The wrap for June 9, 2012 | Goodbye People’s Foods, hello Famoso Pizzeria and Barton Snacks . . .

The charming Barton Snacks at the south east corner of Bathurst and Barton, one block north of Bloor. Finally, somewhere to get indie coffee after 6PM in the Annex.

By West Annex News | Here’s what’s  been happening lately in and around the neighbourhood and on the Web:

New additions to the deadpool: After 50 years, Annex diner People’s Food is folding due to a rent increase [blogTO], while Kromer Radio is closing after 55 years in business. While Kromer told The Grid they’re closing just because they’re tired, an application for a height and usage variance by the new land-owners RioCan suggests that development pressures were the real culprit. Openfile reports that RioCan’s application was turned down by the Committee of Adjustments, but the developer is expected to appeal to the Ontario Municipal Board.

Green sprouts: The tiny but charming Barton Snacks  is cheering up the south-east corner of Bathurst and Barton with espresso-based coffee drinks and premium products like ice cream from Maypole Dairy and healthy(-ish) potato chips prepared with avocado oil and reduced sodium. Manager Chris Sherwood tells us that he’ll also be serving hotdogs. The Snack is open 8AM to 10PM Monday to Friday, and 11AM to 10PM Saturday and Sunday. Finally, a place to get indie coffee after 6PM in the Annex.

And genuine Neapolitan pizza is coming to the Bloor-West Annex strip, albeit in the form of an Edmonton-based chain Famoso Pizzeria. The owners expect to have the 386 Bloor Street location open by June 21, 2012. The previous tenant was the James Joyce Irish Pub.

Busy weekend: We hope the rain holds off for the Portugal Day Parade and Picnic today. The parade starts at 11AM on Landsdowne at Bloor and then heads down to Dundas Street West for the live music and picnic in Trinity-Bellwoods Park.

If it rains, the wonderful Ring Around the City reminds us that the Raw/Vegan Festival is going on all weekend indoors at 918 Bathurst Street, just north of Barton.

918 Bathurst Street, where the Raw/Vegan Food Festival is being held this weekend

The inaugural Junction Flea market is this Sunday June 10, starting at 9AM, on Dundas Street West, one block east of Keele. If this preview of  The Vintage Cabin’s wares is in any way typical of the quality and prices of the offerings, this is a not-to-be missed event.

Then from 11AM to 6PM Sunday it’s the Annex Festival on Bloor. We’re sad this festival seems less Annex, more the same old travelling road show of vendors that you see over and over again at every Toronto street festivals. But we love the chance to walk on a car-free Bloor Street between Spadina and Bathurst once a year and enjoy the live music.

Then at 3:30PM Sunday, don’t forget to head over to the Jean Sibelius Square Park official re-opening.

The renewed Jean Sibelius Square Park, 50 Kendal Avenue in the Annex.

Good reads: YongeStreet proposes how Toronto can further densify without more condos in Right up your alley: Can laneway housing provide an antidote to our high-rise growth spurt. 

Toronto Life has a story about that 83 story condo, the tallest in Canada, that could be coming to the Holt Renfrew Centre on Bloor. Closer to home, the massive condo development including a 40-storey glass condominium planned by the United Church for the Bloor Street United Church at Huron and Bloor has local residents and Councillor Vaughan concerned [The Varsity].

The Dupont Street cycle lanes are probably safe for now despite the plotting of  Ward 17 Councilor and Rob Ford ally Cesar Palacio to get rid of them [openfile].

Ring Around the City is passing on a warning from 14 Division about a hot water scam in the neighbourhood. Two men already face charges.

And the always interesting Atlantic Cities’ website has two recent  articles we enjoyed: Why We Pay More for Walkable Neighbourhoods  and The Evolution of Bike Lanes (cycle tracks anyone?)

Neapolitan pizza in the Annex via Edmonton: Famoso Pizzeria’s big pizza oven has already arrived, readying for the opening at 386 Bloor Street West June 21, 2012

Communication Art Gallery | 209 Harbord Street

Communication Art Gallery | 209 Harbord Street just east of Bathurst

By West Annex News | Before the spectacular success of Prisoners, National Post photographer Brett Gundlock‘s compelling show combining portraits and stories of G-20 detainees, it was easy to overlook the Communication Art Gallery at 209 Harbord Street.

Prisoners at Communication Art Gallery: Emily Berriger, age 23 | by Brett Gundlock

We take pride in exploring the less-travelled corners of the neighbourhood, but the last block of Harbord Street before Bathurst, opposite the Central Technical school playing fields, has attracted only B-list chains, convenience stores and local amenities for years. After the departure of La Carrera Cycles to larger digs closer to Spadina, there seemed to be no reason to walk west of Lippincott Street on Harbord.

209 Harbord's previous incarnation, Maya Cleaning | Google Street View screen capture

But not in the imaginative mind of James Binnie, owner of Paint It Green, an environmental house painting company. Binnie, 36, grew up on nearby Albany Avenue and says he’s spent half his life between Harbord and Dupont, Bathurst and Spadina. Driving on Harbord with a friend in 2009, they spotted an empty storefront at 211 Harbord, and mused that it would make a good art gallery.

Then on his way to BC to work, Binnie says the idea preyed on his mind while he was away. But when he returned to Toronto, the space was rented. Eventually, Krispy Kreme took it over. Binnie felt his dream was not to be.

