According to a nifty chart over at the National Post that compares the city’s new crop of super-luxe hotel-slash-condo-towers—the Trump tower, the Ritz-Carlton, the Four Seasons and the Shangri-La—it’s a tight race. While the Shangri-La earns points for scoring two Momofuku restaurants by New York chef David Chang, the Ritz-Carlton has high-definition televisions in the bathroom mirrors. Then again, a penthouse at the Four Seasons went for $28 million, more than twice the price of any suite in the other buildings. For our part, though, we give the prize to the Trump tower: as the tallest of the lot, it’ll have the largest impact on our city’s skyline. Trust the Donald to recognize that size matters. Read the entire story [National Post] »
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Which of Toronto’s opulent new hotels is the most over-the-top?
Buyers don’t want the Ritz-Carlton’s lavish condos; we wonder what that means for the luxury market
Apparently, the heat of Toronto’s condo market doesn’t extend to luxury penthouses (those one-per-centers must be chilly up there)—nearly a fifth of the 161 high-end condos at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel and Residences have languished on the market for months, and some have even seen their prices slashed, the Toronto Star reports. While the developer is still trying to flog 12 units at $1,100 per square foot, a recently sold two-bedroom condo on the 28th floor was listed at about $825 per square foot. It all makes us wonder if a glut of luxury suites is ahead, with the Trump International tower opening January 31 and the Living Shangri-La and Four Seasons residences due later in the year. Read the entire story [Moneyville] »
Reason to Love Toronto: four new five-star hotels are about to make staycations super-luxe
Toronto is a great place to visit. Just ask the people who live nearby. Residents of Halton Region, a mere 30-minute drive down the QEW, made 153,000 overnight visits to the city in 2009, more than came from British Columbia, California, Texas or Illinois. The same goes for many of Toronto’s other bedroom communities: they could drive home after the show, but they prefer to stay the night. Tourism here is a giant house party, and our accommodations are getting a major upgrade with four new five-star hotels. Last February came the Ritz-Carlton on Wellington Street. January will mark the opening of the Trump Tower, a flamboyant structure at Bay and Adelaide whose 275-metre, 90-ton spire took 12 hours to lift into place (arguably Toronto’s greatest feat of high-rise engineering since the CN Tower). Asian Pacific–style opulence arrives next summer with the 65-storey Shangri-La on University Avenue. And our own luxury export to the world, Izzy Sharp’s Four Seasons, will finally get a hometown building worthy of its brand in summer 2012: two slender glass towers at Bay and Yorkville. The Manhattanization of our hotel industry is the result of an economy that continues to dodge the disasters befalling others. Together, the new hotels will provide 989 super-luxe rooms that are sure to be a hit with tourists. They may even resurrect Toronto in the eyes of Americans, whose impressions of us and willingness to visit are still tainted by the SARS crisis. But above all, they’ll make it more fun to splurge on ourselves.
The Star’s Vertical Toronto series on condo living continues its ascent
(Image: Daniel G.)
Last week we took a glance at the first instalment of Vertical Toronto, a three-part infographic on condo life courtesy of the Toronto Star. This week saw the tower o’ facts climb even higher, laden with some startling statistics. A very lopsided pie chart supports what we’ve reported about T.O.’s condo-building boom: since the turn of the century, three quarters of all new single-family homes purchased in the city have been condos. But more units means less space—the average new unit in downtown Toronto is 749 square feet, compared with 1,052 square feet for resale condos 10 years ago. If that sounds bad, try living in the smallest one sold this year: $166,000 for just 301 square feet in Regent Park (by contrast, the largest this year cost $28 million for 9,038 square feet in Yorkville’s Four Seasons). Also, in case condo-dwellers need to know, the graphic explains that it’s not kosher to fly kites, raise chickens, set off fireworks or raise poisonous snakes on their balconies. There goes the weekend. Read the entire story [Toronto Star] »
Daniel Boulud’s new Café Boulud announced last night at the Four Seasons
(Image: Four Seasons)
The Four Seasons condo presentation centre played host to celeb chef Daniel Boulud last night, where he introduced his much-gossiped-about new restaurant, Café Boulud, set to take up residence in the new Four Seasons hotel on Bay Street. Café Boulud will have its own entrance and patio space facing Yorkville Avenue, and sit above a new bar that will celebrate the hotel group’s 50th year in business. Boulud is famed for his New York-based, globe-spanning empire of restaurants, including his most renowned, the three-Michelin-starred Daniel.
