IN THE MATTER OF THE ONTARIO
HERITAGE ACT
R.S.O. 1990, CHAPTER O.18 AND
CITY OF TORONTO, PROVINCE OF ONTARIO
2365 BAYVIEW AVENUE
NOTICE OF INTENTION TO DESIGNATE
THE PROPERTY
TAKE NOTICE that Council for the
City of Toronto intends to designate the property, including the lands, buildings
and structures thereon known municipally as 2365 Bayview Avenue under Part IV,
Section 29 of the Ontario Heritage Act, R.S.O. 1990, c.O.18, as amended, as a
property of cultural heritage value or interest.
Reasons for Designation
The property at 2365 Bayview Avenue, the Frank
P. Wood estate, is worthy of designation under Part IV, Section 29 of the
Ontario Heritage Act for its cultural heritage value, and meets Ontario
Regulation 9/06, the provincial criteria prescribed for municipal designation
under all three categories of design, associative and contextual value.
Description
The property at 2365 Bayview Avenue, originally
known as the Frank P. Wood estate and now as the Crescent School, is one of a
sequence of grand estates, constructed between 1909 and 1940, on the forested
ravine above the western branch of the Don River, in the Bridle
Path-Sunnybrook-York Mills neighbourhood.
The 30-acre property was purchased in 1928 by Frank P. Wood, the
financier, art collector and major benefactor of the Art Gallery of Toronto
(now the Art Gallery of Ontario). Wood
commissioned the New York firm of Delano & Aldrich Architects who designed
a meticulously-detailed Georgian Revival house set within a picturesque complex
with a forecourt, service-garage building and second garage, clad in limestone
and slate, with terraces, and formal gardens, perched on a ridge above the
ravine landscape of the west branch of the Don River. A painting studio, designed as a log cabin by
the architect Gordon Gibson and set on the slope of the ravine, was later
commissioned by Emma Wood, Frank P. Wood's wife. On Wood's death in 1955 the estate was
bequeathed to the Art Gallery of Toronto.
It was purchased in 1967 by the Crescent School who have altered the interior
of the original buildings, extending the second garage building and have added
a number of large educational buildings, maintaining most of the original
complex, setting and landscape features.
The cluster of four columns set in the garden were relocated in 1970
from the previous location of the Crescent School, the Dentonia Park estate and
the surrounding garden was refurbished in 2013 to mark the school's centennial.
The property was originally listed on the North
York Inventory of Heritage Properties in 1998 and following municipal
amalgamation included on the City of Toronto's Heritage Register in 2006.
Statement of Cultural Heritage Value
Constructed in 1930, the Frank P. Wood estate,
at 2365 Bayview Avenue, has design value as a very fine representative of one
of the Bayview estates constructed in the early 20th century and featuring a
cluster of architect-designed buildings including a large main house and service-garage
buildings whose architecture extended in designed, landscape features, such as
the curvilinear drive leading to the forecourt, the terrace, lawns with formal
plantings and log and stone cabin, all laid-out in response to the ridge and
treed, ravine landscape of the west branch of the Don River.
The main house, is an excellent representative
of the Georgian Revival style, constructed in the early 20th-century, and has
been deemed to be "one of the finest Georgian Revival houses in
Canada."[1] Characteristic elements of the style are
present in the rectangular, two-and-a-half-storey volume with its gable roof,
and symmetrical disposition of elements including the central entrances on its
primary west and east elevations, flanked by double-hung sash windows or French
doors, limestone cladding with quoin details, paired chimneys, and in a nod to
the Georgian architecture of New England, a cupola, reinforcing the symmetry,
of the slate roof. The octagonal second-storey window introduces an Art Deco element
typical of the period in which the house is built, but which is sympathetic to
the Georgian style in its symmetrical form which highlights the axial position
of the main entrance and repeats the octagonal plan of the cupola above. The
random-coursing of limestone cladding is another element which indicates the
early 20th century period of the house.
The log cabin, commissioned by Emma Wood, the
wife of Frank, as a day-time retreat and painting studio, has value as a
representative of a log cabin type, with its single storey, gable-roofed form
with a verandah, three walls of log cladding combined with a fourth wall of
stone including the stone chimney.
A high degree of craftsmanship is displayed in
the detailing of the house including the limestone cladding with its quoins and
precisely laid random coursing, main entrances, doors and door cases. The
interiors of the house also display a high degree of craftsmanship in their
door and window cases, fireplace surrounds, and in the wall panelling with dado,
panels with picture lights and decorative cornices.
