Toronto: until we meet again🍁

Exploring The Distillery District and more

Jun 15, 2024

Welcome! You’ve made it to the final issue in our series on Toronto. Come with me as we explore The Distillery District and more on our last day in Toronto.

Like prior issues, this one has a lot of pictures. If you are reading this in email, you’ll want to read it online or in the Substack app to ensure you can see it all.

With that, let’s jump in!

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Exploring Toronto

This is the fourth in a series. Here are the first three:

Toronto: a love letter 🍁

Bryce Payne

May 25

Read full story

Toronto: lovely, even when it rains 🍁

Bryce Payne

Jun 1

Read full story

Toronto: 3 days and still in love🍁

Bryce Payne

Jun 9

Read full story

Day Four

Today is our last day in Toronto. We fly home tonight. It’s a Sunday.

Last days can be hard. Do you try and cram everything in that you haven’t yet seen? Or do you relax and relish the parts you most enjoy about a place? Or do you find yourself starting to lose your presence as your mind starts thinking about what awaits you when you get home — unpacking, laundry, going back to work, your inbox…

For me, it’s sometimes the first and sometimes the second and (thankfully) rarely the third. On this day, we set out to see a part of town that we hadn’t yet seen and also just enjoy being in Toronto.

But first, breakfast.

Breakfast

We had walked by this cute place with a pigeon as its logo a few times before and decided to try and get in today. It was celebrating its one year anniversary and the only seats we were able to get were at the bar. We enjoyed watching the staff and eating and drinking what we ordered.

Coffee

After breakfast, we visited Second Cup Coffee Co. Regular readers may recall the stock photo I used earlier this year in this issue:

One memorable coffee meeting

Bryce Payne

Jan 14

Read full story

When we arrived in Toronto, I was surprised to see the same sign on our first day. Turns out this location opened in 2015:

We decided it was time for a makeover — The Second Cup Coffee Co.^™ café concept opened December 5th at 289 King Street West in Toronto. To go with our fresh new look, we revamped what goes in our cups, too.

It was hopping when we visited but the coolest feature is the wireless charging embedded into the wood counter (third picture above). I haven’t seen a coffee shop do that before and it’s pure genius.

While I liked the vibe inside, we got our coffee to go and I love the maple leaf coffee sleeve!

City

Here is a picture of the painted concrete barriers on King Street. So much cuter than the usual grey!

Just up the street is this mural:

We hopped a streetcar and rode it the the end of the line.

When we got off at Distillery Loop, this is what it looked like.

It reminded me of the original turnaround for Portland’s MAX light-rail line in downtown when it opened in 1986 fused with the finishes of the PSU Urban Center. It was the most “suburban” feeling scene of our entire time in Toronto.

But even here there was new development.

Crossing the street, we arrived at our actual destination.

The Distillery District

According to Google:

The pedestrian-only Distillery District, set in quaint 19th century buildings that once housed a large whiskey distillery, draws crowds to its cobblestone streets lined with hip indie restaurants, bars and boutiques. Art lovers come for the galleries, outdoor sculptures and dance, music and stage performances at the area's several theatres. In December, the annual Toronto Christmas Market takes over the streets.

We walked in here.

According to its website, “The Distillery Historic District opened in 2003 and today it is widely regarded as Canada's premier arts, culture and entertainment destination.”

The district is full of warm red brick buildings, and in typical Toronto fashion, there are some more modern additions, too.

The name of this next business and its play on words made me smile. Hopefully it makes you smile, too.

The red brick exudes warmth.

The buildings were filled with a variety of shops, including a cool design store. In between, there were tables and chairs and bright yellow umbrellas.

It’s lovely that they were able to save and repurpose these buildings.

It is Sunday afternoon and the sun is out. People are enjoying live music. I have no idea if every day is like this or if this was a special day (there was NOLA-themed decor around) but it’s lively today.

At the edge, behind the stage, there is a row of smaller shops. Pop ups perhaps or just smaller/emerging businesses. Each has a theme.

Here’s a side view. Each shop is are actually a shipping container. Inventive.

Here’s a look back at the crowd watching the live music, an old clock in view, a taller old building to the right and two cranes visible behind. There really are cranes seemingly all over Toronto! (If you are curious what is driving all this growth, check out the postscript to this issue.)

Whoever planned this did a nice job — the yellow umbrellas for tables, the blue umbrellas for food vendors — set off the red brick and green building accents nicely. It’s a vibrant scene.

In the next block, we came upon this: a Lite-Brite museum!

If you’re of a certain age, you may have grown up with a Lite-Brite (I did). The entrance looked like one.

I wish we had had time to experience this. Next time.

(Now that I realize I have readers in Toronto, if any of you have gone, I’d love to hear what it’s actually like inside. Please send me an email or message below.)

We paused to get a fruit smoothie (you can only have so much coffee in one day) and I took this picture of their coffee setup while I was waiting. Cute, right? (I’d like a red cup of….)

Back outside, this was one of the many public sculptures we saw.

We finally got some food and found a place to sit. This was my view. Loving the red brick!

Here’s a view towards the stage. STREATFOOD. See what they did there?

Leaving the neighborhood, we saw this red heart with a long line of people wanting to snap their picture with it. (And a super cool looking lighting store on the left in this picture that was unfortunately closed on a Sunday).

