Left: Robber’s shirt-dress, Chasse Gardée’s sandal, Ella and Elliot’s dishware for kids, Harry Rosen’s cufflinks; Right: Canuck kitsch at the Drake General Store (Image: photographs by Jay Shuster; cufflinks courtesy of Harry Rosen)

Men’s madras shirt
Jonathan and Olivia
49 Ossington Ave., 416-849-5956

Madras is the hot new plaid, in light organic cotton and shades of fern green, henna red and clementine. Our favourite madras shirts, carried by Jonathan and Olivia, are by Engineered Garments designer Daiki Suzuki, who interprets the pattern with sensei authority. The label on each piece admonishes, “Imperfection in fabric is part of its character.” So deal with it. The neo-preppy look (shirts layered on top of a fitted T, worn with skinny shorts and oxfords) works equally well way downtown and in a cabin in the woods. From $205.

Bamboo is the go-to material for phthalate- and plastic-fearing parents. At Ella and Elliot, a gallery-like shop that takes a monastic approach to a child’s environment, the eco-friendly ethos extends to a line of minimalist handmade tableware. Tokyo’s Funfam designs its educational dishware like jigsaw puzzles. The Manners Eating Set ($250) consists of nine finely woodworked utensils small enough for toddler digits, plus four plates and a bowl, all nested in the carved spaces of a slim-profile wooden tray. It’s educational, too: the set is imprinted with little icons that allow kids to distinguish fish fork from dessert fork. The entire thing packs up in its own bamboo plaited box.

City garden centres never look like this: a movie version of a nursery, gloriously open and rambling—big, bold blooms here, luscious tomato plants there, the gurgling sound of water features and maybe even a den of magical elves tucked behind that bush. Best of all, it’s a no-attitude zone for newbie condo owners who want to turn their teensy balconies green. Before you come, check your building’s rules around plant life (some boards are bizarrely strict), measure your space, record the hours of sunlight it gets, and have a rough sense of what you want to plant. Lettuce? Basil? Sunset hyssops? Dwarf Japanese maple? Then ask a staffer to help you navigate Summerhill’s hectare of perennials, annuals, exotics, shade plants, urns, statuary, herbs, gardening magazines, floppy hats and patio furniture.

The return of preppy chic shows no signs of abating. Boat shoes are an essential, and Cole Haan’s versions get our vote for the range of colours and all-out comfort—wearing a pair is like wearing pillows. Nautical types with a playful bent will opt for the men’s three-tone Yacht Club model (a cousin of the Sperry Top-Sider), available in white, blue and red, or white and two shades of blue ($175). Sober sailors can opt for trad all-navy, grey or red ($190).

What began as an outgrowth of the Drake Hotel is now a trio of shops that tread the fine line between kitsch and cool. There’s an emphasis on local miscellany: Shannon Gerard’s hand-crocheted moustache pins ($8), RCMP-themed cocktail napkins ($5) and Radio-Canada shoulder bags ($40). Even the Jenna Jameson colouring book ($30) is the work of an OCAD grad. The witty selection matches the personalities of Carlo Colacci and Joyce Lo, store managers who are also the creators of Shared, a line of super-soft Ts. As for cross-branding, the stores offer jars of the hotel’s homemade granola, mixed berry and apple jam, and ginger- and chili-seasoned trail mix (from $5).

The welcoming downtown co-op carries folding models (beloved by space-obsessed bike nuts) and old-fashioned Dutch-style cruisers, but the trendiest pair of wheels is the fixie. On a single-speed fixed-gear bike, there are fewer parts (no rear brake, derailleur, shift levers or extra sprockets) and a perfectly straight, much shorter chain, making for a lightweight, easy-to-maintain ride. They’re standard issue in the courier world and have caught on with the average city cyclist because they accelerate quickly, are a snap to manoeuvre through downtown gridlock and come with built-in cred. For individualists, the gearheads at Urbane will build a one-of-a-kind fixie from the ground up ($780–$1,000), equipping it with hand-built wheels, which are infinitely stronger than factory-made counterparts.

Every time a baby is born, a little dudeness dies. But dads can draw the line at what kind of diaper bag they’ll carry. Forgo the specialized mommy ones with 30 pockets and candy-coloured polka-dot prints. All you need is something well designed, streamlined and big enough for a couple of Pampers and necessary extras. It should sling over the shoulder for hands-free utility, and Velcro open in a flash. We love Jack Spade for giving guys several understated options made of water-resistant nylon canvas, in such masculine shades as khaki, brown and black. Jack’s messenger-style bags even treat new fathers to exterior zipper pockets and sleeves for their iPods. Not that you’ll ever have time to listen to music again. From $235.