But then he heard that the owner of Maya Cleaning, right next door at 209 Harbord Street, had passed away and her space had become available to rent. Binnie snapped it up, and renovated it himself. He raised the ceiling, and installed hardwood floors and track lighting.

The opening show in September of 2010, Garth Scheuer New Constructions | photo credit James Binnie

He opened the gallery in September of 2010 with Garth Scheuer’s New Constructions, with the intention of bringing in a new show every month.  Brett Gundlock’s Prisoners is the gallery’s sixth show. After it completes its run tomorrow, March 31st, Leah Rainey’s Edits, featuring her abstract paintings, moves in. The opening will be on April 7, 2011 at 5:00PM.

Uros Jelic Oil at Communication Art Gallery in January of 2011 | Photo by James Binnie

Binnie hopes that like Gundlock, other artist will come and pitch ideas to him.  He hopes to see shows of installations, sculpture, and mixed media  join the photography and paintings he has displayed.  Communication is the underlying theme of all the shows; Binnie sees his gallery as a place for artists to have their message transmitted, witnessed, and appreciated.

Outside the Communication Art Gallery on Harbord Street | The shallow gallery space helps it become part of the street

The gallery itself is a relatively shallow space, which greatly enhances its impact. The gallery becomes part of the street with the works clearly visible to bypassers.

Communication Art Gallery is a welcome and lively addition to the street life of Harbord Street between Lippincott and Bathurst Street.

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In Arrivals & Departures we document the changes in the commercial/retails strips of the West Annex.

See the Arrivals & Departures archive for other articles like this one.

about Design Corp. at 1042 Bathurst Street

about Design Corp., where interesting things began to happen in late 2010

By West Annex News | Last month while reviewing the John Cadiz show at Ideasincorporated gallery, we commented upon the exciting mix of galleries, indie coffee houses, shops and restaurants suddenly appearing on Bathurst Street south of Dupont.

Since then we have watched while several more building on this rapidly gentrifying strip have been transformed. None has been more intriguing than 1042 Bathurst Street. Following the departure a few years ago of Apollo Volvo Specialist mechanics in the rear and Das Autopro, a European auto accessories shop in the retail space in the front, this double-wide space had been occupied by a number of short-lived tenants. By mid-2010 the space was empty, and stayed that way for some time.

Then in the late in 2010, interesting things began to happen. First the space was stripped down to white walls and hardwood flooring. Some time later a black curtain appeared across the entire width of the back of the store, and then stark fluorescent tubes were installed on the floor and a wall.  Finally a clothing rack arrived in one window, from which hung beautifully tailored white shirts. But were they shirts? On closer inspection, the shirt tails were sewn together at the bottom, and straps wrapped around them. Were these stylized strait jackets? Was this a gallery? An art installation? A performance space?

Then cryptic information appeared in small letters  in the bottom left corner of the front window.  A name, an email address, and a website, for about Design Corp. We visited the website, which featured moody, enigmatic videos which only deepened the mystery.

To add to the intrigue, the front door were always locked, no matter the time of day we went by. That is, until last Saturday, when we tried the door, and it opened. Inside we met the charming Dean Hutchinson and Yunchieh Chang, the fashion designers and principals behind about Design Corp, who ushered us into their spare, elegant, and now-opened shop.

Yunchieh Chang and Dean Hutchinson of about design corp.

Hutchinson is returning to Toronto after many years in the San Francisco fashion scene. A Canadian, he headed to California immediately upon his graduation from the University of Saskatoon Fine Arts program to learn the fashion business. He quickly built a following for the strong, beautiful architecture of his designs.

In the late 1990′s he established Dean Hutchinson (Design) Inc. where fashion designed and manufactured in Toronto was sold at his San Francisco retail stores.

In California, Hutchinson met Cheng, an American born in Singapore and a winner of a prestigious Council of Fashion Designers of America fashion design scholarship.

Beautifully draped, asymmetrically designed jackets come in fabric or leather

About Design Corp. is the product of their collaboration. Their Bathurst Street atelier contains immaculately constructed classic wardrobe pieces in black, white and gray, together with asymmetrically designed jackets in fabric and leather. The leather is luxurious and buttery soft; it drapes like fabric.  On some pieces exposed zippers add an edge to the feminine designs.

Chang and Hutchinson decided that there would be no labels in the clothing. “We want you to create what you think it is” said Hutchinson, explaining their design philosophy. “We want to be both respectful of the heritage of clothing making, and create a design-centric, artisan collection.”

“New idea need old buildings” Jane Jacobs said. And about Design Corp. and Bathurst Street exemplify this maxim.  The still relatively low rents on the street allow Hutchinson and Chang to locate their design studio, manufacturing facility, and showroom all at in the same building.

Exquisitely constructed, label-free classic wardrobe pieces

Chang and Hutchinson were kind enough to part the black drapes that so dramatically frame their showroom, and give us a behind-the-scenes tour.

Hutchinson and Chang in their design studio at 1042 Bathurst Street

The design and manufacturing area is down the stairs from the showroom. It’s an exciting space bursting with creativity, with paper patterns lining the walls and works in progress partially assembled on dressmaker dummies and spread out on large tables.

