The National Hotel was a hotel built on the southeast corner of

King King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...

and Sherbourne streets, in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. Under pressure for condominium apartment redevelopment, the City of Toronto attempted to preserve the building, designating it a heritage site in 2009, but the building was eventually torn down in 2013. The hotel's north and west facades were preserved as part of the new condominium development, examples of "

facadism Facadism, façadism, or façadomy is the architectural and construction practice where the facade of a building is designed or constructed separately from the rest of a building, or when only the facade of a building is preserved with new buil ...

" in Toronto. The hotel was originally called the "British Exchange Inn" when it was run by its first proprietor George Ross. The hotel was listed in the 1856 Boulton Atlas. In 1861, tax records show it was a three-story brick building. In 1868, the hotel was rebuilt and renamed the Grand Central Hotel and was managed by a William Burke, who expanded the building east – "likely in response to legislation enacted under pressure from the temperance movement". Hotels needed to offer a certain number of rooms to rent before they were entitled to a liquor license. Charles Brewer, the owner in 1905, further expanded the structure to the south. The architect responsible for the 1905 expansion was Henry Simpson, a protege of

E.J. Lennox Edward James Lennox (September 12, 1854 – April 15, 1933) was a Toronto-based architect who designed several of the city's most notable landmarks in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including Old City Hall and Casa Loma. He d ...

, whose design was in the

Richardsonian Romanesque Richardsonian Romanesque is a style of Romanesque Revival architecture named after the American architect Henry Hobson Richardson (1838–1886). The revival style incorporates 11th and 12th century southern French, Spanish, and Italian Romanesque ...

style. The "Terry Museum", one of Toronto's first museums, was housed in the hotel from 1874 to 1878. The property was listed on the City of Toronto Inventory of Heritage Properties in 1973. Despite this, in 2009 Ram's Head Development, the building's owners, announced plans to replace the building with an 18-storey high-rise. The plan stirred controversy and the City of Toronto applied to have the property designated under the ''

Ontario Heritage Act The ''Ontario Heritage Act'', (the ''Act'') first enacted on March 5, 1975, allows municipalities and the provincial government to designate individual properties and districts in the Province of Ontario, Canada, as being of cultural heritage ...

''. The building was protected under the heritage act on October 27, 2009. This was appealed to the

Ontario Municipal Board The Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) was an independent administrative board, operated as an adjudicative tribunal, in the province of Ontario, Canada. It heard applications and appeals on municipal and planning disputes, as well as other matters sp ...

(OMB). The OMB ordered the City of Toronto to approve the development with the retention of the north and west facades. Demolition proceeded in 2013. The "King+" condominium development opened in 2015.

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* * {{coord, 43.6512, -79.3680, type:landmark_region:CA-ON, display=title Hotels in Toronto 1868 establishments in Canada Demolished buildings and structures in Toronto Buildings and structures demolished in 2013 Demolished hotels Defunct hotels in Canada

See also

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