At her new Riverdale boutique, Jennifer Park sources vintage 1970s women’s slacks in wool, cotton and even leather to turn into modern roll-cuffed shorts (from $35). They’re more sophisticated than Daisy Duke–style cut-offs, though you can find DDs here, too, in premium Japanese denim by IT Jeans ($59). Park will also hunt down styles and sizes for custom requests.

Clogs may be experiencing a John Travolta–sized comeback, but for the kitsch averse, these leather A’Détacher sandals have the same carved wood platform heel (they’re handmade in Peru) without making you look like you belong at a tulip festival. Already a hit in Paris, the shoe is deceptively comfortable and summer appropriate. $375.

“We’re not seeing the very stark style anymore, like calla lilies in a vase and nothing else,” says founder Rosemary Little. That’s never been her bed of roses, anyway. Little is a diehard floral romantic, and her 13-year-old business caters to clients as aesthetically minded as the res­taurateur Mark McEwan and the women’s club Verity. This year, Little favours a muted palette of sandy-coloured blooms, with hits of purple (orchids are hot) and “not quite chartreuse and not quite lemon,” she says. Graphic foliage is key: hosta or rounded galax leaves, often wrapped inside vases. Centre­pieces $75, delivery charge $12.

SJP has her Halston pantsuits, but we prefer that other disco-era staple, the shirt-dress. Our favourite is by American prepster label Steven Alan, which has turned its classic button-ups into a knee-length frock of lightweight, organic chambray that’s more at home at Ossington bar Camp 4 than Studio 54. $210.

Located in a corridor of upscale condo towers, whose status-seeking owners it serves, Filter looks beyond scratched teak sideboards of suburban-bungalow contents sales to focus on collector-quality Danish modern finds. Owners Mike and Amy Mason travel north and south of the 49th parallel for what’s still most in demand in vintage furniture: Eames, Jacobsen, Probber, Saar­inen and Bertoia. Then they mix in dramatic, often humorous decorative objects (like vintage models from anatomy class) spanning the post-war years through to the ’70s. A pristine George Nelson CSS storage wall unit in walnut with built-in desk ($6,295) was found at Toronto’s defunct Unilever factory. As for quirk, there’s a ghostly railroad-crossing sign and oil paintings of stern professorial gents.

Like a toy shop for design freaks, this west-end spot carries a mix of weird and wonderful housewares and gift options. Display cases at the back contain a curated cross-section of shiny bartending tools laid out with surgical precision. Always wanted a fancy swizzle stick? Carl Mertens’ stainless steel model expands telescopically into an elegant little whisk and comes with a carrying case ($69). Bottle stoppers? Look no further than Gianni Versace for Rosenthal’s delightfully insane Medusa heads ($135). Alessi’s crystal cocktail shaker by Australian industrial designer Marc Newson eclipses its garden-variety confrères ($118), and an assortment of apple corers, juicers, olive spoons and fruit knives meets every imaginable garnish need.

MEC, the closest thing there is to a couturier of camping, could turn Anna Wintour into an outdoorswoman. Its 4,000-square-metre retail banquet serves wanna­be campers as well as earnest survivor types who appreciate the finer design of super high-tech tents, a specialty. Engineered to be featherweight but resilient, the Carbon Reflex by MSR is a standout: a three-
person yellow dome so portable (only 4.8 pounds, with carbon fibre poles) that you can move camp every day. If the tent’s $599 price has you choking, the Wanderer 4 may be a couple of pounds heavier, but it’s less than $300 and sleeps three people with room to spare.

Playing in indie bands a decade ago, style-setter Julian Finkel was always the guy who said, “I’ll make the T-shirts.” At his seven-year-old shop in Kensington, he does just that. His Ts ($34) are made in a backroom studio, where he silkscreens images based on found art or his own drawings and photographs. Typical choices include enigmatic bearded men, cool bikes (the “Vélo love” series), native emblems and a picture of an old Led Zeppelin cassette tape. Finkel also teaches Silkscreen 101 on-site, a class in vogue for budding T printers (alternating Sundays, $175).

Tucked at the base of the Four Seasons is an oasis for fragrance freaks. Frederico Campos and Nahla Saad, Noor’s owners, have a nose for such old-fashioned brands as Florence’s citrusy Santa Maria Novella and Pen­haligon’s, a London maker of woodsy men’s colognes and English fern shaving creams. Al Oudh, a new scent by L’Artisan Parfumeur, sparked a waiting list last year after bloggers extolled its intense aroma of cumin, musk, vanilla and cedar ($155). It smells, quite frankly, like sex.