About is the latest of a number of new shops, galleries and cafes which have been garnering rave reviews from the media, like Madeleines, Cherry Pie and Ice Cream, Rapido, Burnett, Java Mama, ideasincorporated, Barbara Edwards Contemporary, Ewanika, and Scoop and Bean, and which have joined with neighbourhood stalwarts like Annapurna Vegetarian, La Parette Gallery and the unspoiled vintage diners Apollo 11 and Vesta Lunch to form a vibrant new neighbourhood. For lack of a better name, we called the neighbourhood the upper West Annex in our last article. Since then we’ve heard that local merchants–who are banding together and hope to form a business improvement area–are branding the area “Bathurst-Dupont Village”.

We’re glad to see such efforts towards a BIA. The stretches of interesting new shops on Bathurst are still broken up by tough, gritty sections that discourage pedestrian traffic. Merchants and their landlords have to work together to try to steward the gentle gentrification of the street, to entice shoppers to travel up the street from Bloor.

But care must be taken that the area does not undergo explosive growth like Ossington Avenue experienced, where the pioneers of the gentrification are quickly priced out of the mix by rapidly rising commercial rents.

For all gentrification that has taken place, Bathurst Street between Bloor and Dupont still sports some tough, gritty sections

About are welcome new members of the vanguard who are transforming Bathurst street for the better. We’d like to see them stick around.

Postscript: Before ending our interview with Hutchinson and Chang, we asked about the stylized strait jackets that had so intrigued us for months.  Hutchinson laughed. Neither strait jackets nor art installation: those perplexing white garments are about’s custom-made garment bags.

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Read Karen van Hahn’s Bathurst and Dupont is the newest style mecca in thestar.com, and Bert Archer’s Bathurst Street’s gorgeous bones in YongeStreet.

In Arrivals & Departures we document the changes in the commercial/retails strips of the West Annex on Bloor, Bathurst, and Dupont Streets.

See the Arrivals & Departures archive for other articles like this one.

Introducing Guu SakaBar, Guu Izakaya’s new West Annex location

The unfinished but already jewel box-like tatami room at the front of Guu SakaBar | 559 Bloor Street West.

20 March 2011, 5:20PM update from our Twitter feed: Walked by @GuuSakabar 15 minutes ago and they are indeed finally open, and for probably the only time in their history, there isn’t a line-up–yet.

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By West Annex News | Chowhound first voiced the rumours in July of 2010. By the fall several media outlets confirmed them: Guu Izakaya, the insanely successful Japanese-style pub at 398 Church Street in Toronto is opening a second location at 559 Bloor Street West, in what is now the most eagerly anticipated debut on the Bloor-West Annex strip.

The space, just east of Bathurst, was previously occupied by Burger King, and before that, CFNY Radio’s street-front studio.

559 Bloor Street West's previous incarnation was a Burger King | Screen capture from Google street view

Construction has been ongoing on for many months now, during which time various sites have speculated on the date the Annex Guu will open its doors.

We contacted Hyunsoo Kim, the general manager at Guu Izakaya, who generously invited us in to see the state of the renovations on February 17, 2011.

Although still very much a construction site, the restaurant interior is taking shape.

The sushi bar to the left and the tatami room up front.

Entering the restaurant from the back kitchen entrance, we were immediately attracted to the beautiful tatami room up front, which although only partially finished, already glows like an exquisite jewel box. The many small square port hole-style windows, familiar from the Church Street location, allow twinkling light into the raw quartz-tiled room, and offer glimpses out to Bloor Street. The hardwood floors and textured wooden ceiling tiles give the room a warm glow.

The entranceway off Bloor is a long hall that runs adjacent to the east wall of the tatami room. It has been thoughtfully laid out to provide a large area where patrons can wait in line, sheltered from the outdoors, but separated by a wall from those already seated in the restaurant. Given Guu’s no-reservation policy, admittedly designed to try to keep out demographic undersirables like aging boomers, one suspects that the line-up will continue right out the door and down the laneway that lies to the immediate east of Guu’s building.

The sushi bar, located mid-restaurant on the west wall. The open kitchen is to the left

Right behind the tatami room on the west wall is the sushi bar, finished in rough grey barn-board.

Taking delivery of appliances in Guu SakaBar's gleaming all-stainless open kitchen

Behind the bar in the south-west corner of the building is an open kitchen, already gleaming with its stainless steel walls, and appliances that were just being delivered during out visit.

The main dining room is directly opposite the open kitchen, occupying the south-east corner of the building. It’s now barely roughed-in, and is packed with construction materials and machinery.

We drew this rough, not-to-scale floor plan based on our visit to Guu SakaBar on February 17, 2011

We prepared the sketch, left, of the basic layout of Guu SakaBar after our visit.

Although extremely busy supervising construction and taking delivery of appliances and materials, both General Manager Hyunsoo Kim and manager of the Annex location Natsuhiko Sugimoto were generous with their time answering our questions during the visit. They said the opening is now expected in mid early March 2011. Asked about the menu, Kim said some of the dishes from Church Street will be available in the Annex location, but that they planned “many surprises”, details of which Kim told us, with a smile, that he is saving for the opening.

It was only after we left the premise and inspected the business card that Sugimoto gave us that we noticed that the Annex location is not described as an izakaya restaurant–which in Japan means a cheap and cheerful after-work pub for drinking and snacking while waiting out the worst of rush-hour traffic–but a saka bar. Although the terms are sometimes used interchangeably, in Tokyo at least, saka bars are often a step up in sophistication; more cocktails-and-tapas than pub.