More City

As we began our walk west, I noticed this building. Given how much newspapers keep shrinking in the US, it was great to still see The Globe And Mail masthead on top of a building.

Remember the black squirrel sighting we had on the waterfront? Well, this time I was able to get a picture for you!

And another!

The black squirrel led us to this park.

It’s another great example of an urban greenspace. This one has a playground.

We continue on.

Here’s a random street scene. A pair of tall towers, a green copper church tower, a shiny red streetcar, and a tree. Toronto has a distinct look, a certain je ne sais quoi.

This building looks like Tetris.

Here’s another building under construction; historic church towers on either side.

Here is a historic building, bathed in the late afternoon light, and home to Saks Fifth Avenue, with more modern office towers behind. It works, somehow. It really does.

Here is the fancy skybridge between Hudson’s Bay and Eaton Centre we walked through yesterday. It’s pretty cool.

Toronto has wayfinding signs like this in most of the central districts we explored. I wish more cities did this.

The scale is human-sized and genuinely useful. The top denotes which district you’re in and each district has a signature color and name.

In some other cities, the primary use case seems to be advertising, not wayfinding. For comparison, here’s a picture I took when I was living in San Francisco in 2002:

Effective signage seems to be a strength of Canadians generally and Torontonians specifically. Exhibit 1:

It’s pretty unlikely you’re going to get on the wrong bus. Also, it’s playful.

Our time in Toronto is drawing to a close. But here’s one more building under construction as we head to Union Station.

I pause to take one last picture of the stately Fairmont Royal York hotel before dashing into Union Station.

Union Station & UP

We pause at Balzac’s to get one last maple pistachio latte. It’s fitting. This was the first coffee I had in Toronto and it’s a perfect bookend to four fantastic days.

I splurge and buy a notecard to help me remember this place.

And then we’re off.

In many cities, the rail station often isn’t in the best part of town. Here in Toronto, there are shiny glass skyscrapers literally just across the tracks.

A GO train approaches on another track.

We start going, too.

Suddenly the base of the CN tower appears.

And then the top.

The Toronto Blue Jays sign at Rogers Centre comes into view.

I keep tying to capture a full GO train car in the frame. I love the bright green and white on GO and the red and white on the streetcars.

I am eventually successful.

We keep going, following and eventually passing a GO train. I rarely take video but took this 32 seconds and am sharing with you. It’s mesmerizing to watch as the city begins to recede in the background.

As we near the airport, the sky is striking over a surface parking lot.

We approach the airport. I notice it has an arched glass canopy over the drive like PDX. The road system is impressive.

And we arrive back at YYZ. It’s efficient. Multimodal. The way transit is suppose to be.

Signage

This is the restroom signage. What is particularly helpful is the signage above the drinking fountain that lets you know how far away the next restroom is. (How often when traveling do you find yourself thinking, we’re running late, let’s get closer to the gate only to discover you’ve passed your last restroom and have to double back?)

The inclusive iconography on this family/accessible restroom makes me smile. Everyone’s welcome.

We board the plane and I manage to snap a picture of the Air Canada logo before everyone gets on.

Flying

We take off and soon the sun recedes over the horizon.

We explore the inflight movie options and wind up watching a rom-com.

I wouldn’t go to a theater to watch it, but it was entertaining for in-flight. Here’s the trailer.

Landing at PDX, we notice they’ve updated the giant Post-it notes they’ve been using as part of the communications plan during the airport construction. It’s going to look a lot different come August. I’m excited.

Wrap up

Thank you for joining me and experiencing Toronto as I saw it in May 2024. This series is something different that I’ve not done before and I welcome your feedback. It was a bit of an experiment and soon took on a life of its own. Based on the comments I’ve seen, some of you really enjoyed it and that makes me happy.

I hope it might inspire you to see your own hometown in a new light.

And if it makes you want to visit Toronto, well, I’m sure Destination Toronto would be excited to welcome you.

(And just in case there is ANY doubt: this series was fully conceived, written and photographed by Bryce and was not sponsored by anyone and no individual, business or organization had any editorial input, except for my wife who allowed me to upgrade her from my previous privacy-protecting “partner” to her actual title, “wife.” Thanks, sweetie. :)

Postscript: ULI Spring Meeting Toronto 2023

I didn’t make it to the ULI Spring meeting in Toronto last year. Knowing what I know now, I am super sad I didn’t. It just might be my biggest professional regret.

Regardless, if you’re not tired of Toronto yet and have another 2 minutes and 14 seconds to give, this video does a great job of capturing both the energy of Toronto and the trends making it the place I’ve just spent four issues on. If you’re a bit of a real estate geek (and even if you’re not), watch it.

And if you’re really a real estate geek, here’s the recap video (which is less about Toronto and more about why the Urban Land Institute is amazing).

With that, I’m calling it a day.

Have a fantastic weekend. And Happy Father’s Day to those who celebrate it tomorrow.

I’ll be back next week. Until then…

Be well,

-Bryce

Bryce's Blog

Toronto: a love letter 🍁

Toronto: lovely, even when it rains 🍁

Toronto: 3 days and still in love🍁

One memorable coffee meeting

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