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Growing up in downtown Tel Aviv, Avi Friedman got a sense of what a real neighbourhood is all about: urban living on a human scale. The family’s fourth-floor apartment was in a Bauhaus building that was classic mixed-use: stores at street level, apartments and offices above. School was around the corner and so was a large public market. It’s the kind of environment that Friedman, now 58 and an established Montreal architect and author, has sought out ever since.

It’s also the subject of his new book, A Place in Mind: The Search for Authenticity (Vehicule Press, $19.95). In just under 200 pages, the McGill University architecture professor takes readers on a leisurely tour of some of his favourite places around the world: to a tea room in Istanbul, a restaurant in Tuscany, farmers’ markets in China and England, a playground in Israel, a sculpture garden in the Canadian Arctic and more. Each illustrates what Friedman thinks makes a place “work” -its size, its history, its humanity.

But why leave Montreal to find those things? I asked Friedman, who has lived here for 30 years, to prepare an itinerary of places Montrealers can visit to rediscover their city and find what makes it a great place to live. Roaming the metropolis is something he is accustomed to doing, so he obliged -with gusto.

“It’s my habit -I hunt for neighbourhoods,” Friedman explained on the Monday morning I picked him up at McGill. Our drive would last more than five hours and cover a lot of ground.

“I teach a course on urban development, and to start it off I always take my students on a tour,” the professor said. “To prepare, I familiarize myself with different places; my wife drives and I stay on the lookout. When I see wonderful places, they register in my mind. And later I come back and revisit them.

“I don’t have to go to faraway places. I believe that on the Island of Montreal, there are many places waiting to be discovered -and celebrated.”

Come along for the ride, as we visit 12 places around the city that put a local face to some of the global themes in Friedman’s book.

View Montreal’s urban spaces in a larger map

1. HUMILITY

St. Norbert St., in Ville Marie borough

Tucked away below Sherbrooke St. E. between Hotel de Ville Ave. and St. Laurent Blvd. is a three-block stretch of architectural symmetry. On the north side: condos in a converted building of the Bon Pasteur convent complex, with arched entrances to the garages and front doors. On the south side: condos in a newly built row whose tawny stone facades and three-storey roofline mirror those across the street.

“One of the things that I like about additions to cities is how nicely they fit together with what is there,” Friedman notes as we approach. “I sometimes see architecture that seems to scream ‘Look at me!’ while other architecture is more in line with what is already there. I’m looking for something that creates a nice blend between what is there and what is added. And in my opinion, this street is a nice example of that.

“On the north, we have what used to be the convent and, on the left, what is a residential addition to the landscape. There is a balance: the selection of colour in the doors and the stone facade, the respect for the top element of the facade, the proportions and alignment of the entrances, the addition of a row of trees on the south side.

“In my book, I have a chapter on what I call London humility, places in the British capital you can walk through where all the elements blend nicely into the others. And here on this street is a classic example of new residences that I hope will be built more often in this city.”

2. THE PUBLIC SQUARE (1)

Carre St. Louis, Plateau Mont-Royal

Justnorthof SherbrookeSt. between St. Denis St. and Laval Ave. is a leafy, tranquil place that’s the spiritual heart of the Plateau. It’s ringed by Victorian townhouses that have been home to a who’s who of Quebec arts luminaries over the years: among them, Emile Nelligan, Claude Jutra and Gerald Godin.

“This is a nice, functional square that has a few elements that make it ever so unique,” Friedman says as we start a clockwise circle route from the northeast side. “I believe that every stretch of the city needs to teach you something. You walk here and you learn something by looking at things, like that sculpture of (19th-century poet Octave) Cremazie and that other one of Nelligan.

“Another important thing is what the park offers you. Good squares have wonderful walls. And here you have many nice, gracious buildings around the square that are of a reasonable scale and that frame the space nicely. Like in London, the square offers an opportunity for people in those buildings to go to the park and cross paths with people who are just passing through.”

We come to the huge fountain in the middle. “A square also needs to have a fixture in the centre that attracts people in,” Friedman says, “and there is one here: a cast-iron water fountain. I would have put a better wall around it, not just the low concrete wall that’s there now.

“Now look at the buildings across the street. These are things that make Montreal unique. It’s our treasure. … Look at the stained glass over the windows, the tourettes and details in the stonework -we takes these things for granted but they should be celebrated.”

3. THE PUBLIC SQUARE (2) Parc du Portugal, Plateau Mont-Royal

Designed by landscape architect Carlos Martinez, the most tangible symbol of Little Portugal is a little park at thesoutheastcornerof St. Laurent Blvd. and Marie Anne St. It has a gazebo, a drinking fountain, a plaque honouring the neighbourhood’s most famous resident, Leonard Cohen, lots of blue-and-white Portuguese tile and a canopy of trees.

“I love small places that celebrate a neighbourhood, that allow people to congregate,” Friedman says by way of introduction. “Unfortunately, what’s happened in the last few years is that Facebook has become the public square, and we don’t have that many places to congregate anymore. … Having some small place that celebrates culture, that has a plaque on the wall for a famous poet, that has a place for bands to play, that’s important to a city.”