The first Toronto location of this popular Vancouver franchise has polarized Toronto diners. The Church Street spot ranks number 3 on Joanne Kates’ current top ten restaurants in Toronto and number 2 on NOW’s most overrated restaurants.  But a careful review of the comments section of most on-line reviews generally shows raves for the imaginative and well-executed food, but loathing for line-ups for seats of up to two hours.

Maguro tataki: lighly seared BC albacore tuna sashimi with ponzu sauce and garlic chips ($6.80) from Guu Izakaya's Church Street location | photo credit Sifu Renka

This second location should alleviate the line ups somewhat. And line-ups are nothing for habitués of the Bloor-West Annex strip, long-practiced in the art of the line thanks to venues like Lee’s Palace, the Brunswick House, New Generation Sushi and Sushi on Bloor. Guu SakaBar should be a perfect fit for a neighbourhood already obsessed with Japanese food and willing to put in some time to get it.

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See Sifu Renka’s photoset of the food and decor of Guu Izakaya’s Church Street location on Flickr.

In Arrivals & Departures we document the changes in the commercial/retails strips of the West Annex on Bloor, Bathurst, and Dupont Streets, and think about these changes in the context of Jane Jacobs’ observation that popularity on retail strips can lead to commercial monocultures, and of Max Fawcett’s thesis that the Annex is un-gentrifying.

See the Arrivals & Departures archive for other articles like this one.

Fanny Chadwick’s is now open at 268 Howland Avenue

By West Annex News | Finally! The wait is over. Fanny Chadwick’s at Howland and Dupont opened its doors the evening of Wednesday, February 16, 2011.

We were given a look inside on Thursday, February 17th, just after the restaurant’s soft opening the night before. The transformation from the space’s last incarnation–AAA Chinese–is remarkable. There are large windows on the north, east and west sides of the restaurant, which allow natural light to flood into the space.  Inside is spacious, comfortable, and contemporary. The medium-brown wooden floors gleam. Comfy booths upholstered with bright, modern, geometric fabric line the walls, and vintage bar stools, upholstered in red leather–restored originals dating back from the days the space was Angelo’s Diner– provide seating around the L-shaped bar.

“The scene tonight @Fanny Chadwick’s” by @foodie411/Joel Solish

Sadly, we can’t show you the photographs we took during of our look inside the restaurant; part-owner Sarah Baxter wanted prior approval before we posted them, approval which she ultimately would not give. So we can only show you this mobile phone photo that @foodie411 (aka Joel Solish) apparently snapped off on opening night and shared on twitpic.

Baxter wouldn’t show us her menu either (although we found it later, also posted by Solish) as she said it was still evolving based on the feedback received during this week’s soft opening. She did share that the menu’s focus will be on seasonal comfort food, sourced locally where possible.  The meat will be from Rowe Farms, the beers from Ontario and Quebec, and the wine international.

An enthusiastic review of the food served the night of the soft opening night can be found on Solish’s Community Foodist website, together with more photographs of various dishes served that night.

111 Howland, where the original Fanny Chadwick lived from 1884 to 1898

As we understand it, Fanny’s will be open for dinner this week, brunch on the weekend, and then open full hours sometime next week. The Fanny Chadwick’s website is still under construction but gives this phone number–416.944.1606–and an email address for information: info@fannychadwicks.com. Regular updates are appearing on Fanny’s Twitter account, @FannyChadwicks.

The restaurant is named after Fanny Chadwick, an illustrious former resident of 111 Howland Avenue. According to Jack Batten in The Annex: The Story of a Toronto Neighbourhood, Fanny was born on January 10, 1873, and moved to 111 Howland Avenue at age 11 when her father, a successful senior partner with a prestigious 19th century Toronto law firm, built the enormous home opposite the See House beside St. Alban’s the Martyr Cathedral.The Chadwicks were Anglicans and committed supporters of the then partially constructed Cathedral.

Memorial window in St. Alban the Martyr Cathedral, 100 Howland Avenue

A gifted writer and actress, Fanny prolifically wrote, produced, and starred in plays which she presented in the living room of the spacious family home, to rave reviews from audiences that included members of Toronto’s working press. Fanny’s output dropped off after her marriage in 1898 and the birth of her son in 1900.  She died in 1905 at the age of 32.  A stained-glass window in the Cathedral of St. Alban the Martyr at 100 Howland Avenue–across the street from the Chadwick home–commemorates her, donated by her heart-broken father.

Detail of memorial window dedicated to Fanny by her father

Fanny Chadwick’s restaurant is yet another sign that the upper West Annex is transforming itself, and far outpacing the Bloor Street strip to the south for the number of interesting shops, cafes, galleries and restaurant that are opening.

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Also see:

Bert Archer, “Venerable Dupont diner gets $250,000 overhaul, transforms into Fanny Chadwick’s”, YongeStreet.

Jack Batten,The Annex: The Story of a Toronto Neighbourhood, 2004, Erin, Boston Mills Press.

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10 March 2011 update (from our Twitter feed):

WestAnnexNews As we have a chef & restaurant owner in our family, we know it’s not fair to review restaurants until they’ve had a few months to sort out.  So we had no intention of mentioning our meal @FannyChadwicks tonight before the Tarragon Theatre. But it was superb – food & service. The seared rainbow trout @FannyChadwicks is incredibly moist & flavourful & the portion size was generous (for the fish and the slice of apple pie).

*20 February 2011: edited this post to add Fanny Chadwick’s phone number, now posted on their website along with the restaurant hours.

