Toronto Star

In the case of the Michael Lee-Chin Crystal, which opens next Saturday at the Royal Ontario Museum, what you see is not what you get. From the street, the $270 million addition is sharp-edged, hard-surfaced, angular and aggressive. Step inside, however, and it suddenly becomes gentle, meditative, all about creating connections and a sense of intimacy. Designed by New York-based Daniel Libeskind, this is 21st century architecture at its most brilliant. Make no mistake about it; this is Libeskind at his best. True, the Crystal bears an uncomfortable resemblance to many of his other projects – the Jewish Museum in Berlin and the Denver Art Gallery, for example – but to put it simply: it works. Though he can be rightly criticized for approaching architecture as an exercise in applied style, the Crystal shows Libeskind's remarkable ability to create beautiful spaces, if not exquisite objects.