9. Commerce Court (CIBC Tower) - 199 Bay Street

We’re here at Commerce Court, a classic Toronto combination of old and new architecture working together. Flush along King Street is Commerce Court North, an ornate 1931 building that was said to have been the tallest building in the British Empire for a few decades. Closer to the corner is the glass and steel tower known as Commerce Court West. Completed in 1972, it, like the TD Centre across the street, is in the International Style. Designed by architect I.M. Pei, perhaps most famous for his glass pyramids that were added to the Louvre in Paris, it also has direct Bauhaus connections.

Pei was trained at the Harvard Graduate School of Design where he met and worked with Bauhaus architects Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. Harvard itself also played host to the first Bauhaus exhibition in the United States in 1930 and went on to be a major centre of all things Bauhaus in America, so Pei was steeped in its ideals.

As of 2021, Commerce Court is set to change yet again as the shorter south building, behind Pei’s glass tower, is set to be razed and a new tower put in its place. The city is never static.