Adaptive Reuse, Accessibility & Additions
Spotlight

Originally home to Knox College, and eventually occupied by one of the world’s first insulin manufacturers and a military hospital, the Gothic Revival building at 1 Spadina Crescent has a rich history and is a major city landmark, terminating views north from Spadina Avenue. ERA worked with NADAAA between 2011 and 2017 to oversee the...

Completed in 1864, the Old Don Jail was the last work of one of Canada’s most respected early architects, William Thomas, and the largest building project in Toronto’s history at the time. Like much of Thomas’s late work, the jail was conceived in the Renaissance Revival style popular during the mid-1800s which draws inspiration from...

Situé au cœur du site patrimonial du Vieux-Montréal, « l’Îlot Bonsecours » est un ensemble composé de 4 bâtiments historiques, notamment la maison du Calvet et son annexe, le magasin Davies et la maison Louis-Viger, qui ont été amalgamés au cours des dernières décennies pour accueillir, entre autres, l’Auberge Pierre du Calvet. À ceux-ci se...

English translation below L’ancien Hôpital Royal Victoria (HRV) a été inauguré en 1895 et conçu par l’architecte anglais Henry Saxon Snell dans le style néo-baronnial écossais. Étant d’une grande richesse historique, architecturale et paysagère, et associé à une institution hospitalière d’une grande importance, le site est une des propriétés majeures du site patrimonial cité et...

The site, once owned by the City of Toronto, operated as a public market from 1837 to around 1900. The Water Works Buildings were designed in the Art Deco style by City Architect, J. J. Woolnough and completed in 1933. The construction project was part of a plan supported by federal, provincial, and municipal governments...

The University College Revitalization project brings new life to the University of Toronto’s central architectural landmark, the Romanesque Revival University College, designed in 1852 by architects by Cumberland and Storm. The updates to the National Historic Site respond to the demands of 21st century academia, renewing facilities to expand use and create a more inclusive...

The Bombardier Centre for Aerospace and Aviation, Downsview Campus, expands and adaptively reuses a historic building that was once the centre of aviation manufacturing and design in Canada — transforming it into an innovative learning institution for Centennial College’s Aviation and Engineering Technology Programs. The new campus includes teaching, research, testing labs and learning spaces for...

After remaining unused for many years, Phillips House now has a new life as North York General Hospital’s centre that provides outpatient mental health care for children and adolescents. The property is located north of the hospital at Sheppard and Leslie. While the house and grounds, designed by Mathers and Haldenby Architects and Edwin Kay,...

The Paradise Theatre is a surviving example of Toronto’s hallmark 20th-century theatres, complete with distinct Art Deco styling specific to the World War II era, with abstracted classical and geometrical elements. Opened in 1937, the Paradise Theatre was designed by Benjamin Brown, one of the earliest Jewish architects in Toronto. Situated prominently between Dovercourt and...

The Cornell Campbell Farmstead is a local landmark and a remnant of a period of agricultural significance in Scarborough’s history. The property retains an intact farmstead with historical associations of the Late Woodland period (AD 1300-1500), and 19th to early 20th-century farming practices and settlement patterns. ERA Architects in joint venture with HOK were retained...

The Kingsmill’s Department Store building in downtown London is now home to Fanshawe College’s Schools of Information Technology and Tourism, Hospitality and Culinary Arts. Located on 130 Dundas Street, previously 126-132 Dundas St, the building is an important cultural landmark for the city and was built in 1865. Its current façade is composed of both...

Historic farmstead properties are a common sight throughout small, rural Ontario. The large acreage lots often contain a combination of built structures and landscape features, including the brick farmhouse, the wood-framed barn, outbuildings, silos and mature trees. In 2017, ERA was approached by Cambium Farms to think through how their 1873 barn, currently operating as...

Ottawa’s Booth Street Complex — bordered by Booth, Norman, Rochester, and Orangeville streets in Little Italy — was acquired in 2012 by Canada Lands Company from the federal government. The conditions of the transfer required that best efforts be made to conserve the heritage character of the former federal heritage buildings, and that the spirit...

The Gooderham Mansion is a landmark building on the corner of Sherbourne and Selby Streets in Toronto’s St. Jamestown neighbourhood. Now a mixed-use space, the top two floors of the building are used as amenity space for The Selby, a purpose-built rental tower developed by Tricon Capital. The ground and basement floors house a restaurant...