A high degree of artistic merit is displayed in
the two service-garage buildings as their design responds to the main house in
their use of the same materials, limestone and slate and differentiates them as
subsidiary to the main house through their lower scale, hipped, instead of
gabled roof form and on the south face of the service-garage building facing
the forecourt, in its modest and more rural character and minimal architectural
elements evident in the design of the windows and single roof dormer. Its large arched opening is indicative of its
original function as a vehicular passage to the garages facing the service
forecourt.
The property has historical and associative
value as it was the home of Frank Porter Wood (1882-1955) a successful Toronto
financier and philanthropist. An early
and avid collector of European paintings, Wood was a major benefactor of the
Art Gallery of Toronto (now known as the Art Gallery of Ontario) donating
important works during his lifetime and on his death, works of global
importance, the proceeds from the sale of his estate to fund the acquisition of
art for the gallery. The gallery
acknowledged his generous patronage with the creation of the Frank P. Wood
Gallery.
The property also has historic and associative
value as it is one of the several large estates constructed along or adjacent
to Bayview Avenue in the Bridle Path-Sunnybrook neighbourhood in the early 20th
century. These estates, with their grand
houses and out-buildings designed by leading architects which were responsive
to the ravine landscapes of the west Don River represent a particular
development in the newly incorporated Township of North York as it was
undergoing transformation from its 19th century origins as vast tracts of
farmland.
The property has historical and associative
value with the Crescent School, which has owned the property since 1970. During the past 50 years the school has
demonstrated their stewardship of the property's heritage through their
adaptive re-use of the original residential estate buildings, including the
main house, the garage-service building, the garage, the log cabin and the
landscape features including the curvilinear drive, forecourt, service court
and lawn. New educational buildings
added to the property have been sympathetic to the original estate buildings in
siting, form and materials.
The Frank P. Wood estate was designed by the New
York firm of Delano & Aldrich Architects.
The partnership of William Adams Delano (1874-1960) and Chester Holmes Aldrich
(1871-1940) lasted from 1903-1940. Their
work reflected their training at the Paris Ecole des Beaux Arts and internship
at the influential New York firm of Carrere & Hastings. They were particularly renowned for their
country house designs for the U. S. east coast elite including the Vanderbilt,
Astor, Rockefeller and Whitney families and for their Georgian Revival style,
both of which are reflected at the Wood estate, their only known Toronto-based
commission.
Located on the east side of Bayview Avenue north
of Lawrence Avenue in the Bridle Path-Sunnybrook neighbourhood, the property
has contextual value as it defines and maintains the landscaped and treed,
ravine setting of the west branch of the Don River and the original Frank P
Wood estate, one of the original country estates which have been characteristic
of this part of North York since its incorporation. As with many of the surrounding former
private estates, the Wood estate is characteristic as it has been adaptively
re-used for institutional purposes, in this case for the Crescent School,
resulting in the addition of new buildings and modification to the original
landscaped setting. Constructed in 1930,
the Frank P. Wood estate is physically and historically linked to its
surroundings representing that "brief period of about thirty years, from
1925-1955, the Bayview area was a delightful pastoral suburb on the edge of a
burgeoning city."
Heritage Attributes
Design and Physical Value
The following heritage attributes contribute to
the value of the Frank P. Wood estate at 2365 Bayview Avenue as a
representative of an early 20th-century country house estate type typical of
the Bayview Avenue estates:
·
The setback,
placement and orientation of the main house, its service-garage building,
secondary garage building, forecourt and service court which are placed in
alignment with the ridge, on its crest and with views to the surrounding ravine
valleys
·
The view of the house
from Bayview Avenue along the driveway
·
The approach to the
house from Bayview Avenue via a long curvilinear driveway which terminates at
the entry forecourt, surrounded by low walls on the south and west, the main
house on the east and service-garage building on the north
·
The secondary
driveway which deviates from the main drive to proceed to the service court
which is flanked to the south by the service-garage building and to the north
by the secondary garage building
·
The terrace surrounding
the house on the north, east and south elevations, now modified and extended
but still maintaining the change in level and steps down to the east and the
designed open space of the formal, rectangular-shaped lawn and the open area to
the north
·
The arc of four
columns supporting an entablature at the end of the lawn, formerly at the
Dentonia Park estate and relocated by the Crescent School
·
The scale form and
massing of the two-and-a-half storey, rectangular, main house with its gable
roof, pair of chimneys and cupola and the two-storey-hipped roof,
