TOUR de FER
In the summer of 2001, my wife and I vacationed in Montreal for a week. In between the underground city, the fireworks competition, and the numerous festivals, I decided to put the digital camera to work.

Since I've recently become obsessed with blacksmithing, I thought a "walking tour" of the local ironwork would be a good test of the camera's abilities. The following is the result. Keep in mind that I'm probably a better blacksmith than a photographer. Also, this is a walking tour and not an in-depth study. A proper treatment would include more information, such as dates, artists, etc.

So come along with me on the tour.

A couple notes: Whenever I mention the term "wrought iron" I'm referring to the wrought iron look, not necessarily the material. I really don't know when, therefore, what of, these works were made.

Secondly, "Tour de Fer" is a little play on the Tour de France. "Fer" is the French word for iron. "Tour" is actually French for "tower", not the English "tour". But if it's good enough for the bike race, it'll do for me.

And, as usual, clicking on any picture will bring up the original size. Beware, though, that the original size averages around 300K, so a slower connection might take a few seconds to bring up. I didn't want to reduce them because some have quite a bit of detailing and I didn't want to lose resolution.

Two-and-a-Halfs

"Two-and-a-halfs" is a term that refers to a very common residence in Montreal. It stands for two-rooms plus kitchen (the half). The buildings themselves usually have two of these, sometimes three, on separate floors. Each building pretty much butts side-by-side with the other buildings.

To save space, there are no internal staircases between apartments, so all access is from the outside. Virtually all the staircases I saw were constructed of steel, probably because of their superior ability to withstand the Montreal winters.


The above picture shows the variety in colors and styles of the ironwork. The following are more examples of the variety in architecture. One thing to keep in mind; most of these are lower income apartments. While a basic, functional, style would have sufficed and probably be less expensive, they chose to add a little style to the city.







Rue Berri

We were staying at a hotel on Rue Berri, so this was a natural area for a walking tour. The following are pics taken of different structures that caught my eye.



Rue Notre Dame

On one of my walks down Rue Berri, I took a right onto Rue Notre Dame and took a few pics. This road was a nice walk into downtown Montreal. It passes by quite a few attractions, most notable the Notre Dame Basilica. This is one of the nicest churches you'll ever run across. We'll end up there in a bit, but let's enjoy the walk.

Basilica Notre Dame

The Notre Dame Basilica is one of the major attractions in Montreal, a city famous for its churches. Many call it a cathedral, but technically, in the Roman Catholic Church, to be called a cathedral it's got to be the church of the bishop in the diocese. Basilica is the descriptive term for such a structure. Notre Dame has got an amazing ceiling, wonderful stained glass, and very impressive architecture. Sorry, folks, but the inside is not really ironwork, so it's not a stop on this tour.


This is a view from across the street.


And a closeup of the door's hardware.


This is a closeup of the base of the lamp in the first photo. I liked the heavy-duty scrolls.




And a gate around the side of the church. This is an example of old iron (the gate) and new "iron" (the bike).

The old Bank of Quebec

The Bank of Quebec moved some years ago into more modern facilities next door, but left this little piece behind. I believe it now houses offices.


A most impressive entranceway.




And a closeup of the ironwork above the doorway. Work like this makes me wish I had more time to really research. I would love to find out more about the artist(s) who did this work and the following gate.




La Cathedrale Marie du Monde

Also known as Mary Queen of the World Cathedral. This church is a few streets away from Notre Dame. This church has impressive metalwork on the inside as well as outside. While not strictly ironwork, I thought I'd include it anyway.


This door is a bit of a departure from the other churches' architecture.


The baptismal font inside the church.


The mortuary where previous bishops are entombed.


And the altar. This is a combination of wood and metal.



St. Joseph's Oratory


Unfortunately, the background makes it difficult to see the bottom of the gate, but you get a good idea of the work up top. The Oratory is in the background.

Christ Church Cathedral

The last church on the tour, the Christ Church Cathedral is an Anglican cathedral. The hinges are not functional, but obviously were at some point in time.




Centre of Commerce Mondial

Basic decoration, but I thought it was a nice touch.





Le Chateau Ramezay

A slightly different style.




The Hotel deVille

Actually, the old Hotel deVille. More gothic ironwork.




A Gift

Paris presented the city of Montreal with the following railing and lamp. It's iron, but with that interesting shade of green paint. I think the lamp looks like something out of "War of the Worlds". This piece is actually used as an entrance to the Metro, Montreal's subway.




Speaking of the Metro

More Modern Work

Now we move into more modern metal artwork. This just shows that Montreal's love of metal work is still developing.


This is a gate in one of the Metro's stops. I don't know what it's gating, because behind the gate is just a small, empty, 6 X 6 "room". Whatever its function, it was skillfully welded and shows a more modern attention to art metal.


The D'Aversa is a very upscale restaurant located in the Montreal underground city. This is the railing to one of their indoors entrances.


The entrance to the Hilton.


The main bus terminal of Montreal, the Terminus Centreville. The Hilton's gateway is in the foreground, but you can see the Terminus' steel and glass structure.



The Botanical Garden

Part of the BioDome complex, the Botanical Garden and Arboretum is a wonderful display of nature. This natural beauty is accented by man's creativity.




My Coffee with Victor

And last, but certainly not least, when I asked the Artmetal list for site that might be interesting to a blacksmith-type person, Victor Leunens invited me to his apartment. Victor's father, Guillaume, was an artist who worked with metal. His technique remains a mystery today, as he seems to have left no clues, apparently preferring to leave it as a challenge. His metal work was mainly some type of molten metal on aluminum. So while it's not iron, I found it interesting enough to include in my tour. Victor's apartment is but a small collection of his father's work, but still it covers every wall. A better treatment of Guillaume Leunens, authored by Victor work can be read here. But here's what I had the great opportunity to see as Victor's guest.
Psaume
Harsadd
Linperr
Fleuressterr
These are metal on metal. Leunens was fascinated with the outer space and you can see that in these pieces.

Rorr
This one is metal on canvas. Leunens like to experiment with textures, colors, and, obviously, media. There are quite a few other works in Victor's apartment, but I didn't include them here because they were not related to metal.

If you're interested in following up more on Leunens' work, visit the following sites. There's no way I could ever do a proper treatment.

http://wuarchive.wustl.edu/edu/arts/metal/Features/Leunens/
http://pages.globetrotter.net/leunens/metal/index.html


That should do it for the tour. I hope you enjoyed the trip.

-Marc
08/05/2001