VERVE CONDOMINIUM

Developer: Tridel
Architect: Burka Varacalli Architects

This residential condominium project, completed in 2008, at the north side of Wellesley Street, between Church and Jarvis Streets, near midtown Toronto, is comprised of a forty-one level tower block, and a seven level loft block. The entire project is constructed above a three level subgrade parking garage.
Columns and walls are founded on spread and strip footings, respectively, and the tower elevator shafts and scissors stair walls are founded on
2050 mm deep mat footings.
Framed parking levels, P1 and P2, are similar and are 200 mm thick, reinforced concrete, flat slabs, with 125 mm deep drop panels, at the columns.
The ground floor framing within the tower area is, for the most part, a
200 mm thick, reinforced concrete, flat slab, with 150 mm deep drop panels, at the columns. There are ninety-three reinforced concrete beams in the ground floor of the loft block, many of which are transfer beams, to carry the loads from the shear walls above onto the parking garage columns below.
At the second floor level, between the towers and the loft blocks, there is a 10.3 metre long entrance lobby bridge structure. Inside the tower, there is a curved lobby stair which leads down to the ground floor.
The tower floors from the fourth through to the thirty-ninth level are framed in a similar manner with 200 mm thick, one-way, reinforced concrete, slabs spanning between reinforced concrete shear walls. The strength of the concrete for all balconies, on all floor levels, was specified to be 35 megapascals, at twenty-eight days, with 6 to 8 percent entrained air, to satisfy exposure class “C1” criteria.
The main roof, of the loft block, is framed as a series of one-way, reinforced concrete, slabs with thicknesses varying from 200 mm to 300 mm to provide slopes to drains on the landscaped terrace where the swimming pool and the whirlpool are located.
The penthouse roofs are primarily framed as a one-way, reinforced concrete, slabs, with minimum, thicknesses of 200 mm, to provide slopes to roof drains.
The mechanical penthouse, for the tower, is at the fortieth level, as is the main roof. The framing on this level is a series of 200 mm to 300 mm thick, one-way, reinforced concrete, slabs, providing slopes to roof drains.
Lateral forces and deformations imposed on the structure by wind and seismic affects are resisted, and controlled by coupled shear walls, interacting with the walls of the elevator shaft, and the stairwells, in the loft block, which is structurally separated from the tower block. In the tower block, the lateral forces are resisted and controlled by the interaction of the shear walls and the central, reinforced concrete core.