*19 February 2011: this post was edited to add the photograph by @foodie411/Joel Solish.  Visit his Community Foodist website.

Arrivals & Departures | Rowe Farms at 468 Bloor Street West: meat for the elite

Rowe Farms retail store opened at 468 Bloor Street West on January 28, 2011

By West Annex News | After waiting almost a month for their hydro hookup, the Rowe Farms retail store at 468 Bloor Street West finally opened its doors in the West Annex today. Rowe Farms takes over the space vacated by Organics on Bloor in the first half of 2010.

Many in the neighbourhood will be familiar with Rowe Farms meat products from Fiesta Farms and from the Rowe Farms outlet in the north building of St. Lawerence Market. Many do not know however that founder John Rowe sold his operation a few years back. The new ownership is expanding the brand with a string of retail outlets in various family-friendly, upper middle-class neighbourhoods in Toronto, including the Beach, Roncesvalles, Leslieville, and Bloor West Village.

The frozen and refrigerated packaged meat cases, with butcher counter at the rear

While waiting for the opening of the store on the West Annex Bloor strip, we visited the Roncesvalles store, which has a similar floor plan to that of the West Annex shop. It’s an attractive, well-organized space, offering the full selection of Rowe Farms meat, poultry, and prepared meat products like sausages and meat balls.

The outside sign is green, the walls inside are green, and even the shades on the light fixtures are green. Yes, the theme is local and sustainable with an emphasis on animal welfare. Rowe Farms’ slogan is “Quality with a Conscience” and the website recites a farming philosophy of “locally-grown, antibiotic-free, hormone-free, conscientiously-farmed, nitrite-cured (100% nitrate-free)”. Note: while the meat may be all that, the butcher at the Roncesvalles shop acknowledged to us that Rowe Farms products are not organic.

The store also offers a selection of products from other local producers including Organic Meadow dairy products, Anton Kozlick’s Mustards, and eggs, salad greens, and other prepared foods.

The store offers a wide range of Organic Meadow dairy products, like Organics on Bloor before it

In addition to offering frozen and refrigerated packaged meat products in the large coolers that line the sides of the shop, there’s a butcher’s counter at the back, staffed by a real live butcher.

The butcher counter

The West Annex Bloor strip has been without a butcher shop since a rent increase caused the owner of Elizabeth Deli and Meat Market to lock the doors and walked away from her thriving store at 410 Bloor Street West in December of 2005. Some will welcome Rowe Farms as the return of a basic neighbourhood amenity to Bloor Street.

But is Rowe Farms a basic amenity?

Elizabeth’s was a full service butcher and European-style delicatessen. It contained its own smokehouse on the second floor where staff prepared sausages, hams and other meats. Elizabeth’s offered a wide variety of products at an equally wide range of prices.  It attracted a socio-economically diverse clientele.

Rowe Farms’ retail model is decidedly different. During the week starting December 31, 2010, we compared the price of selected Rowe Farms products at Fiesta Farms against the equivalent product in other local supermarkets. We found that the Rowe Farms’ prices per kilogram were consistently the most expensive, often double or more the lowest price amongst the competition.  Some examples:

• Pork loin centre chop boneless:  Rowe Farms $26.99; Loblaws “Free From” $15.41; Metro “Traditionally Raised” $12.76; Metro regular $12.99; Price Chopper $12.10;  No Frills: $11.40; Fiesta Farms $11.00;
• Boneless, skinless chicken thighs:  Rowe Farms: $19.82; Loblaws “Free From” and Price Chopper $15.41; Metro (Prime) $14.64; No Frills $13.44; Fiesta Farms (Prime) $12.99
• Extra lean ground beef:  Rowe Farms: $16.99; Fiesta Farms (ground Angus) $15.41; Loblaws President’s Choice Blue Menu (Angus Sirloin) $13.21; No Frills $9.44; Metro: $8.80; Price Chopper $8.45.

Rowe Farms boneless skinless chicken thighs $19.82 per kg

There are legitimate reasons why “traditionally raised” meats cost more. As Rachel Hahn pointed out in her article Like Sex in the City, but with meat: Toronto’s Gourmet Butcher Scene, “farmers who don’t use a factory farm model . . . spend more money per animal. If animals are free-range, there’s more space to pay for and if they’re free of hormones and antibiotics, they take longer to become ready for slaughter.”

Torontonians are in the grip of a so-called ethical and healthy meat craze. Nose to tail eating and charcuterie plates reign in Toronto’s trendiest restaurants, and indie butchers are eclipsing indie coffee shops as the hottest trend in retail.

Centre cut boneless pork chop $26.99 per kg

Hahn quotes Toronto celebrity butcher Peter Sanagan of Kensington Market’s Sanagan’s Meat Locker in explaining the trend: “In Ontario we are not as lucky as, say, California or Vancouver where they have a more temperate growing zone where vegetables have a longer season. But meat is something we can do well, and it’s all year round.” But Sanagan is honest enough to acknowledge that the movement towards local produce is a “privilege trend” because of the cost.

The proliferation of high-end butcher shops–variously described as green, healthy, ethical, organic, local, and conscientious–is more evidence that Toronto is becoming a city of stark socio-economic extremes, the work of The Stop and Food Share in promoting local and healthy foods for low-income Torontonians notwithstanding.

Organics on Bloor shuttered its doors in early 2010

And are these meats really all that green and ethical?

