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08/16/2005: "On The Waterfront"

Last Thursday we met at the nice cafe at the Sunnyside Bathing Pavilion. I like that there is a whole pavilion dedicated to bathing. It sounds civic and clean at the same time - two very good concepts. The water at this beach, unlike some other lovely Toronto beaches, is sort of stale looking and unfit for swimming. It's full of geese and dragon boat people, both of which make the water undesirable. The dragon people did invade the cafe later as well, but we well behaved but poorly dressed. The food is mostly the kind of stuff with lots of melted cheese piled on it, but the building makes up for it. I'm glad the café does bring some accessible life into the place. I wish somebody would do the same for the Palais Royal down the shore. It looked boarded up and in need of dancing or something. It has (I think) the only sprung dance floor left in Toronto.

Nadia wrote about it . on her blog, and posted some pictures. Matt also posted some pictures on the Toronto Psychogeography Society's Flicker site found here .

Replies: 3 Comments

on Friday, August 19th, sookie said

Your wish will come true. 2 million bucks has been invested into Palais Royale to refurbish it to it's original 1930's dance hall state. That's why it's boarded up. I'm so glad someone will take care of it. Poor little thing was one of only a few buildings that survived when the Gardiner ripped through this part of town.

on Friday, August 19th, Dylan said

I danced at the Palais Royale a few years ago just before it was closed, to a swing band. It was very low-key by then, but still a fantastic large dance floor. I can't wait for it to be restored.

BTW, there was a silly-sweet Canadian movie set there called "Palais Royale", featuring Kim Cattral doing her sexy schtick long before Sex in the City.

I was kind of glad the Sunnyside Pavilion was pretty low-key - it was very accessible that way. I fear if it was restored it would be invaded by the type of people who take the Style section of the Saturday Globe seriously, and frequent the Drake.

on Saturday, August 20th, Nadia said

A couple of summers ago I saw Neil Finn live at the Palais Royale. It was a really nice, character-ful venue, with good sound and a lovely side patio overlooking the lake, but it had neither a/c nor adequate ventilation, and it was incredibly, unbelievably hot. Finn said it was the hottest room he'd ever played in, and at one point asked everyone in the audience to blow at the stage at the same time, in the hopes of getting a bit of a breeze going.

So a reno will be a good thing, yes.