The Elevation Empire

In December 2009 we bought a 90 year old, 3 storey commercial building on Queen Street East. It was a noble pile, but in need of care and attention - basic maintenance was an idea last visited in the 1970’s.  We moved from our Kingston Rd storefront to a   cozy, non-hierarchical office space (ie: small) on the second floor. However, without a retail presence on the ground floor we worried about visibility. We didn’t need a storefront, but we needed a sign.  It had to say “Elevation Architects lives here”.

The Early years:

The ground floor tenant ran a nail salon. The interior of the salon was a subtle mix of hospital waiting room and all-night Laundromat.  The exterior was a jumble of signs on the cornice and front window – back- lit fascia, neon, and hand scrawled.    The grim door and hallway to the upper floors was better suited to a detective agency than an architect’s office.  We couldn’t help ourselves – we had to personalize our space.

The first thing we did was install a tall green banner on the front wall above the sidewalk.  It was breathtakingly visible to us and practically non-existent to pedestrian traffic. Fine.  We restored the crumbling frieze band and cornice above the ground floor and painted all paintable surfaces off-black (apparently, the new black).  Wow – but only a temporary fix.  An untenanted ground floor made change a priority.

The New Look (or Your Tax Dollars Hard at Work)



We didn’t want much – just floor to ceiling glass along the Queen Façade.  Our entrance, although unchanged in width, would have a 9’ high glass door.  The wall between our entry and the store would be re-clad in back-painted floor to ceiling glass to mimic the green banner above the door. As it turns out, the city wanted pretty much the same thing that we did.  We were able to take advantage of the Commerical Façade Improvement program offered by the City of Toronto.  With a matching grant of $10,000 we transformed our façade.
  

Our New Door!                                                            New Tenant Store Front

Old ( Bad!) Stair                          New (Good!) Stair

The Details

Glass façade and doors: InKan

Green backpainted glass spandrel panel: InKan

Light: TPL Lighting (exterior)

Green Stair treads: Johnsonite – Rubber

Conceptual Budget:  $20,000

Actual Budget: $30,000
New Tenant: Groms