Dundee Kilmer Developments has named the first wave of retailers for Canary District, the new neighbourhood housing the Pan Am Games athletes' village this summer. Shops won’t be open by then, but president Jason Lester tells us they'll hew to the community's healthy spirit.

The retailers, coming spring 2016, will be located at the base of residential buildings along an expanded Front Street East. The roster includes Dark Horse Espresso Bar, Fuel Plus (a cafe), OpusGlow Concept Spa, Pizza e Pazzi, Tabule Middle Eastern Cuisine, The Running Room and Think Fitness Studio. Dundee Kilmer secured the tenancies through a partnership with LiveWorkLearnPlay Inc., a real estate advisory firm specializing in mixed-use projects. “We’ve specifically created a health and wellness retail community,” explains Jason, snapped on site. “It’s a concept that’s unique in Toronto.”

Jason’s firm, Dream Unlimited, which is co-developing Canary District in a JV with Kilmer Van Nostrand, took a similar approach when it selected retailers for the Distillery District, which it built over a decade ago; most had an arts and culture focus. “That was on a much larger scale,” he says, 400k SF of space. The first phase of retail at Canary District will be about 30k SF. But the health and wellness theme is "resonating" with tenants, says Jason. It's also a big plus having a new YMCA and Corktown Common, an 18-acre park that serves as a trailhead to path networks up the Don Valley and along the lake.

After the Pan Am Games are done, the site's handed back to Dundee Kilmer for completion as a mixed-use community, the second neighbourhood in the West Don Lands. A second phase of condo buildings, which will include additional retail, will be developed in coming years. The 46k SF of total retail space will eventually incorporate the historic CNR building at the district’s entrance, at Front and Cherry streets, as well as the old Canary Restaurant building that inspired the district’s name.

While most retailers are locally based and indie, Jason says he specifically sought out The Running Room—with 114 locations across North America—to reinforce the wellness theme. “There’s really nothing comparable,” he says, noting it’s the neighbourhood's only national chain. All cafes and restos will have patio space, part of Dundee Kilmer's “massive investment” in the area's public realm. Accordingly, says Jason (snapped at a brick ceremony last fall), it was key retailers could do as good a job programming exterior spaces as interiors. “It had to be part of their business plan.”