Twenty years ago, London investment banker Robert Tateossian found his true calling designing tastefully eccentric cufflinks. Today, his namesake line is a must for the sartorially savvy jet set. The selection at Harry Rosen includes miniature working compasses in non-tarnishing rhodium plating (from $195) and classic designs with semi-precious stones set in sterling silver (from $360).

BLUSH PRETTY HYDRATION EVENT
Beauty Web site Blush Pretty is hosting an evening of product sampling (brands include Olay, Pantene Pro-V, Dermaglow, DaLish, Cake Beauty and Cover Girl), make-overs, hors d’oeuvre and wine. RSVP to beautymail@blushpretty.com. Oct. 25, 5–9. $20. The Hudson Condominium Party Room, 493 King St. W., blushpretty.com.

COMRADES IN CRAFT (FREE!)
This indie craft fair is an uprising against grandma-style DIY. Forget tea cozies and macramé, these Toronto-area crafters recycle and reuse materials to create pretty and unique handmade art. Keep and eye out for co-organizer Danielle Holke’s bottle cap jewellery, Priya Narasimhan’s botanical bath goodies and Melissa Hamel-Smith’s voodoo dolls. Cash only. October 17. St. David’s Church, 49 Donlands Ave., comradesincraft.com.

CREATIVE SEWING AND NEEDLEWORK FESTIVAL
With knitting, sewing and crocheting supplies moving from brick-and-mortar stores to the Web, this festival gives hobbyists the opportunity to see the goods in person. Shop for equipment, yarn, textiles and just about any crafting supply imaginable. Oct. 16­ to 18. $12. Metro Toronto Convention Centre, South Bldg., 222 Bremner Blvd., creativfestival.ca.

FASHION AND BEAUTY

CLUB MONACO
For one evening, Club Monaco is offering 15 per cent off to men buying from the store’s new collection. Women will also receive the same discount if they bring in a guy friend. Oct. 15. 4–9. Various locations.

DUE WEST
Here’s a good opportunity to pick up a new pair of jeans. Starting Thursday, there will be no tax charged on any purchase at the Queen West shop, which carries denim from Seven, Rock and Republic and Diesel. Canada Goose parkas are excluded from the event but are marked down by $30 instead. Oct. 15 to 18. 431 Queen St. W., 416-593-6267, duewestclothing.com.

FRESH COLLECTIVE
Laura-Jean Bernhardson has been designing the geek-chic line Fresh Baked Goods for 15 years; in celebration of the anniversary, all regular-price items from the label—cute dresses and knit sweaters galore—are 15 per cent off. Until Oct. 31. 692 Queen St. W., 416-594-1313.

HOME

BARRYMORE FURNITURE
The huge fall sale at Barrymore slashes up to 60 per cent off clearance items and 25 to 30 per cent off custom sofas, sectionals and chairs, dining room sets and bedroom furniture. 1168 Caledonia Rd., 416-532-2891, barrymorefurniture.com.

CASALIFE
The condo-friendly furniture store is closing its Vaughan Mills store on November 1. That means that all items in both stores will be reduced by 20 to 75 per cent. Look for the best deals at the Vaughan location, as everything in the store must be sold. 171 East Liberty St., Unit 170, 416-922-2785; 255 Bass Pro Mills Dr., 416-922-2785, casalife.com.

ELTE
Save 20 per cent off broadloom—including wool, seagrass and sisal options—by the square foot or as area rugs. Until Oct. 31. 80 Ronald Ave., 416-785-7885, elte.com.

FUTÉ DESIGNS
This furniture shop on an ever-less-dingy strip of Dundas West is holding an inventory clearance sale: indoor items are 30 per cent off, and outdoor items are 40 per cent off, including rattan daybeds and genie chairs. Get 20 per cent off lighting, too. 824 Dundas St. W., 416-762-0167, futedesign.com.

GINGER’S
Renovators, take note. This retailer of high-quality and high-design kitchen and bathroom fixtures is holding its Kitchen Sale Event, offering 20 per cent off most sinks, faucets and hardware. Some bathroom accessories are also marked down. 95 Ronald Ave., 416-787-1787, gingersbath.com.

RESTORATION HARDWARE
Save up to 25 per cent off “all things lighting”: chandeliers, outdoor lighting, floor lamps, table lamps and custom shades are all marked down. 2434 Yonge St., 416-322-9422; 2901 Bayview Ave., 416-223-2055, restorationhardware.com.

