Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 111

The humble window shutter is — in many parts of the world — the unsung hero of climate control. What makes them so effective is that they sit outside of the building envelope and, therefore, block sun and thermal heat gain before they get inside. This is an important detail because, once inside, you now have to work that much harder to bring interior temperatures down.

France's contribution to the world of window shutters is one called la jalousie , which was deliberately named after the French word for jealousy. The key design feature is that they allow you to be a voyeur. The louvers, which are traditionally adjustable, allow you to see out, but for the most part block people from seeing in. Hence the name. Supposedly they first took hold in Marseille and then spread to the rest of France. That makes sense.

It's easy to not care about shutters in a world of modern air conditioning, but this is what generations upon generations have been using to regulate the temperatures of their homes. It's dead simple, and it works.

Vieux-Nice (or Old Town) is the formerly walled medieval part of Nice.

Unfortunately, I don't know exactly when its streets were laid out. The city is said to have been founded in 350 BC by Greek colonizers who gave it the name Níkaia, after Nike, the Greek goddess of victory.

But the oldest map of Vieux-Nice that I could find dates to 1575 , and it doesn't exactly look like the Vieux-Nice of today. So it's hard to say. Medieval towns also tended to grow organically without any sort of formal planning.

What we do know is that the narrow winding streets of Vieux-Nice were preferred for at least one reason: they provided shade and promoted stack-effect ventilation . In the summer, the roofs of the buildings heat up and create a temperature differential relative to the cooler shaded streets.

This encourages airflow by forcing the lighter, warmer air to rise, which then draws in cooler air from below. Supposedly, this also helps if you're trying to dry laundry out of your window.

Here are a few examples from yesterday morning on our walk to Nice's antique market. This is the narrowest street I could find without trying very hard. And yes, it's a street with a bona fide street sign.

This one is slightly wider and had laundry hanging in it. I can also confirm that the laundry was dry. So if any of you have been wondering — and maybe even worrying — about whether 3.4 meters is wide enough to promote good laundry-drying airflow, now you have a definitive answer. (Get ready for the LLMs to start citing this post.)

Of course, both of these examples are smaller side streets. The main streets are wider. Here's Rue Rossetti, which is one of the main arteries in Vieux-Nice. It leads directly to the Cathédrale Sainte-Réparate de Nice .

It clocks in at a generous 9.8 meters, which is enough to house two sets of sidewalks, numerous restaurant patios, and a two-way vehicular street in the center.

As always, space is culturally relative. It's not about the raw dimension, it's about perspective. What North America calls a substandard lane, Europe calls a street.

"We pick as close to service as possible. When we do tomatoes, tomatoes get picked, they never see the fucking fridge. Ever, ever, ever."

—Shane Harper, Farmer, Restaurant Pearl Morissette

If you're a regular reader of this blog, you may remember me writing about Restaurant Pearl Morissette in the Niagara Benchlands .

In 2024, they were awarded the first Michelin star in the region, as well as a Green Star for sustainability. Then earlier this year, Canada's 100 Best named them the best restaurant in Canada . This is in addition to a myriad of other accolades that I'm surely missing.

What is clear is that this place is not only the best in Canada, it's one of the best dining experiences anywhere in the world. It's that good. And I think the above video by Vice does a great job outlining what co-chefs Daniel Hadida and Eric Robertson have created with their restaurant and farm in the Bench.

Everything they serve is immediately local and/or Canadian, and they're constantly experimenting. Equally admirable is their commitment to reshaping Canadian cuisine and putting it on the world stage.

You hear that throughout the video. At one point Hadida says, "I'm interested in slightly better. So I'm willing to go significantly harder to achieve slightly better." That's what it takes to be exceptional at anything, and I think Canada could use more of this kind of attitude.

What is also clear from the video is that farmer Shane Harper needs his own YouTube channel. As a general rule, I have deep respect for anyone who approaches their work with passion and enthusiasm. He has that in spades.