[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="599" caption="Canadian Museum of Nature: Victorian, haunted, under renovation, and *not* the answer"][/caption] No one has correctly guessed the correct answer to last week's puzzler. To refresh memories, here it is again: While I currently sit unassumingly at the base of the city, stripped down, but encased, I once played host to spectacles and even the Prime Minister. What structure am I? So it's time to break out the cheat-sheet and make with the extra hints: I am not the Musuem of Nature (Victoria Memorial Building) I am located in the northern ...

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600" caption="Courtyard behind Sussex Drive"][/caption] When you're getting to know someone you think might have prospects it often a good idea to spend some sunshine hours with them before moving on to dinner and a movie and whatever might come next. Going for a walk can be a great strategy. Let them choose the route, maybe end up somewhere for a coffee, and spend a while with them where you can get a sense of who they are before there are any expectations. One person we thought Ottawa needs to go on a daytime stroll with and get to know of a little better is George Dark, chair of the Strategic Design Review and Advisory Panel. That's the panel charged with making sure the design of the new Lansdowne will do Ottawa proud. How important is that? Well, some argue that Lansdowne Live might be the biggest city-building project we've seen in decades. So this thing we've started with George might be very serious, indeed. But beyond getting paid for it, we wondered -- why should a Toronto landscape architect care what a long-neglected site 400 kilometers away from his office really ends up looking like? Why should we trust him to care about us?

First of all congratulations to Charles A-M aka Centretretowner for correctly identifying the former bank’s likeness in the central carved panel above the Wellington Street entrance. As you'll recall our first round was a two-part question: I am a building, and I just may be the only one in the downtown core to include a depiction of myself on my exterior. Who am I, and where on me do I feature this image of me? The first part of the question drew a blank from everyone, but once we named the building as a further clue, Charles found the depiction, located under the rays of “Thrift” up on the edge of a bluff ( see image below). It is a rather heroic likeness, but there is nothing wrong with a little artistic license now and then.

We've had no correct answers to our first Where in Ottawa contest. even after two times of asking, so it's time to move on! The building in question is the Former Bank of Montreal Building at the corner of O’Connor and Wellington (through to Sparks Street). This 1932 RAIC Gold Medal winning building was designed by Ernest Barott of Barott and Blackader out of Montreal in 1929. Barott is also known for designing the Aldred Building in Montreal on Place D’Armes which was designed during the same time as the Former Bank of Montreal.

A couple of weeks back we wrote about some excellent Ottawa blogs that take an urbanist point of view with them as they explore our city's streets and structures. Today we've got three more that are well worth adding to your RSS reader; Spacing Ottawa checks these ones on a daily basis to see what new gems have been brought to light. We'll start with the photoblog Wawtawa Life maintained by photographer Robin Kelsey. Robin tries to post one image every day, and though he's slowed off that pace a bit recently he still manages to be one of the most regular photobloggers around. Based near Somerset West, his eye for the telling detail is superb as he chronicles the fascinating streetscape of Chinatown and adjacent downtown districts. He's a clever man with his photoshop, but for our money he is at his very best when he employs composition or  perspective to tell a story. One mild criticism; it would be great if Wawtawa included a thumbnail gallery to make navigating the site a bit simpler. Still, clicking on a text description instead of a thumbnail image does add to the surprise factor.

I was walking with my out-of-town friend around Ottawa, when, at Parliament Hill my friend remarked that while the Parliament buildings were nice, Ottawa as a city had no sense of cohesion. I was shocked and defensive at first, but he gestured towards the cityscape in front of us and I had to swallow my civic pride. The south side of Wellington is a jumble of architectural styles. Snuggled together is the Second Empire style 1880s Langevin Building, a contemporary National Capital Commission INFOcentre, the 1930s neo-Classical Bank of Canada, enlarged with 1970s glass towers, and peaking out behind these buildings is the Ottawa Marriot with Ottawa’s one revolving restaurant. Certainly, this skyline is influenced by policies beginning in 1910 that prevented buildings in a designated distance from Parliament to exceed the height of Parliament’s Peace Tower. Policies didn’t however regulate for architectural consistency.

Getting off the bus on Rideau Street located in front of the Rideau Centre you are confronted with the former Ogilvy's department store. The five story buff brick building sits as it has been for the past 17 years, empty, deteriorating, while still distinctly marking the corner at Rideau and Nicholas. How did it reach this point, and what is possible in the future? Ogilvy’s is important both from a historic perspective and an urbanistic perspective. The building in its current incarnation started life in 1907 when Charles Ogilvy constructed a modest three story story structure on the site extending halfway through the block with architect W.E. Noffke. As business improved the building more than doubled in size filling out the remainder of the block now occupying the site from Rideau to Besserer; again designed by Noffke in 1917. The building was further expanded, receiving the fourth story in 1931 and the fifth and final story in 1934. With the fifth story it became one of Ottawa’s largest department stores; the square footage was a clear indication of the success that Ogilvy's enjoyed during the first half of the twentieth century.