The TD-Waterhouse Tower, completed in 1985, is an example of a tower inspired by Mies. B+H Architects of Toronto, along with Fujikawa Contarato Lohan & Associate – the Chicago firm that evolved from the practice of Mies van der Rohe after his passing, designed the project. It follows the same steel tower in the plaza formation of the original TD-Centre as well as much of the same aesthetics and detailing. It is programmatically unique from the adjacent towers as it contains a substantial art gallery on its main floor.
The tower is sited south of Wellington Street and is bounded by the Royal Bank Plaza, 95 Wellington office building and the Royal York Hotel. It is directly across from the Toronto Dominion Bank Tower, located north of Wellington, and forms the southern boundary of the TD Centre – the principle open space in the financial district. This prominent project is visible from Union Station’s forecourt, and is of a scale only slightly larger than that of the Royal York. This fits into the gradual increase in building height from Front towards King Street and First Canadian Place to the north. The project is situated on land that would have been Federal Avenue. The building’s plaza acts as a popular pedestrian passageway that leads from the TD-Centre to the Royal York Hotel and on to Union Station.
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