06/03/2026
✨This Toronto school, built in 1969, is sooooo Wes Anderson / Mondrian-coded ✨
Step into the pool area and you’re transported to the late 60s. Colour-blocked windows scatter sunlight into a kaleidoscope, while original signs and tiles anchor the space in its era.
In a city with a number of drab, dutiful public buildings, this one bursts with life.
The magic comes from Manchester-born architect Peter Pennington, a name I mention often and one long overdue for wider recognition. As a staff designer for the Toronto Board of Education, he infused a distinctly British, delightfully whimsical modernism into a handful of Toronto schools.
Pennington once said, “A school gives the designer an excuse to let his hair down… to laugh at convention.” And you feel that everywhere in his work: the bold colours and the unconventional forms that stir the imagination rather than recede into the background.
But the joy carries a pang. Pennington’s defining work, Davisville Junior Public School, was demolished in 2018 despite strong community pushback. Today, budget pressures threaten several remaining school pools: even here at Carleton Village, swim access is halved, and at the City Adult Learning Centre, the pool has been filled in, leaving only traces of its former magic.
This school is usually closed to the public (understandably), but a handful of adult swim programs still run through outside providers. If you get the chance to step inside, run—don’t walk (unless you’re on the deck). It’s one of the most joyful, quietly radical lessons in mid-century design left in the city.
