Harbord Village

[flar]

hmm, where is this?

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[kool maudit]

to me, this area embodies the best of pre-war residential toronto.

[Jaborandi]

Another excellent tour by flar, this time of a charming neighbourhood that is so often overlooked or forgotten. I think I know where my next walk will be to. Thanks!

[rousseau]

Thing is: where else could it be? Too bad that most of these houses cost $2 million. Otherwise I'd want to live there.

Great tour, Flar. Thanks.

[montréaliste]

Loved walking around that whole westside area of Toronto a coupla months ago. I agree with Kool Maudit, Harbord Village is good stuff.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Thing is: where else could it be? Too bad that most of these houses cost $2 million. Otherwise I'd want to live there.

Great tour, Flar. Thanks.

nice vernacular-focused shots.

2 million?

toronto must be hyper-gentrifing. the equivalent is 50k to 300k homes, here.

[Docere]

It isn't $2 million in Harbord Village - that sounds like The Annex to the north. Average price in HV is about $1 million.

I love the neighborhood! The first pic (corner of Sussex and Major) is one of my favorite Toronto houses.

[softee]

There's only one place that could be. Old Toronto definitely has its own, distinctive style of housing.

[flar]

A pretty large section of old Toronto looks like this, except some streets in this area have the big boulevards and more trees. The Harbord Village area must have been more upper middle class back in the day.

Heading west, the typical streets are a little plainer and have smaller front yards and fewer trees, more like this:




Toronto has those distinctive steep, narrow bay and gables. Hamilton has a similar housing format, but it typically looks more like this:

[Docere]

Originally Posted by flar

A pretty large section of old Toronto looks like this, except some streets in this area have the big boulevards and more trees. The Harbord Village area must have been more upper middle class back in the day.

It was predominantly Jewish between WWI and the 1960s, being part of the Spadina area. Pretty working class/lower middle class at the time, many worked in the garment industry. Before it was Jewish I presume it was skilled working class anglo.

Heading west, the typical streets are a little plainer and have smaller front yards and fewer trees

Yup, that seems quite evident. Closer to Spadina it feels grander. Of the major north-south streets, Robert is the most gentrified, Major and Brunswick a little less so, Borden it drops off a bit and Lippincott has a bit of the "Bathurst residue."

[Beedok]

So it's a neighbourhood of Toronto that looks like Hamilton but costs 5x as much?

[flar]

Originally Posted by Beedok

So it's a neighbourhood of Toronto that looks like Hamilton but costs 5x as much?

Hamilton could start by planting a few trees, implementing proper traffic control, enforcing property standards and outlawing the practice of turning those tiny front yards into driveways. Toronto is so much more pleasant simply because the streets are lush with greenery rather than concrete slabs like in Hamilton.

[xzmattzx]

Nice pictures! Why did you go to Harbord Village? Is it because it seemingly has an above average stock of Victorian houses?

Where is Harbord Village? I have never heard of this area.

[flar]

Originally Posted by xzmattzx

Nice pictures! Why did you go to Harbord Village? Is it because it seemingly has an above average stock of Victorian houses?

Where is Harbord Village? I have never heard of this area.

It's beside the University of Toronto, right between Kensington Market and the Annex.

I didn't specifically plan to go to Harbord Village. I was just in the area and it seemed like a nice place to take a morning walk.

I don't think Harbord Village is even historically the name of this area, the neighbourhood association just started calling it that, probably when it started to (re)gentrify.

[Dr Awesomesauce]

I'm not so sure. People talk about Toronto's distinctive housing vernacular but aside from those attached cottages with the mansard roof, any of those houses could have been in Hamilton. I've always found it to be an interesting phenomenon, really, though I suppose we owe those similarities to geography.

Thanks for the pics, by the way.

[M II A II R II K]

You didn't get a picture of that fish and chips shop.

[Docere]

My hood. Too bad I'm a year late to the thread!

[yaletown_fella]

Wow! You JUST missed my parent's old house in picture number 7. It's right beside the right-most house.

[kool maudit]

might be my favorite area of toronto.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

might be my favorite area of toronto.

Mine too. Wonderful Victorian housing stock, very walkable, transit-friendly, near U of T, the Annex strip along Bloor, Kensington Market and very accessible to the downtown core, some excellent restaurants along Harbord etc....it really is a gem IMO. The Residents Association has become very active (the name "Harbord Village" was adopted in the last decade or so).

The only issues I've really heard raised is the lack of greenspace/parks, and for those obsessed with school rankings, the local elementary schools - Lord Lansdowne and King Edward - aren't as good as the schools north of Bloor like Huron and Palmerston. There are very few children in the neighborhood - it's no Roncesvalles or Riverdale - the population is largely made up of professional DINKs and empty nesters. There is also, not surprisingly, a lot of university professors in the area.