After energy production, livestock is the second highest contributor to atmosphere-altering gases.  Nearly one fifth of all greenhouse gas is generated by livestock production, more than all modes of transportation combined.

And four hundred scientists in 34 countries recently compiled a report for the British Government about the overstressed global food system, and the need for it to expand to feed a projected 9.5 billion people in 2050. Professor Charles Godfray, one of the report’s lead authors told Jessica Leeder of the Globe and Mail that “consumer demand for unsustainable goods will have to be harnessed. This includes meats, the production of which creates a huge drag on the environment.  It would just be impossible for the global population to consume meat at the rate we do in North America and Europe.”

In “Attention Whole Food Shoppers” in Foreign Policy Magazine, Robert Paarlberg observes how local, organic and slow food has become an elite preoccupation in the West. “The hope that we can help others by changing our shopping and eating habits is being wildly oversold to Western consumers. If we are going to get serious about solving global hunger, we need to de-romanticize our view of preindustrial food and farming. Factory farming is essential to feed the hunger-plagued rest of the world.”

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For more on the myth of green and ethical meat, see Mark Bittman’s What’s wrong with what we eat:

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Note: interior photographs are of the Roncesvalles store.

In Arrivals & Departures, we watch the changes in the commercial/retail strips of the West Annex on Bloor, Bathurst, and Dupont Streets, and think about these changes in the context of Jane Jacobs’ analysis that popularity on retail strips can lead to commercial monocultures and store vacancies and Max Fawcett’s thesis that the Annex is un-gentrifying.

For related articles, visit the Arrivals & Departures archive.

Arrivals & Departures: Lettieri Espresso Bar and Hero Certified Burgers at 581 Bloor Street West

Lettieri Espresso Bar closed its doors for good on December 30, 2010

Another one bites the dust . . .

By West Annex News | Coffee Corner, Java Junction, or Corporate Coffee Headquarter; whatever you call the aggregation of coffee shops around Bloor Street West and Albany Avenue, the group suffered its first fatality at the end of 2010 when Lettieri Expresso Bar on the south-west corner of Bathurst and Bloor quietly closed its doors on December 30.  A note posted on the front door reads: “After eight years of making fresh espresso, Lettieri Espresso Bar will be closed on December 30, 2010.  We have loved being a part of this community.  It has been an absolute joy serving you. Wish you all have a very happy new year.”

Good-bye note from Lettieri franchise owner Joe Lee | click to enlarge

Signs already hang in the windows announcing that a Hero Certified Burgers will be moving in to the 581 Bloor Street West space.  The Lettieri website says cryptically that Lettieri is “co-branding with Hero Certified Burgers”.  Lettieri directs readers to the Hero website for further information, but we found no mention there of Lettieri or of co-branding. John Lettieri is the founder of both the Lettieri Espresso Bar and Hero Certified Burgers franchises.

Honest Ed's signage overwhelmed that of Lettieri

It’s hard to say what lead to the demise of Lettieri. Once inside the shop, it was an attractive, soothing, light-filled space with large east-facing windows looking out on Bathurst Street.  And Lettieri made arguably the best-tasting espresso-based drinks of all the chains located on the West Annex Bloor strip. But tucked in the north-east corner of Honest Ed’s, the garish extravagance of  Ed’s signage overwhelmed that of Lettieri’s; it was easy to forget the coffee shop was even there.

And Bathurst Street still forms a considerable psychological barrier for Annex shoppers. Although the number of non-Korean-themed shops establishing themselves west of Bathurst on the Bloor West strip is increasing, many shoppers still hold on to the notion that Bloor west of Bathurst is a Korean ethnic enclave with little to offer shoppers who do not share that ethnicity.   As we noted in a previous post, the stiff competition with four major coffee chain outlets killed a local tea shop in 2010. With that competition located on the more desirable West Annex side of Bathurst, the few extra steps to cross the street into Koreatown apparently proved a few steps too far for Lettieri’s survival.

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Lettieri Espresso Bar was located at the south west corner of Bathurst and Bloor, in Honest Ed’s

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In Arrivals & Departures, we watch the changes in the commercial/retail strips of the West Annex on Bloor, Bathurst, and Dupont Streets, and think about these changes in the context of Jane Jacobs’ analysis that popularity on retail strips can lead to commercial monocultures and store vacancies and Max Fawcett’s thesis that the Annex is un-gentrifying.

Visit the Arrivals & Departures archive.

Jane Jacobs on the hazard of popularity

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In 2004, Jane Jacobs warned of the hazard of popularity on retail strips that form community hearts:

“Some community hearts and their associated street anatomies attract many outsiders and are widely enjoyed.  This is not a bad thing; on the contrary.  The hazard is this: as leases for commercial or institutional spaces expire, tenants are apt to be faced with shockingly increased rents.  Property taxes on the popular premises can soar too, instigating even further increases.  If zoning prevents commercial overflow, so much the worse.  The upshot is that many facilities are priced out of the mix.  The hardware store goes, the bookstore closes, the place that repairs small appliances moves away, the butcher shops and bakeries disappear.

As diversity diminishes, into its place comes a kind of monoculture: incredible repetitions of whatever happens to be most profitable on that street at that time.  Of course these optimists don’t all succeed.  Six of the seventeen new restaurants, say, die off rather rapidly, and five of the seven gift shops don’t make it through the next Christmas.  Into their places come other optimists who hope something will be left in the till after the debt costs on renovations and the incredible rents are paid.  But starting gradually while times are good, and rapidly when they aren’t, the street becomes dotted with vacancies. The old conveniences don’t return to fill them. They can’t afford to. All this is not owing to competition from malls or big boxes–but because success has priced out diversity.