While I was digging around salvage places looking for the finishing touches for Union (like sinks and mirrors and dishes), I came across some lights that used to hang in an old theatre in Collingwood. My gut told me to buy them and put them above me in the kitchen. I think all the drama, the concrete, the ’hood, the plumbing, the loans and the anxiety that have come with building Union out of an old karaoke dive have made me look at the restaurant in a different way. I now compare the undertaking with building a theatre on a lively street, where a play will run for as long as it can. Union—with its brick walls and barn floors and great lights and horseshoe bar and open kitchen—is going to be a big stage, an opportunity to perform, to dig in a little bit and see where it can go. If building Union had been smooth, easy and on time, I would have missed the chance to understand it this way, to see what it can become. Now I can define it; I can visualize the food and the flow and the acts. I want it to be a place where people perform and lift life up a bit and feel as if they could be anywhere.

Maybe all this theatre business is just an act, a way for me to diffuse the anxiety I am feeling about the grind and routine that awaits me in the kitchen. But seeing it all like a drama reminds me that cooking is not just a tiring trade; it’s creating and expressing and performing. And if I can build a place where I can cook and feel as if I am anywhere, then maybe something different can come out of there. The food I begin with is just the introduction; where it all will go from there is a mystery. All I know is that I will have theatre lights to remind me, on the darkest and roughest of restaurant days, to see Union like I do right now—with excitement. A place where, at any moment, something great could happen.

I spent the weekend at the farm, smoking chickens for an upcoming dinner—I dry cure them first and smoke them for a day and then barbecue them. They come out looking like Peking chicken, country style. Those smoky, sweet birds are going to be a staple at Union, along with elk tempura sliders, mirin-glazed sardines and some classics, like steak frites and maybe even red veal tartare (something I picked up in Piedmont). But we will see how that goes over. I am also talking to a few bread makers, trying to figure out how to make my own yeast from the apples at the farm; specifically, I want to make a sourdough starter, so that Union can have its own unique bread that gets better and better as the restaurant grows. While the birds were smoking, I went out to do the rounds. I picked up some splake to smoke from Collingwood Fisheries and hit the hundred-mile market to get some lamb, then made a date for the farmers’ dinner. I went into Owen Sound to Wilford and Hanna’s place to pick up the ’50s cigarette stools for the horseshoe bar at Union. Wilford is the man. He’s got a barn full of everything: boats, old broken Mercedes, stoves, cast iron pots and pans, big-ass fans and radios, pine floors, mirrors and pretty much everything else. His wife, Hanna, has a vintage clothing store in Clarksburg, and when I told her some of the design ideas for Union, she told me to go see Wilford. We spent a couple of hours together in his garage—he is a cool old guy who, like me, likes to bust out the double denim. He looks like Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke. I left with a beautiful double-barrel stainless sink and square-top storage cabinet for the kitchen, as well as an old diner-style hot water heater. It was a great country afternoon with Wilford—he’s got a peaceful sparkle to him, like he is doing exactly what he wants to be doing. Attached to the barn is a broken-down roofless stone house that he dreams of living in. It’s a long shot, though. As he put it, it’s good to wake up with dreams, because if you don’t, you just have a pain in your side all day long. Amen to that.”

The whole story is longer and more complicated than that, but that is what stuck with me. To me, slow food is a way of bringing ingredients from the farm to the table the way it should be done and the way we have a right for it to be done. Here in North America, we are missing out. Meat is not hung long enough, our milk is pasteurized, and our pork industry is overworked. My grandfather asked me why he can’t find sweetbreads anymore (years ago, he ate them on toast on Sundays). It turns out most meat companies don’t bother with them. We have everything we need in Ontario: vineyards, rich land, century-old farms, great artisanal cheeses and a hungry interest in food.

With Union, I want to take advantage of that as much as I can. I want a stage—not so much for me but for our local farmers. I will play the director, making sure it all goes well. If we don’t protect the little guys, we’re going to lose them and their art, and that is going to put us in an inescapable culinary hole. You can be a great chef, but if you can’t get your hands on anything good to cook, you are screwed. I don’t just want a restaurant. I want something bigger, with more importance than just bringing food in the back, cooking it, and selling it in the front. I want to break it down and slow it down. I want to find rhythm and method in the business so I can keep it genuine and simple, so I can honour what the farmers are working so hard to make right. Besides all that, I find it’s easier to create when I have restrictions to work within—keeps me from being overwhelmed.

Now. I just have to build the damn place first.

