Thread by @shawnmicallef

Lionhearted in the face of pandemic, inflation, & recession, undeterred by imminent bulldozer & real estate frenzy, the hardest working Christmas tree in Toronto is BACK & more resolute than ever, this year with a new plinth & rug. ✊🏼🎄12/10 #EveryCorporateChristmasTreeInToronto

North York Centre tree. Excellent ball & light coverage. Symmetry is good. Star bursts add a celestial feel (added point). Santa chair keeps it real. Taper ratio ok. Mel Lastman would be proud of this tree in his inventional downtown. 11/10 🎄#EveryCorporateChristmasTreeInToronto

Uniquo Eaton Centre tree. Rare pastel-hued tree + Minecraft-esque presents appear to holding it up. The matching sweater-plinth puts this into a category of its own. Some will argue it’s too-meta but all trees are good. 11.5/10 🎄#EveryCorporateChristmasTreeInToronto

The Rivoli tree. Metallic throwback to 1950s atomic age trees. Restrained pops of red. Classic skirt with added Santa welcome. Snowflake tree topper. A tree to watch the streetcars go by. 13/10 #EveryCorporateChristmasTreeInToronto 🎄

Danforth-Coxwell @torontolibrary branch tree. Despite the mayor’s austerity budget (aka cuts) to library, this tree is proud & noble. Hat as tree topper is a whimsical nod & the crumpled skirt is an effortlessly fluid take on tradition. Tinsel that plays by its own rules. 13/10

Nordstrom Eaton Centre trees. Pink on pink trees. Height but little girth, flash but no balls or garland: a deeply subversive comment on conspicuous consumption that would make Thorstein Veblen proud. The deep ennui exhibited by the mannequins just nails it. 10.5/10

MaRS Discovery District trees. A tableau scene of a quiet forest moment, before the chainsaws are started & the trees transported to the city. A nice town & country moment in the place where they discovered insulin. Excellent snow. 12/10 #EveryCorporateChristmasTreeInToronto

Long & McQuade window tree. A musical tree with rare purple motifs (An homage to Prince? Musicians just being odd?) A Bluetooth speaker of a tree: small but packs a lot in. 11/10 #EveryCorporateChristmasTreeInToronto

Loblaws Empress Walk tree. Tree of bounty at first glance, but the price of the “presents” aka nuts was fixed in collision w other bountiful trees. Tree has also made billions but hasn’t shared w hardworking drummers + bears. They are unionizing, however. 🎄✊🏼💰10/10

*collusion 🎄

Atrium on Bay tree. Silver balls, silver deer, a rocket ship of a tree fit for this 1981 Space Shuttle-cool interior. Sadly slated for redevelopment - all we want for Xmas is better heritage policy that protects unique places like this vs blocking new housing elsewhere. 14/10 🎄

Manulife Centre, Bank of Montreal tree. Branch office category. Roughly hewn, tufts of coniferous unruliness belies staid Canadian banking tradition. Visible cord realness. Good use of corporate-branded reflective plastics. A tree to wait by, wondering about yer own economy.🎄

Unboxed Market tree. Grocery story where you bring your own box/bag/container. True to its ethos, this fine tree does not come with a box. Not even under the tree. 12/10 🎄

Hudson Bay Centre trees. Usual plinth + balls, no change over the past years but for more haphazard placement due to strange new World Cup lounge by the shuttered The Bay. While the trees are pure, FIFA is corrupt. 10.5/10 #EveryCorporateChristmasTreeInToronto 🎄

Metro Central @YMCAGTA tree. A non-profit tree that believes in clean living &, looking at those trim, ripped abs, the kettle bell. Does the tree sometimes just go into the hottub & steam room instead of actually working out? Maybe. No matter though, it’s a good tree. 13/10 🎄

Humbertown tree vignette. Usually it rotates. Though Humbertown plaza is now being developed into dense housing (opposed by…Doug Ford 10 years ago), the display remains a defiant ode to Yellow Belt exclusionary zoning. We hope this display will be rezoned for apartments. 10/10🎄

320 Front Street West tree. Postmodern palace with a highly controversial, radical take on the traditional tree. This is the future of Christmas that postmodernists want. Appropriate caution signs warn of intellectual chaos ahead. 14/10 🎄#EveryCorporateChristmasTreeInToronto

City Hall tree. Government tree category. Extraordinarily wide tree, an homage to mayoral verbosity perhaps? Tory blue, on the nose. Rather hollow interior. No garland, no tinsel, few balls. A tree trying its best in a municipal miasma of hostile austerity. 11/10 🎄

Muji tree.

They really take the minimalism thing seriously.

Extra point for using HAL as a tree topper.

12.5/10 🎄

Marbl restaurant tree corral. Real trees. Enlivens the King Street sidewalks well. Like a patio of trees. A new model. 12/10

Sherway Gardens tree. Super-regional-mall category. A tree wholly owned by the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan via Cadillac Fairview. Sign warns “don’t touch” but trees must live w the risk, yet pension plans are risk averse (save for crypto dalliances). Conundrum tree. 11.5/10 🎄

The Ritz Carlton tree. Part of a trend of creating Insta-ready scenes. Tree is more ornament than tree, overtly ritzy, one might say. Twiggy tree top is a reminder to fight to preserve the greenbelt. 12/10 🎄

BCE Place (aka some new name) hanging tree. Familiar for the last few years in the Santiago Calatrava-designed “palm court”, it is another wholly-owned pension plan tree, this time Ontario Municipal Employees (OMERS). Take a civil servant on a date to see their trees. 13/10 🎄

Runnymede @torontolibrary branch tree. Excellent placement by mirror, creates x2 bang 4 buck. Potpourri of old standard ornaments, laid back in that particular Bloor West Village way. John Lyle (architect of Union Stn) 1929. No skirt, owns the stain-proof carpet. 11/10 🎄

A couple of downtown condo lobby trees. There is a lot to compete with and these little ones are trying their best. 14/10

CIBC tree. Lobby by I.M. Pei 1972, classic International Style Xmas scene. Pei studied under 2 Bauhaus members, tree may be indirectly influenced. Trimming thickness appropriate for an institution that made $1.19 billion in Q4. They could buy a tree for everyone. 11/10 🎄

Michael’s tree in former Chapter’s site, below cinemas. Unique placement category. Incredible restraint shown by massive craft store w this relatively minimalist tree. Tree lives on the edge, not just in revolving door, but past security panels. Trees must live w risk. 13/10

Workplace Safety & Insurance Board lobby/interstitial area tree. While we are sure this tree has passed health and safety, it does look a bit prickly & unlike mall trees, it has no safety barrier. Perhaps this is a Gen X, latch-key + unsupervised WSIB tree. 14/10 🎄

It’s the @SonicBoomMusic window tree on Spadina. Turntable spinning underneath. Lights like stage footlights as this is a PERFORMANCE. Record train too for the nerds. Jukebox. Fisher price. And Bumble the Abominable Snowman makes an annual appearance. Tour de force. 16/10🎄☃️

Social Real Estate company + insurance brokerage window tree, College street west, Little Portugal. Tree floats as if its skirt is a flying carpet. The tree may not cause pause in every passerby, but it’s there for those who need a moment. 14/10 🎄