A popular main pedestrian street running through my own neighbourhood is now afflicted by this dynamic.”

 -  Jacobs, J. 2004 Time and Change as Neighbourhood Allies. Ideas that Matter, Volume 3, (Number 2): pp. 6-7.

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3 Jan ’11 | Correction:  There are 11 sushi restaurants on Bloor Street West between Spadina and Bathurst. Incorrect information appeared in the slide show caption.  Our thanks to Fred Freedman for pointing out the omission of Mariko at 551 Bloor Street West.

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Arrivals & Departures: David’s Tea and Sweet Pete’s Bicycle Shop

The last week saw two new arrivals on the Bloor-Annex commercial strip, David’s Tea, and Sweet Pete’s Bicycle Shop – the B-Side.

DavidsTea | 424 Bloor Street West

David’s Tea opened December 11th at 424 Bloor Street West, just east of Howland Avenue, in the premises formerly occupied by Alex Cuts (now re-located to the second floor of  386 Bloor Street West). This Canadian chain began as a single store in Montreal in 2008 and has since exploded into 41 locations, the Annex location being the fifth to open in Toronto in under two years.

The upscale store sports a slick, modern interior with halogen lighting throughout.  There is minimal seating — one table at the front and two at the back of the shop — but there is a long bar to stand and try samples of some of the over 120 different loose teas proffered by eager staff.   The tea selection ranges from black, green, and white teas to exotic pu’erh cakes.

The tea bar

Thirty-three of the teas are caffeine-free herbal or rooibos blends.

A tea shop seems a natural addition to java junction, the aggregation of coffee shops clustered around the intersection of Bloor Street West and Albany Avenue. But All Things Tea, an independent tea shop with a similar offering of teas and tea paraphernalia recently pulled the plug on their 476 Bloor Street West shop.  They too offered minimal seating and as a result never attracted the same crowds that flock to the local coffee shops to meet, talk, and surf.   Like All Things Tea, DavidsTea lacks a patio, much-desired in local coffee shop culture.

It will be interesting to see if this successful chain’s business model translates to the Annex.

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Sweet Pete’s Bicycle Shop — the B-Side

Sweet Pete's Bicycle Shop | 517 Bloor Street West

Sweet Pete’s opened on December 8, 2010 at 517 Bloor Street West, in the former premises of The Tap Bar and Grill. In this second Sweet Pete’s location, the shop is making a strong bid to go head-to-head with nearby Curbside Cycle for the city bike/urban commuter bicycle market.  But where Curbside features mostly European bikes from Batavus, Pashley, Biomega and others, Sweet Pete’s focuses on bikes from North American companies like Kona, Trek, and Opus who have of late jumped on the Euro-style commuter bicycle bandwagon.

The interior

The shop interior is sleek and welcoming, with exposed steel beams, bare brick walls, “eco-friendly wood flooring” (according to Sweet Pete’s website) and subtle lighting.  Classic jazz plays on the sound system.

Most welcome is the large workshop in the back, where Sweet Pete’s will offer bike tune-ups and repairs.  Since Curbside stopped providing repairs to all but the bikes they sell, ex-Curbside mechanic Rob Bateman’s Bicycle Co. has been the go-to place for tune-ups and repairs in the neighbourhood.  But in the busy summer months, Bateman is sometimes a victim of his own excellent reputation, and his 29A Barton Avenue shop can get overwhelmed with work.

Mechanics' work area

Sweet Pete’s has thoughtfully left The Tap’s signature sign, a neon beer stein with animated keg tap, intact above their own sign, in a nice tip of the hat to the memory of the long-time Annex institution.

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In Arrivals & Departures we document the changes in the commercial/retails strips of the West Annex on Bloor, Bathurst, and Dupont Streets, and think about these changes in the context of Jane Jacobs’ observation that popularity on retail strips can lead to commercial monocultures, and Max Fawcett’s thesis that the Annex is un-gentrifying.

The life and death of a great Toronto neighbourhood

Max Fawcett explores the worrisome decline of the Annex

It might be time for Toronto’s urban geographers and city planners to add the term un-gentrification to their lexicon, because that’s precisely what’s happening in the Annex, one of their city’s oldest and most famous neighbourhoods. Unlike other neighbourhoods in the city that are being bought out and up by neo-yuppies, who spark the transformation of old carpet stores and empty storefronts into painfully hip clothing boutiques, espresso bars, and of-the-moment restaurants, the Annex is sliding in the other direction. Where the neighbourhood was once a bohemian haven defined by a decidedly middle-class ethic it now is rapidly becoming nothing more than an upscale student ghetto defined by fast-food restaurants, ten dollar martinis, a dwindling clutch of futon stores, and a startling increase in the number of vacant storefronts and the homeless people that populate them.

One of the most important and visible aspects of the gentrification process is the influx of new and interesting restaurants that in turn attract more people to the neighbourhood and more fuel to the fires of gentrification. It stands to reason that the reverse is also true, and that the disappearance of interesting restaurants portends trouble ahead for a given neighbourhood. That’s precisely what has happened over the past five years in the Annex, as the diverse selection of quality restaurants that served something other than sushi and shawarmas have been replaced by places pursuing the aforementioned culinary zeitgeist or downmarket chains aimed at cash-starved students like Pizzaiolo and St. Louis BBQ. Meanwhile, the supply of quality delicatessens, bakeries, and speciality suppliers, necessary adjuncts to a prosperous local food culture, have all disappeared.

