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Up in the Air
A skylit two-storey Yorkville penthouse made for partying By Kelvin Browne
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Before he was convicted of cooking the books, Garth Drabinsky used this panoramic space as an office. Now the Davenport Road penthouse belongs to a 50-something couple who love to throw parties. Dennis Keefe, a marketing and communications consultant, and John Jordan, a psychologist, spend most of the winter in St. Barth’s, so in 2008 they sold their house on Roxborough Street West and opted for an easier-to-maintain, 3,800-square-foot Toronto pied-à-terre. “We looked at a dozen big condos in this area, and they were always divided into little, uninteresting rooms,” Keefe says. “We were starting to think that an open space made for large-scale entertaining didn’t exist. We told our agent, ‘Find us something unusual.’ Three days later, he came back with this, and we were sold.” Keefe describes the exterior of the four-storey building as unassuming compared to the glitzy ’70s interior. “We loved the black lacquer, chrome and mirror,” he says. “We thought the shiny bling factor was really cool.”
During a kitchen reno, they added a wine fridge, a commercial ice maker and a large bar sink, essential for their huge catered—and often themed—parties. (Past favourites have included a 1960s Sunset Strip soirée and a sarong party with a skimpy dress code.) A second-floor lounge overlooking the main room leads out to a large roof deck with a view of downtown. “In summer,” says Keefe, “the party flows right outside and into the treetops.”
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