One King West Hotel & Residence (or 1 King West) is a

condo hotel A condo hotel, also known as a condotel, hotel condo or a contel, is a building which is legally a condominium but which is operated as a hotel, offering short term rentals, and which maintains a front desk. Condo hotels are typically high-rise ...

located at 1 King Street West in the financial district of

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. It was completed in 2006 after a new tower was attached to the side of the heritage

Dominion Bank The Dominion Bank was a Canadian bank that was chartered in 1869 and based in Toronto, Ontario. On February 1, 1955, it merged with the Bank of Toronto to form the Toronto-Dominion Bank, which is known as the present-day TD Bank Group. History ...

Building (1914), itself an early 13-storey

skyscraper A skyscraper is a tall continuously habitable building having multiple floors. Modern sources currently define skyscrapers as being at least or in height, though there is no universally accepted definition. Skyscrapers are very tall high-ris ...

. Four additional floors were also added on top of the heritage building. The site for One King West also included the neighbouring Michie & Co. Grocers & Wine Merchant at 7 King Street West which was demolished in 2001 to accommodate the residential tower.

Overview

The building has 575 suites, including two 3-storey penthouses. The suites are either in the new tower, or in the historic building forming the base of the complex. The Dominion Bank Building from 1914 was designed by Darling and Pearson in the Beaux-Arts style, with Renaissance Revival detailing. The new tower stands at 51 storeys or 176 metres tall. Stanford Downey Architect Inc. were the architects involved in the renovation. The building was originally a bank. The Grand Banking Hall is a magnificent example of early 20th-century classicism with ornate detailing including stately Corinthian columns and towering windows. It has been converted into a large meeting room with a bar. The historic bank vault in the basement (designed by

Frederick S. Holmes Frederick S. Holmes was an American safe and vault engineer aninventorwho designed the largest vaults in the world. During his career, Holmes designed hundreds of vaults throughout the United States, Canada and Japan from 1895 to 1941. The majori ...

) can be used for private meetings or meals. The lobby bar is appropriately named Teller's Bar. Each suite in the hotel is individually owned, but the profits are shared amongst suite owners who have placed their suites in the hotel pool. Similar projects are usually seen in resort towns. The individual owners of the units in the building financed the purchase of the common assets of the hotel and now control the company that manages the hotel operations. Recent upgrades include converting several suites to have two beds instead of just king beds so that the hotel can be more appealing to group bookings. The investors in 1 King West were involved in a dispute over property tax assessments for their units, as rather than being taxed at residential rates (approximately 1% of market value), they are being taxed at commercial hotel rates (approximately 4%). This dispute has been resolved and now units are taxed at commercial rates, but are valued also as commercial properties. On March 9, 2007

Harry Stinson Harry Stinson (born June 3, 1953 in Toronto, Ontario) is a Canadian real estate developer from Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. He is president of Stinson Properties, Inc. He has been called Toronto's "condo king". Biography Stinson's most significant ...

, the developer and operator of this project, filed for bankruptcy protection using the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act at the Ontario Superior Court of Justice as a result of an $11.8 million dispute with

David Mirvish David Mirvish, (born August 29, 1944) is a Canadian art collector, art dealer, theatre producer, real estate developer and son of the late Toronto discount department store owner "Honest" Ed Mirvish and artist Anne Lazar Macklin. Life and caree ...

, the financier of 1 King West. The condo corporation bought all the assets and now owns the entire building plus the hotel and related businesses.

References

External links

One King West Hotel & Residence
– official website
History of One King West

"Toronto's Edwardian Skyscraper Row"
in JSSAC 40 - 2015 {{DEFAULTSORT:One King West Hotel and Residence Residential buildings completed in 2006 Condo hotels in Canada Beaux-Arts architecture in Canada Darling and Pearson buildings Postmodern architecture in Canada Renaissance Revival architecture in Canada Residential skyscrapers in Toronto Historic bank buildings in Canada

Overview

See also

References

External links