Skip to content

ERA Architects

Projects/

Building Conservation

Spotlight

Greenhouse at the Parkwood Estate National Historic Site. Parkwood Estate National Historic Site: Greenhouse Conservation

Oshawa’s Parkwood Estate was erected in 1915 as the home of automotive industrialist Colonel Sam McLaughlin, who had a keen interest in horticulture. Designed by the leading establishment architecture firm Darling & Pearson, the estate included five greenhouses, with additional greenhouses added over time. The estate is now a National Historic Site. After the property...

exterior view of new addition to NAC National Arts Centre

Situated in the heart of the nation’s capital on Confederation Square, Ottawa’s National Arts Centre (NAC) displays a robust Brutalist geometric form, evoking the image of a fortress for the arts. Built between 1964 and 1969 as one of the federal government’s centennial projects, the NAC was designed by Fred Lebensold of the Montreal-based architecture...

Îlot Bonsecours – PHI Contemporain

Located in the heart of the Old Montreal heritage site, the “Îlot Bonsecours” is a group of four historic buildings, notably the Calvet House and its annex, the Davies Store and the Viger House, which have been combined in recent decades to become the Auberge Pierre du Calvet, among others. In addition to those, there...

The McGill New Vic Project

The former Royal Victoria Hospital (RVH), founded in 1893, was designed by the London architect Henry Saxon Snell in the Scottish neo-baronial style. Located on the slope of Mount Royal, it was intended to be a place of healing close to nature and far from the industrial city, in accordance with the theories of the...

Waterworks

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...

8 King Street East

Following the Great Fire of 1904, the intersection of King and Yonge streets became the site of Toronto’s first modern skyscraper ensemble – a collection of buildings which inalterably changed the skyline and image of the city.  With the CPR building (south-east corner) completed 1913, and the Dominion Building (south-west corner) completed 1914, the Royal...

Bombardier Centre for Aerospace and Aviation

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...

Paradise Theatre

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...

University of Toronto Scarborough Campus map University of Toronto: Scarborough Campus

In 2015, a new Secondary Plan was developed for the University of Toronto Scarborough Campus. As a sub-consultant on the planning team led by Urban Strategies, ERA undertook a Cultural Heritage Resource Assessment in order to identify and assess cultural heritage resources, including the buildings, views and open spaces, in accordance with the Ontario Heritage...

Fanshawe College's building at 130 Dundas Fanshawe College: School of Culinary Arts & Information Technology

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...

Exterior driveway and barn of Cambium Farms Cambium Farms

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...

Arial view of Booth Street Booth Street Redevelopment Master Plan

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...

Crystal Ballroom - King Edward Hotel Crystal Ballroom – King Edward Hotel

Completed in 1903, the original King Edward Hotel was Toronto’s first ‘palace hotel’. It was built at the start of the Edwardian age, which brought opulence and exuberance to the design language at the turn of the century. The hotel’s Crystal Ballroom opened on the 17th floor atop the 1922 tower addition, to great public...

Morden House Captain G.E. Morden House

Built in 1858, Captain G.E. Morden House is an example of an original residential estate built during the time of settlement in the Town of Oakville. The building’s historical value is rooted in its past as the home to Oakville’s Morden family from 1900-1947. Captain George Handy Morden owned and operated several Lake Schooners and...

Recent Projects

plazaPOPS plazaPOPS
Greater Toronto Area
Centretown Heritage Inventory City of Ottawa
Ottawa
Exploratory typo-morphological study of Île-d’Orléans Ministère de la Culture et des Communications du Québec (MCCQ)
l’Île-d’Orléans
Bleau residence – Adaptive re-use study Service des grands parcs, du Mont-Royal et des sports, Ville de Montréal
Montréal