Soho 477 Richmond Street West

The Soho, (not to be confused with the other Soho’s in Toronto – the developer seems to have fallen in love with the name and continues to use it for all of his developments), was bought out of receivership in the mid 1990’s by Bruce Greenberg (also behind the Soho Metropolitan Hotel). It was originally conceived as an office condominium but did not turn out to be popular. Thus the bank lender sold the unsold parts of the building to Mr. Greenberg who promptly started to sell them one by one as live/work condominiums. The 100 or so units stretch across 10 levels with 11 foot clear ceilings. The spaces are fabulous. As it was Toronto’s first new (from the ground up) loft building, it struggled for acceptance. It is located in what is now a phenomenal part of town just east of Spadina Avenue on Richmond Street West – literally where a loft should be. Units start at 500sqft and rise to be in excess of 1200sqft, (the largest plan is 1200sqft, however many units have now been put together to offer over 2000sqft in some cases). Pricing is hard to get a handle on but typically could fetch as much as $350 per sqft. I believe that 477 Richmond was and is an important building for Toronto, as it was a pioneer and a precursor of what was and is to come.