Scooter symphony

If you’re like me, you spilled your coffee all over the table when you came across this ad on page K13 of today’s Vancouver Sun. It’s a three-quarter page placement for Dolce Symphony Place — a condo property purported to provide access to “the sweet life just steps away from Robson.”

Indeed, this is true — Dolce is sweetly located within a block of what some would call Canada’s equivalent to Rodeo Drive. But if the old cliché holds that a picture says a thousand words, then this ad says some funny things.

You see that purple and white train car in the bottom left? That’s a commuter train and I can tell you right now, there ain’t no railyard “just steps away” from Robson Street. Most Lower Mainland residents could tell you right away that that train is the West Coast Express and this image is most likely snapped in Gastown. Either somebody gave the photographer the wrong address or this is yet another example of how reality has no place in Vancouver condo marketing.

I love the discomforted look of the male passenger. It’s even better because you know the Vespa is at a stand-still, probably supported by the kick-stand cropped out at the base of the image. But props to Solterra for putting the male as the passenger. On an intertextual level, this is a cute jab at the gender politics featured in the most recent ad for The Zone which I looked at a few days ago.

For the interested, you can register at the Dolce website for more information. Those on the registration list are eligible to win a Vespa. Now I’m not encouraging anything but it would be pretty sweet if a condohype reader won. If that happens, I’ve got a stylish condohype t-shirt ready to be worn to the prize pickup.