E.T. is the best—he is the key to my kitchen, and he knows his stuff. He even took the landlord around town to show him his work and make a case for shooting the vent right up through the roof, so we have no elbows in the duct, for maximum exhausting power. To quote E.T. himself, I’m going to have “McDonald’s kinda power.”

For all those types of guys, there are good ones like my friend K.K. He used to have a café on Kensington Avenue called Kensington Café, but everybody just called it K.K.’s. I spent a lot of time there after school, lingering in his kitchen just talking to him. He tipped me off that Michael Stadtländer was coming into the city to do a dinner at K.K.’s one night. I showed up, helped Nobuyo (Stadtländer’s wife) cut bread and met the chef himself. Six months later, I was cooking at his place—Eigensinn Farm.

K.K. called me out of the blue recently because he’s got a ton of pots, pans and equipment stuffed in his garage that he’s looking to sell. Man, he wasn’t kidding. He had everything: ice cream maker, juicer, tons of beautiful pots and pans, tongs, shaving dishes—he’s even got madeleine trays. On his lawn were two big stainless steel sinks from the old café, disrupting the ambience of his wife’s dinner parties. K.K. is a great guy. There is something reassuring and special about using his old stuff from the café and the new stuff he has been stashing. It makes this all feel like I made the right choice coming home to Toronto—and maybe I can transcend the bullshit and really bring something special to the city. K.K. even had a mop-and-bucket set stuffed away in that garage.

Last time, I mentioned how I was going to invite some of the Ontario farmers I’ve met for a meal made with their own food. Events like that are very useful in developing specific dishes—especially now that I have to do it for the menu at Union. For my last year in Paris, I cooked Stadtländer-inspired dinners for the Parisian elite in beautiful apartments all around the Left Bank and Neuilly. I had a really amazing waitress from Sweden named Anna; she would sing “Happy Birthday” in Swedish, and it sounded just like a German marching song. We had a lot of success; we got a couple standing ovations and, one time, after the raw tuna–fried plantain–foie gras burger made its debut, we left the apartment with 10 pissed French people chanting “Teo! Teo! Teo!” You could still hear them from the courtyard.

The high points were great, but shopping around Paris by foot, bike and metro wore me down. On a typical day, I might go from the butcher that had the best sweetbreads and filet de boeuf (where Gérard Depardieu goes) to the Chinese market for bok choy and Thai basil, then to Rue Montorgeuil for cheap good vegetables, and finally to the fish shop up by Métro Denfert-Rochereau. I’d have to heave the food up seven flights of stairs to my flat, only to lug it back down and haul it on my back onto a rush-hour metro car along with cast iron pans and knives. And I tell you: it ain’t easy cooking five-course meals for discerning Parisians in other people’s kitchens.

Pulling those dinners off taught me to trust my gut: to keep the food simple, invest in the best stuff, and let it speak for itself. At Union, I want to keep the same style and approach that I had when I was doing the apartment cooking. But I just want my own kitchen—my stage, my place where people come to me. At Union, I am going to have a simple menu that won’t handcuff me. I want it to be flexible enough to be able to work with the small farmers and the freshest stuff out there. I am excited to cook here, in Toronto, and I want to bring something different to the city.

When I think about the food that I want to slide onto the tables at Union, I always come back to the same place: the Rungis market in Paris. I worked there for a while, buying all kinds of birds and big côtes de veau, sweetbreads, mushrooms and vegetables for a company that sent it to restaurants in Dublin. Rungis is the biggest market in the world—it looks like a massive air base with hangars full of vegetables and meat. The best part about it was buying the birds and game, picking supplies from boxes packed with ducks with red ribbons and heads crowned with feathers; unskinned rabbits tucked in rows in boxes; fat, feathered capons; and milk-white Bresse chickens with blue feet and red heads—like the French flag. And right in the middle of all this chaos is an elegant glassed-in café stuffed with bruising French guys in bloodstained white jackets drinking rosy liqueurs and eating steak frites at six in the morning. It’s beautiful.

I will miss cooking those plump, yellow Des Landes chickens and well-marbled meats, but I’m excited about the great stuff I am finding here in Ontario. My family has a farm in Grey County not far from Eigensinn Farm, Michael Stadtländer’s place. I try to meet the local farmers whenever I get up there. One guy, David, is a game farmer who opened the 100-mile market in Meaford. His elk has an amazing, clean beef taste—or, as my grandmother puts it, “how beef used to taste.” He’s led me to other farmers: a red veal guy and a chicken lady who raises a ton of different breeds of ducks and chickens. My plan is to invite them all to my family’s farm before Union opens and cook a dinner with all their products and see where we can go from there. This should get me thinking more about the menu and where I am going to get my supplies.