Habitat 67: Montreal’s Most Famous Apartment Building

Habitat: you love it or you hate it. One thing this building has never inspired is neutrality. For some, it resembles a kind of post-apocalyptic factory, for others a fantastical leviathan perched across from the Old Port. As you may have guessed, I fall into the second camp.

The Design

Habitat 67, as it's formally known, was designed by Moshe Safdie as a modular construction based around the cube. The cubes – of which there are 354 - seem to be stacked upon each other, precariously so from certain angles. Habitat was expressly designed as a three-dimensional structure, and so is meant to be taken in from different perspectives. If you wander down the river, you'll see the building completely change shape from one vantage point to another. I like to head down along the piers if it isn't too windy.

The Name

As the name Habitat 67 would suggest, the building was completed in 1967. This year marks a watershed in the history of Montreal, for the city played host to the International and Universal Exposition of 1967, or as it's more commonly known, Expo 67. At the time, it was the single most attended world exposition. Habitat 67 was expressly built for it and became a central fixture as housing was one of the exposition's main themes. Back then, all kinds of international visitors explored Habitat, and it also housed visiting dignitaries for short stints.

Residences

As originally conceived, Habitat would have had 950 residences, rendering it fully 6 times it's already monstrous size. Today, it breaks down to 148 private residences, which range in size from 1 cube to 8 cubes. Unfortunately, it's very difficult to get a peek at the interior. Tours are organized through museums or the city, but they are rare.

Location

Habitat 67 crouches on the Cité-du-Havre peninsula, jutting out into the St. Lawrence River. The peninsula is connected to the Ile-Sainte-Hélène, which was significantly enlarged for Expo 67, as well as Ile-Notre-Dame, which was actually created for Expo. Most reminders of this milestone year are spread out on these three islands. While Habitat is to me the most spectacular, the Biosphere, designed by Buckminster Fuller is no slouch.

Habitat 67 is certainly closer to the grotesque than the picturesque. While it's not everyone's architectural cup of tea, at the very least it is noteworthy as a monument to a particularly effervescent year in the city's past. There is, finally, one last remarkable point about Habitat 67 to be made. If you are familiar with Moshe Safdie, you may have calculated that he was not yet 30 when construction was completed, which is pretty impressive. However, the design was actually based on work from the Master's thesis he completed as a student at McGill University in 1961, when he was just 24. Not bad at all, for student work that is.

Since you can't sleep in one of the cubes overnight, look for a Montreal hotel instead.