Books & Lit
Spacing Magazine Party Supported by Mayor
Spacing magazine celebrated five years of publishing its magazine about understanding the urban landscape in Toronto on Wednesday night at The Great Hall.
As a longtime contributor, I've witnessed the magazine expand from a little-known local rag five years ago to one of the most respected sources of information on public space issues.
Spacing magazine is now much more widely read, has two blogs and has a facebook group with over 2,800 members and has won a handful of National Magazine Awards.
Mayor David Miller came by the party to help congratulate the staff and supporters for their efforts. Is that a Corona in his left hand?
"I wish you success for another 50 years," said Miller (pictured above with Spacing publisher and creative director Matt Blackett).
"We're hoping to increase our publication to four, and eventually six issues a year," added Blackett, in his brief address to the crowd. The magazine currently publishes three times a year.
Shuffle Demon Richard Underhill (right) helped celebrate the evening with some smooth grooves on his saxophone.
By the end of the night people had filled the dance floor to the sounds of the DJ, who eventually played Spadina Bus.
The finalists from the thinkToronto urban ideas competition were featured on large displays in the hall (as well as in the magazine's latest issue).
There's some awesome ideas presented here. If you're at all interested in how we can improve our city, I urge you to take a good look at some of the innovative ideas presented.
A neatly laid out selection of TTC subway buttons were on display and sale as well.
One of my favourite parts of the night was to help devour the beautifully made architectural Spacing cakes (not to be confused with space cakes that were made expressly for the occasion.
Spacing magazine anniversary party attendees David Oppenheimer (below left) and Richie Wiskin were eager to tear into the Fall '08/Winter '09 issue.
Photos by Roger Cullman
Rannie Turingan had his portable photo station set up to help document the Spacing supporters who attended the event. Photo slide show below:
Rose Bianchini filmed people as they attempted to answer the statement: Name five things you like about Toronto (the result of which we hope to see soon). In the meantime, tell us how you'd answer....
Discussion
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Had a great time there, especially loved the mid 90's high school-esq dance music.
Great event and congratulations to both SPacing and all "ThinkToronto" finalists.
It brings me great joy to see creative people involving themselves in making change(or hoping to anyway) and simply caring about their city in this way.
Making a difference in this city is hard, but exposure like this(*ie. Mayor Miller and rallies around town) tells people that we don't simply want a place to live and work. We want Toronto to be the world class city it deserves(without the red tape)
Culture, transportation, urban planning, affordable housing and sustainable livingspaces are all hot topics right now and Spacing is doing good by bringing these issues to the fore.
Keep it up Spacing and may you live to have many more celebrations.
The problem with that party: not enough hipsters. I would've liked to see more people wearing scarves and toques indoors.
Seriously: spacing is an awesome rag, keep up the good work.
As good an idea as I think Spacing is, I sure do wish they'd turn it up a notch. You know, lean a little harder on David Miller.
The magazine reads as though it's written by gentle, civic-minded hipsters who license their cats, and wear warm fuzzy hats and scarfs inside, and hold events at the Great Hall!
Love spacing and hope they go for another 20 years ( how cool would that be?). I think they lean on the City more than Miller because staff are the ones implementing policies. And their city hall people ( John Lorinc) have been rather critical.
But i take issue with the snarky comments above: why this need to classify people so dismissively? Do you want it to be filled with jocks or nerds or goths instead? It seems so shallow and petty. And right out of high school.
Yes I like scarves and good parties and the great hall and care about the future of our city? Do I or anyone else deserve ridicule? Replace "hipster" with "white trash" and see how silly it sounds. Or maybe this is just a case of hipsters only being allowed to call each other hipsters, like black people being able to.....