Gentrification | torontolife.com

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Creative Types

Galleries reap rewards of Ossington restaurant restrictions

The Saint remains closed on Ossington (Image: Jessica Darmanin)

When the contentious moratorium on new bars and restaurants on Ossington Avenue was passed last year, the strip lost its gentrification momentum. The outright ban has been replaced by strict rules that limit the size of new restaurants, cafés and bars and restrict them to only the ground floors of buildings. Some business owners are troubled by what these regulations mean to the boom, but the Star notes that galleries have been able to capitalize by moving into large homes. Case in point, the opening of three new art projects.

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| Leave a Comment » March 15, 2010 | 2:45 pm | Natalie Goldenberg-Fife

Shop Talk

Shoppers Drug Mart will open at Queen and John

(Photo via Google Street View)

Last week, Urban Planet closed the doors on its massive store at 262 Queen Street West (the same building that once housed Caban), and the latest news is that Shoppers Drug Mart will be taking over the 20,000-square-foot space. The story was reported today in the National Post as the official sign of “long-coming death of Queen Street West bohemia,” though we’d never associate chain clothing store Urban Planet with bohemia.

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| 2 Comments » December 7, 2009 | 2:15 pm | Carley Fortune

Deathwatch

Carman’s Dining Club steak house finally put out of its misery

Carman's Dining Club, 1959-2009 (Photo courtesy of Google)

Arthur Carman’s storied and troubled steak house on Alexander Street went into hibernation this summer, never to wake up. This makes the restaurant—credited with introducing Toronto to garlic bread—the latest Village establishment to disappear in recent months (the list also includes Crews and Tango, Bigliardi’s, Il Fornello and Zelda’s).

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| 34 Comments » November 19, 2009 | 11:51 am | Karon Liu

Restauran-TO

Jolt of caffeine: 13 new independent cafés open in Toronto

Brew colours: Espresso's popularity endures (Photo by Iain Farrell)

Brew colours: coffee houses are sprouting up everywhere this recession (Photo by Iain Farrell)

While McDonald’s, Tim Hortons and Starbucks duke it out across North America in their giveaway coffee war, a new batch of independent brewers has emerged in Toronto. Since our last roundup six months ago, at least 13 new cafés have opened up. Here, organized by neighbourhood, is our survey of the city’s hot new fuel-up joints.

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| 11 Comments » July 29, 2009 | 8:00 am | Karon Liu

Restauran-TO

The Ossington Guide

Lovers likely awaiting a table at Foxley, a popular Ossington Avenue restaurant (Photo by Jessica Darmanin)

Over the past few years, we’ve watched the Ossington strip evolve from a no-go set of dodgy storefronts to an edgy Queen West offshoot to the city’s hippest drag—a gentrification so rapid that city council recently imposed a year-long moratorium on licensing new bars and restaurants. While residents and entrepreneurs face off over growing pains, we traipsed the avenue, day and night, to compile a user’s guide to Toronto’s latest eating and drinking destination.

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| Leave a Comment » June 11, 2009 | 8:41 am | Davida Aronovitch

Aprons & Icons

Rosewater’s former chef, Paul Boehmer, jumps on the Ossington bandwagon with his new restaurant

Ossified: The avenue is changed forever (Photo by Dawn Paley)

How much more can Ossington take? A lot, it seems. The avenue’s seemingly endless gentrification will take another step this summer when chef Paul Boehmer opens his first restaurant, Böhmer. After considering Queen West and Yorkville, the former Rosewater Supper Club chef set his sights on a 5,000-square-foot single-storey building at 93 Ossington Avenue. “I see a real surge of restaurants on Ossington. It’s bringing the whole street alive, and it’s full every day,” says the chef, whose credits also include Scaramouche, Atlas and, more recently, Six Steps. “If you capture a reasonable market—like, don’t charge $45 for an entrée—and keep it to a price range where people can afford it and hang out, they’ll keep coming back.”

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| 9 Comments » May 5, 2009 | 2:52 pm | Karon Liu

Pantry Raid

Mark McEwan predicts that Torontonians will “get” his North York version of Dean & Deluca

Mark McEwan, shopkeep (Photo by Nikki Leigh McKean)

We’ve been hearing about McEwan—Mark McEwan’s proposed gourmet grocery store—for what seems like eons now. News about it broke in late 2007, with an opening date set for January 2009. But then we were told we’d have to wait another five months. Now, even though controversy is brewing over the store’s gentrifying effects, we are told that the suspense is almost over. Come June, the Bymark chef will open the doors to his supermarket at Lawrence and Don Mills. He envisions the size of his store as somewhere between Pusateri’s and Whole Foods, with aisles of gourmet ingredients and prepared foods tended by employees offering restaurant-style service.

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| 14 Comments » February 26, 2009 | 2:14 pm | Chloe Ellingson