4050 YONGE STREET

4050 YONGE STREET

Located in Toronto’s “Hoggs Hollow” district, at the northwest corner of Yonge Street and Wilson Avenue, is a new mixed-use complex, amalgamating office condominiums with a four-star hotel. The site, a former commuter parking lot, is bordered by a natural landscape of hardwood forests on its northern and western edges that includes a small, active run-off creek. The pristine, manicured grounds of the Don Valley Golf Course are located to the northwest.

The concept for this mixed-use project was twofold: to clearly articulate the building’s distinct programmatic parts (office condominiums, hotel, retail space and entrances) and to express the building with a nature-inspired architectural language.

As such, the facade of the nine-storey hotel was configured with vertical, bent bands of silver pre-finished metal (spandrel panels) and fritted glass, that are a nod to the verticality of the surrounding trees. To carry this concept further, maple trees have been planted on the rooftop terraces of the hotel’s outer edge, capping the building with foliage year-round.

To clearly demarcate the hotel’s main entrance, a large vertical sign has been added to the facade (hotel operator to be determined) along with a horizontal two-storey window cut out of the hotel’s vertical tree-like texture.

East of the hotel, the seven-storey office condominium facade is made up of vertical maple wood battens, which are set between the glass of its curtain wall, starting at chair rail height and running below the slab, to control solar glare. In contrast to the hotel, the office building has a subtle horizontality to its facades, readily distinguishing it from the adjacent hotel.

Directly alongside Yonge Street, on the office condominium east facade, is a vertical glass tower composed of vertical maple wood battens, which are set between the glass of the curtain wall, signaling the entrance to the office condominiums and the TTC.

Horizontally separating the hotel and office programs from the street level retail space is an organically shaped canopy, whose outer edges bend up, like a curled leaf. Its underside, clad in tongue and groove composite wood decking, gives this sheltered pedestrian space an unusually warm, natural feeling, directly connecting it to this natural site.

In its completed form, this mixed-use project presents a collage of architectural languages, all of which are inspired by nature, strategically bound together by common materials and tailor-made for this urban corner lot.

LOCATION: Toronto, Ontario

ARCHITECT: IBI Group Architects

DESIGN LEADERSHIP: Michael Poitras,
Consultant-in-Charge of Design (IBI)

CLIENT: Easton’s Group of Hotels

STATISTICS:

  • No. of storeys (office): 7
  • No. of storeys (hotel): 9
  • Total gross floor area:
    480,824 ft2 (44,670 m2)
  • Below grade parking: 592 stalls
  • Below grade bicycle parking: 134 stalls

MATERIALS:

  • Silver butt-glazed curtain wall + vertical maple wood battens set between the glass
  • Silver curtain wall windows & doors
  • Silver pre-finished metal panels
  • Fritted glass
  • Composite oak wood soffits
  • Painted steel channel fascias
  • Flamed black granite floors
  • Limestone floors
  • Oak wood floors
  • Carpet floors
  • Outdoor landscaping

GENERAL PROGRAM:

  • Office condominiums
  • Multi-purpose 7-storey atrium (office)
  • Four-star hotel (200 rooms)
  • Multi-purpose 8-storey atrium (hotel)
  • Retail
  • Outdoor rooftop pool & bar
  • Underground subway connection
  • Loading docks: 4

LEED: Gold

COST: $300 million

COMPLETION: 2018