Another important factor in and indicator of the process of gentrification is a vibrant nightlife built around interesting and eclectic bars that draw in young people from other neighbourhoods, and here again the Annex exhibits the opposite trend. In better days, the neighbourhood’s evening trade was anchored around Lee’s Palace, a venerable old music hall that hosted some of Canada’s best live music performances. Nearby bars like the Tap and Las Iguanas, which were jointly managed and staffed by former members of the early 90s band Pursuit of Happiness, attracted a healthy mix of musicians, artists, and locals, while the Green Room was popular among underage kids from across the city who were looking for their first drink. Today, in contrast, the nexus of the Annex’s after-hours scene is located in the bowels of the Brunswick House, a place that attracts crowds of professional pukers, UFC aficionados, and other people that normally head to the club district. The only thing they have added to the neighbourhood is an increase in late night fist-fights, noise disturbances, and property damage.

As if these trends aren’t discouraging enough, those interested in the long-term health of the Annex must now also respond to the death of both its heart and soul. Dooney’s Cafe, the long-time haunt for writers, artists, and other assorted political and cultural rabble-rousers that acted as the neighbourhood’s soul, was sold recently. Ownership of the famous cafe, which successfully fended off the predatory gaze of Starbucks in 1995 in one of the neighbourhood’s seminal moments, passed from the steady hands of Graziano Marchese to those of Marnie Goldlust, a 25 year old with no experience in the business or, perhaps more importantly, in the neighbourhood and its unique politics. Its devoted core of regulars, which included people like Globe and Mail columnist Rick Salutin, writer David Gilmore, jazz impresario Bill King, and actor Tony Nardi, has already abandoned the place for more hospitable climes, most of which are situated outside the Annex entirely.

The neighbourhood’s heart, meanwhile, is slated for transplant surgery. Honest Ed’s, that infamous insult to good taste that anchors the neighbourhood for tourists and locals alike, is widely expected to meet the business end of a wrecking ball sometime in the near future, as David Mirvish converts it and significant parts of neighbouring Mirvish Village into a lucrative mega-condominium project. While the finished project and the upwardly mobile tenants that will populate its units may help to stop the de-gentrification of the Annex by providing local merchants with an influx of new residents with disposable incomes to burn, it could just as easily accelerate the process by replacing a glittering monument to the neighbourhood’s quirky eclecticism with another cold and sterile condominium block.

Un-gentrification shouldn’t be confused with de-gentrification, a concept best described by writer Adam Sternbergh in a November 2007 piece in New York Magazine on the New York borough of Red Hook. In it, he describes how Red Hook failed to take off as the latest it-neighbourhood despite the fact that it was subject to the attentions of New York’s real-estate developers, artists, professional hipsters, and other members of the vanguard of gentrification. It was, as Sternberg noted, a realtor’s dream, “boasting Manhattan views, a salty maritime history (working piers! Brawling sailors!), and a brochure-ready name, all of which would play perfectly on some theoretical condo prospectus. Seeking waterfront living with a dusting of urban grit? Then drop your anchor in Red Hook!” The fact that Red Hook has yet to exchange its bars and diners for flower boutiques and it-fashion stores left Sternbergh wondering whether gentrification was the raging and unstoppable fire that its proponents depicted it as or instead a flood that raises all ships but eventually, and indeed inexorably, puts them right back, and in so doing leaves behind a badly damaged version of the original landscape. The Annex, however, is a unique case, and as such doesn’t co-operate with Sternbergh’s analysis. Far from being a neighbourhood awaiting the arrival of gentrification, be it with anticipation, nervousness, loathing, or some combination thereof, the Annex is one whose cycle is already complete. It is un-gentrifying, a phenomenon that may merit its own feature article one day.

The recent shootout that left two wounded at the corner of Bloor and Brunswick Streets, the geographical heart of the Annex, should have served as a bloody reminder of the Annex’s decline, or even a catalyst for discussion about it. Instead, it elicited no more than the usual isn’t-that-terrifying and aren’t-guns-terrible titterings that inevitably accompany the rubbernecking spectators and the police tape at shootings. That nobody seems to have noticed the broader trend that produced the shooting is a consequence of its comparatively glacial pace. While previously no-go neighbourhoods like Ossington Street or West Queen West appear to gentrify in a matter of months, the Annex’s decline has been much more gradual. But that difference in pace makes it all the more dangerous and all the more difficult to reverse. The people affected by it, from local residents and business owners to the ever-shifting landscape of public officials and politicians, have been lulled by the gentle grade of the decline into believing that the long-vacant storefronts, corporate fast-food outlets, habituated homeless population, and pools of blood and broken glass that should be viewed as warning signs are instead perceived as longstanding characteristics of the neighbourhood and elements of its charm. Unfortunately for those who care about the neighbourhood, it appears that nothing, not even the shooting of innocent bystanders on a popular street corner, is capable of exposing this dangerous deceit.

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This article was first published in Dooney’s Cafe.com and is republished here with the kind permission of  the author.  Max Fawcett is a freelance writer and former resident of the Annex.  To see more of his work, visit Dooney’s Cafe.com and www.maxfawcett.com.