Hotel X Toronto

Design

The complex is composed of two buildings: a thirty-storey main tower and a four-storey sports club building. The overall design was done by NORR Architects of Toronto, with architecture and interior design services provided by Stephen B. Jacobs Group of New York and Andi Pepper Interior Design of Philadelphia. The original design of the building, then known as "Hotel in the Garden" was by Toronto architect Rocco Maragna. It was completely redesigned by NORR to garner the approval of the City of Toronto's Design Review Panel in 2012.

The main tower holds the over 400 rooms (including suites and two penthouses), meeting rooms, restaurants and bars. The main entrance is located on Newfoundland Road, just north of Lake Shore Boulevard. The sports club building is immediately north of the tower, situated alongside Newfoundland Road north to Princes' Boulevard. It has a total of 11,000 square feet (1,000 m²) space for recreation, including squash and tennis courts and a weight/cardio/physio-therapy centre. To the west of the two buildings, the complex includes the revealed foundations of several of the original barracks buildings, and a landscaped plaza/garden area north and south of the Stanley Barracks, which will become a pub. The Hotel holds an option to expand into the plaza area.

Project history

The site was forested land when settlement by the British began around 1800. After the War of 1812, the land was cleared by the British military as a "Garrison Reserve" to support the garrison known today as Fort York. The site was used for marching, target practice, horse training and temporary campgrounds. As the 1810s era Fort York buildings aged, new facilities were built outside the fort on the Garrison Reserve. Several barracks were built on the current hotel site. One, Stanley Barracks, the former officers' building, continues to exist and is next to the hotel. During the 1800s, as Toronto grew, sections of the Garrison Reserve were transferred to other uses. The northern section became the site for a jail and an asylum. In the 1850s, a new east-west rail line was constructed along the northern boundary. The western half of the reserve became the new Exhibition Grounds for the Toronto Industrial Exhibition (the future Canadian National Exhibition (CNE)). The Canadian military would use the Exhibition Grounds for various purposes during World War I and World War II and then vacated the site, turning it over entirely to the City of Toronto. The Stanley Barracks was used as the Marine Museum for several decades. The other military buildings on the site were all demolished. The area was used for surface parking, outdoor exhibit space and midway during the CNE.

After the Direct Energy Centre (now known as "Enercare Centre") opened in 1997, Exhibition Place management sought to build facilities complementary to its large exhibitions space: meeting rooms and accommodations, that would make the facility more attractive to convention planners. A hotel was first proposed for the site in 1999, but three attempts to get the project started failed. While the hotel project failed to get off the ground, meeting rooms were added with the conversion of the Automotive Building to the Allstream Centre, connected via the underground parking garage to the Direct Energy Centre. In 2008, HK Hotels (later becoming Library Hotels) won the bid to build and operate a hotel on the site. Final agreement on a 49-year lease between HK and the City came in 2009, after issues surrounding archaeological issues and the Stanley Barracks were sorted out. Ownership changed when Library Hotels sold a stake in the project to billionaire Alexander Rovt for US$50 million.

Construction began in 2013. Contaminated soil was found on the site, which delayed construction as it was identified and removed at a cost of CA$5 million, paid for by the City. Colder than normal winters also slowed construction, as the building was hoped to be complete in time for the 2015 Pan American Games. The building was topped off on April 23, 2015.