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The cat’s out of the bag: Daniel Boulud to open restaurant at the new Four Seasons
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Back in April, we reported that Daniel Boulud was another in the growing group of Michelin-starred chefs to snub Toronto in favour of Vancouver or Montreal. Not so, apparently: the National Post’s Shinan Govani confirmed yesterday the rumours that the lauded New York chef of Daniel fame will be opening a restaurant in the new Four Seasons hotel and condo complex on Bay Street (there’s an official announcement scheduled for next Thursday). This is the second Canadian hotel partnership in the works for the chef, who is opening Maison Boulud in Montreal in early 2012 to coincide with a $150-million renovation to the Montreal Ritz-Carlton. Previously, Boulud opened and subsequently closed two restaurants in Vancouver, DB Bistro Moderne and Lumière, after only two years in business.
Toronto ranked middle of the pack by Condé Nast Traveler Reader’s Choice Awards
Publishing powerhouse Condé Nast recently released the Condé Nast Traveler Reader’s Choice Awards—an annual roundup of the best places to visit and stay around the world—and Toronto’s showing was average at best. More than eight million votes were cast for the survey, with top honours going to exotic locales like Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, the Peninsula House in Dominican Republic and Four Seasons Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt. Toronto, on the other hand, seems to lack the allure of other far-flung (read: tropical) destinations. In fact, no Toronto-based hotels made the cut on the Top 100 travel experiences list, although a few Canadian locations did (King Pacific Lodge in B.C., Langdon Hall in Cambridge, Ontario, Emerald Lake Lodge in B.C. and Auberge Saint-Antoine in Quebec City). In the Canadian rankings, Toronto ranked fifth, behind practically every other city that matters (Quebec City, Vancouver, Montreal and even little Victoria). Although a few local spots did make the cut for the Canadian hotels list (the Hazelton Hotel was named fifth best in the country, the Four Seasons in Yorkville ranked 27th and the Windsor Arms and the Toronto Marriott Downtown Eaton Centre Hotel took 31st and 35th place, respectively), the results prove that the CN Tower has nothing on historical clout, mountains or waterfalls. The verdict: we could really use an ocean view and year-round sunshine. Read the entire story [Condé Nast] »
TIFF Weekend Roundup: the five splashiest parties
It girl in the making Elizabeth Olson is introduced to perennial it man George Clooney. (Image: Jeff Vespa/WireImage/Getty Images Entertainment)
The first weekend of TIFF is basically one big long party, with a non-stop crush of big premieres, boldface names and tremendous amounts of running around (sleep is usually not involved). In case you missed it, here are last weekend’s five splashiest parties:
- If you haven’t already heard, the party for A Dangerous Method at Greg Goose Soho House was pretty much the best party ever. In attendance: David Cronenberg, George Clooney, Win Butler, Régine Chassagne, Bono, Keira Knightley, Evan Rachel Wood, Emily Blunt, Adam Scott, Jonah Hill, Chris Pratt, Anna Faris, Jon Hamm, Alexander Skarsgård and many more. Read our recap »
- As usual, the Vanity Fair party had all the markers of a successful TIFF bash: happy (drunken) partygoers and a stack of celebrities sticking around for more than 10 minutes (Bono, George Clooney, Elizabeth Olsen, Alexander Skarsgård and more). It also featured some rather provocative posing by The Oranges’ Allison Janney. Read our recap »
- George Stroumboulopoulos once again took over the Hazelton Hotel for his trademark mix of big stars, CBC television personalities and gawkers. We particularly enjoyed seeing Jon Hamm in full-on shaggy-hair mode (compared with Don Draper, at least). Read our recap »
- There’s something about tall, Scandinavian vampires that sets the fan girls wild, which is exactly what happened at the Melancholia party when Alexander Skarsgård (Eric Northman from True Blood) showed up. Kirsten Dunst had the good sense to smile politely and stand aside. Read our recap »
- A rather more genteel time was had at the annual luncheon thrown by famed Hollywood reporter George Christy at the Four Seasons. In attendance: Kathleen Turner, Geoffrey Rush, Norman Jewison, Atom Egoyan and assorted Mulroneys. Read our recap »
TIFF after hours: the 44 (and counting) film fest venues with the coveted 4 a.m. last call
(Image: walknboston)
Every year celebs from all over the world flood into the city for TIFF, but for many, it’s the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario that’s the real star throughout the month of September. Just in time to combat post-summer blues, the AGCO grants certain venues the rights to the elusive 4 a.m. last call. While last year’s list clocked in at 44 venues This year’s list of venues with extended hours finally caught up with last year’s, bringing the current number to 44—some of them not open to the public (we’re looking at you, Windsor Arms) and others open for one night only. Check out the list of late-night watering holes after the jump and stay tuned for updates on extended hours, as more are expected to roll in before the festival.