service-garage building and one-and-a-half storey hipped roof garage building
·
The south elevation
of the house with its addition of a five-sided sunroom with its slender metal
columns, glazed panels, decorative cornice and copper roof
·
The French doors on
the north, east and south elevations of the house which are a modification of
the typical Georgian sash window as the estate and design of the house responds
to the topography and access to terraces
·
The scale form and
massing of two-storey-hipped roof, service-garage building and one-and-a-half
storey hipped roof garage building, both with roof dormers
·
The south elevation
of the service-garage building with it large arched opening, designed as a
passage to the service court, the flanking double-hung sash windows with the
circular windows above at the second floor level and the semi-circular dormer
in the roof
·
The scale form and
massing of the single-storey, gable roof, log and stone cabin built on the
slope to the north-east of the house, with its stone base, extending into the
adjacent terrace, stone wall with chimney
·
The elevations of the
cabin which feature a base of stone, a fireplace wall of stone, extending
beyond the volume of the cabin with corbelled stones at the eaves line, the
openings in the west, north and east elevations with their views of the ravine
landscape
·
The single volume
interior of the cabin with its stone wall with fireplace, log walls and exposed
rafters and cross beams
The following heritage attributes contribute to
the design and physical value of the property at 2365 Bayview Avenue as a
well-designed representative of the early-20th century Georgian Revival style
with elements of American colonial style and contemporary Art Deco style and
modern influence:
·
The rectangular form
with a gable roof and cupola featuring symmetrical chimneys, symmetrical
dormers, and a five-sided porch/sun room on the south elevation, and central
entrances on the principal east and west elevations leading to the internal
central hall plan
·
The composition and
design of the principal, west (entry) and east (garden) elevations with their
central entries flanked by three double hung sash windows or French doors on
either side with shutters, an octagonal (west) or sash window above the
entrance, flanked by three windows aligned with the windows below and the
dormers, in the roof, three on the west and four on the east elevations,
aligned symmetrically with the openings below
·
The principal entries
on the west and east elevations with their classical door surrounds featuring
columns supporting entablatures with pediments above (triangular pediment on
the west and broken-arched pediment on the east)
·
The composition and
design of the south elevation with four openings arranged symmetrically at each
level with a central arched opening in the attic storey
·
The six-over-six sash
windows and their shutters
·
The octagonal window
on the west elevation centred over the door as it represents the contemporary
influence of the Art Deco style and is also sympathetic to the symmetry and
hierarchy of the Georgian Revival facade
·
The cupola which with
its weather vane is a characteristic feature of the New England Colonial and
Neo-Colonial architecture reflecting the English Georgian roots
·
The formality of the
landscaped setting, the terraces, the designed open space of the formal,
rectangular-shaped lawn and the various classical elements which reflect the
Georgian Revival influence
·
The west and north
elevations of the service-garage building with its stone cladding, quoins,
walls that extend into low level walls enclosing the court, double-hung sash
windows with shutters and, at grade, the former openings to the two garages and
the access from the forecourt
The following heritage attributes contribute to
the contextual value of the property at 2365 Bayview Avenue as it supports the
early-20th century character of this section of Bayview Avenue to the north and
south of Lawrence Avenue as characterized by grand country estates with the
well-treed and landscaped setting of the ravines of the west branch of the Don
River:
·
The view of the house
from Bayview Avenue along the driveway
·
The set-back from
Bayview Avenue with the curvilinear drive to the complex
·
The landscaped, treed
setting with its ravine topography
·
The original complex
of buildings associated with the Frank P. Woods estate maintained within later
additions undertaken by the Crescent School expressing the adaptive re-use of
the complex and the changed use from residential to institutional
Notice of Objection to the Notice of Intention to Designate
Notice of an objection to the Notice of
Intention to Designate the Property may be served on the City Clerk, Attention:
Administrator, Secretariat, City Clerk's Office, Toronto City Hall, 2nd Floor
West, 100 Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario, M5H 2N2.; Email: hertpb@toronto.ca within thirty days of December 23, 2021, which is January 24, 2022. The
notice of objection to the Notice of Intention to Designate the Property must
set out the reason(s) for the objection and all relevant facts.
Getting Additional Information:
Further information in respect of the Notice of
Intention to Designate the Property is available from the City of Toronto at:
http://app.toronto.ca/tmmis/viewAgendaItemHistory.do?item=2021.PH29.17
Dated at the City of Toronto on December 23,
2021.
John D. Elvidge
City Clerk
[1] Dendy, William and William Kilburn, Toronto Observed: its Architecture, Patrons, and History, 1986, p. 233.