5. Sir Adam Beck Statue - 250 University Avenue

Here in the middle of University Avenue is the monument to Sir Adam Beck, the German-Canadian politician and early advocate for public hydro-electricity in Ontario. If you look around the base of the monument, the locations of Ontario’s hydro-electric generating stations are listed. The sculpture was designed by German-Canadian sculptor Emanual Hahn, perhaps most famous for his Bluenose sculpture on the 10-cent coin.

Beck has a great view of the Opera House on the east side of the street. When lit from within at night it has a lantern effect, and the curtain glass wall here is an echo of the glass wall on the Bauhaus building in Dessau supported by narrow steel mullions. Its structure is exposed and transparent, as we can see the balconies and staircases within.

We’re also standing atop the Osgoode TTC station -- note the signs on each corner. Bauhaus member Herbert Bayer created the Universal typeface and visual identity for the school, which today we would call the “brand”. In the same spirit, the TTC commissioned the Toronto Subway typeface for the opening of the first stretch of the Yonge line in 1954, creating a uniform look along the line. Use of the type was neglected by the TTC in intervening decades but it has been revived in recent years.