Here is a fine mid-century mid-rise specimen from Etobicoke. The MayorBrothers & Doug Holyday seem to like Etobicoke, so I’ve been following their leadership and spending a lot of time there. There are loads of great mid-rise buildings peppered throughout genteel single-family-home neighbourhoods, and everybody seems to get along just fine. Lessons for downtown from Etobicoke, perhaps.
This five-storey beauty is not in deep Etobicoke as it’s the first building welcoming you to Fordlandia as you pass the Humber River on Bloor (across from Old Mill station). It makes use of the embankment it’s built into and goes down an additional two storeys, while the parking lot contains passages down into the Humber River Park. A penthouse on the roof, not so visible here, has a robust garden, making this building seem a bit like a Chia Pet.
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What a blast from the past. Those are nice old walk-up apartments with sensible floorplans and livable rooms — the kind you could live in for life; the kind nobody seems to build now. I haven’t been in there in nearly 20 years but they used to be maintained decently too. And cheap! A large 1-bd there in the mid-90s was $550, vs. the $700+ I was paying for my Annex bachelor apt.
The layouts of these mid-century apts are dreamy — as my real estate agent told me people get “condo shock” when they go from one of these to one of the newer condos.
Now buyers want swimming pools (which they don’t use), fitness rooms, (which they don’t use), meeting rooms (which they don’t use), lockers (which are now full to the top), parking spaces (which you now have to pay extra for), etc.
Lots from this era have pools too – though as you say, few use them. When I lived in a 1968 double tower, I’d often be the only one I’d ever see in the pool (which was fine by me).
You neglected an important element: it still seems to have a lot of its original sash (at least on the right–but alas, it looks like there’s replacements on the left, at least on the upper storey)
I love those wrap-around corner windows. A little hold-over from the Art Deco era.
Corner windows are civilization.
Despite the fact that this is an apartment neighbourhood on the subway the zoning which prohibits retail would make it very hard to inhabit these buildings without a vehicle(s). Buying the proverbial popsicle or loaf of bread involves a trip on the subway or a walk back across the Humber to Toronto.
“Now buyers want swimming pools (which they don’t use), fitness rooms…”
Government also didn’t always have regulations mandating things like amenity space, open space and parking, which are generally highest in the suburbs raising housing costs and lowering density.