Discard or Recycle? Pondering the Fate of Coca-Cola Canada's Iconic Modernist HQ Building

Coca-Cola Canada is moving downtown and out of its Toronto headquarters on Overlea Blvd. in Thorncliffe Park, and the future of the structure is unknown, despite it's iconic status.

“It is one of the best remaining examples in Toronto of a suburban corporate headquarters, which was a new and important building type during the postwar period,” Robert Moffatt of Moriyama & Teshima Architects told The Toronto Star. “It’s a classic, clean-lined modernist design, executed with high-quality materials and workmanship, and immaculately maintained in original condition.”

Designed by Mathers and Halenby, a long-standing Toronto architecture firm whose work included The Eaton Centre and the National Library and Archives in Ottawa, the building was opened July 22, 1965.

Equally uncertain is the fate of the HQ building's beloved bronze landscape sculpture of Coke bottles by Walter Yarwood. "We are doing research to find out whether it belongs to the community or it belongs to (Coca-Cola),” Tova White, Coke HR VP told The Star. “It is obviously an iconic piece that was created especially for this building, so it will be entrusted in some way to either the community or our new facility.”