Prior to Great Gulf’s development of 357 King, the site was affectionately known as the ‘postage stamp.’ The resulting building is a great example of a difficult site that required innovative and creative thinking to develop a viable solution.

Designing a user-friendly building on this narrow site required careful placement of columns and the elevator cores. To maximize the usable floor plate, the elevators are on the west side of the building — rather than in the middle — with strategically placed walls to counteract the increase in torsion.

Regular columns on the ground floor would have blocked access to the retail entrance and a vehicle access/loading area. A prominent V-column between the 3rd and 5th floors at the northwest corner was designed to redistribute structural loads and reduce the number of columns required at the ground floor. The rear driveway is set within the floor plate to leave the public laneway open, and the building cantilevers over this open space to eliminate columns.