Why generations of artists insist on attempting the impossible—adapting Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
(illustration: Gluekit)
Back in the 1990s, I starred as the Red Queen in Alice: The Rock Opera, a student production at the Claude Watson School for the Arts in North York. My costume was a red power suit with eye-gouging shoulder pads and a giant heart cut out of the back. There were lengthy hallucinogenic Alvin Ailey–inspired dance numbers. The Caterpillar sucked on a bong instead of a hookah. It was, of course, beyond terrible. But at the time, we thought our creation had hit on something scintillatingly deep. The show’s source material—Lewis Carroll’s beloved 1865 children’s classic, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland—and the way it revelled in the topsy-turvy nature of reality—was alluring to our rapidly expanding (i.e., hash-addled) adolescent brains.
Daniel Boulud announces new Montreal resto, joins long line of Michelin-starred chefs to snub Toronto
Daniel Boulud at his eponymous restaurant in New York (Image: winestem)
First Jean-Georges Vongerichten, then Daniel Boulud, then Gordon Ramsay, and now Daniel Boulud again. That’s three Michelin-starred celebrity chefs that have passed over Toronto to open Canadian outposts in Vancouver and Montreal. Boulud (who made his name at Le Cirque and Daniel, among others) announced today that he would open a new restaurant, Maison Boulud, at the Ritz-Carlton in Montreal.
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Boogie Nights: three trippy dance shows and their inspirations, in pictures
Eonnagata
Robert Lepage turns his genre-splicing genius to one of history’s most notorious boundary blurrers, Charles de Beaumont, an 18th-century spy, soldier and diplomat. Otherwise known as the Chevalier d’Éon, he spent half of his life as a man and the other half as a woman. The kabuki and martial arts–inspired dance-theatre show stars Lepage, French dance star Sylvie Guillem and legendary British choreographer Russell Maliphant.
Nov. 18 and 19. Sony Centre.
Emergence
For 28 minutes, a trembling mass of National Ballet dancers skitter, click and buzz their way across the stage, alternately seducing and scaring the exoskeletons off one another (and entomophobes everywhere). Karen Kain originally commissioned the piece in 2009 from Vancouver’s Crystal Pite for a showcase of new works by up-and-coming choreographers. The beautifully deranged creation is back as part of the National Ballet’s fall mixed program.Nov. 24 to 28. Four Seasons Centre.
Chroma
Wayne McGregor is a former club kid who served as a movement director for a Harry Potter movie and was a research fellow in the experimental psychology department at Cambridge. All of which influence this piece, which was met with delirious praise at its Covent Garden premiere in 2006. Performed here by the National Ballet and set in a box of white light to the music of the White Stripes, the jagged work—about the emotions that colours evoke—features five couples in flesh‑toned skivvies.Nov. 24 to 28. Four Seasons Centre.
The Mega-Soprano: Sondra Radvanovsky finally takes on Aida—and the COC
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She’s regularly described as the finest Verdi soprano of her generation, the successor to legends Leontyne Price and Zinka Milanov, a woman with a voice that can blast you back into the row behind or leave you dangling on a floated pianissimo. American-born Sondra Radvanovsky, who moved here eight years ago after marrying a Canadian, is adding the Four Seasons Centre to the list of stellar international houses that have featured her name on their marquee. She’ll be singing the tragic title role in Aida, a first for her, and the first time the COC has mounted this Verdi favourite since 1986. For all its reputation as an elephant-heavy spectacle, the Egyptian extravaganza is also an intimate quartet about patriotism, homeland, love and jealousy. There isn’t a more Italian combo than that. Read our Q&A with Radvanovsky after the jump.
Looking back at TIFF 2010: an Alliance Films VP gives her run down of this year’s fest
Colin Firth and Helena Bonham Carter in The King's Speech
On Friday morning, Carrie Wolfe, the vice president of publicity and promotion for Alliance Films, was packing up her headquarters at the Intercontinental in Yorkville. After 11 years of building buzz for Oscar noms like Frieda, The Young Victoria and Eastern Promises out of the Bloor Street hotel, Alliance is moving its TIFF office down to King Street for 2011 to be closer to the Bell Lightbox. Though the 13-year film fest veteran was running on her final fumes of adrenaline, she offered to take a minute and share with us the people, performances and publicity coups that made her year at TIFF.
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Spotted! Ryan Gosling at the Four Seasons
The name's Gosling, Ryan Gosling. (Image: Vito Amati/Getty Images Entertainment/Getty Images)
Kevin Spacey is pretty much the only noteworthy dude we’ll see on the (very wet) red carpet today for the premiere of Casino Jack, but the Four Seasons is still seeing celeb traffic. Ryan Gosling was spotted leaving the Studio Café around 1:45 p.m. this afternoon; his film with Michelle Williams, Blue Valentine, had its TIFF premiere last night. Williams wasn’t in town for the gala, but Gosling turned up on the red carpet in a light grey suit and shades.
= Find this story on our Celebrity Sightings Map, where we plot the locations of stars spotted throughout Toronto
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