BSäR Group of Cos picked one helluva building to signal its entry into the TO condo world: a captivating Rubik’s Cube-like structure on Beverley Street with a three-floor section that dramatically twists 12 degrees off centre.
We snapped BSäR principal Tarek Sobhi and CORE Architects principal Charles Gane outside 12 Degrees, one of Bisnow's 10 coolest-looking new condos. The audacious design of the 11-storey, stone-clad building was inspired by the creativity surrounding it: it’s in the heart of the design district, just off Queen West, and steps from OCAD University and Art Gallery of Ontario (featuring an intervention by Toronto-born Frank Gehry, who, it turns out, grew up at 15 Beverley, where 12 Degrees now stands). Tarek notes the condo's odd configuration means it has 67 unique floor plans in a building of just 96 units.
Opening in the middle as it does, 12 Degrees is intended to serve as a gateway to this creative district, Tarek tells us. “The city wanted to see something funky here.” The building is decidedly modern (its rooftop terrace, below, will have a 40-foot pool with infinity edge and cabanas) but townhouses at its base, accented by bay windows and stone piers, tie 12 Degrees in with the heritage house-fronts found up and down Beverley. Charles got the idea for the structure’s off-kilter look from his son Finn's school art project, a cardboard condo. “They glued a bunch of boxes together, built them up, tried to make it straight, but they didn’t.”
Charles, who also designed Freed Developments’ Fashion House and 500 Wellington West, says he wanted to create a building that “had some fun.” Though he acknowledges now “it was a pain in the (rear) for Tarek (and business partner Tyler Hershberg) to pull off that fun.” Construction of uniform box-like condos is typically “mindless and fast,” Tarek says. Things get infinitely more complicated when “you start to do twisting and turning, and all of your stacks are offline, and you’re not repeating floor plates." Every floor at 12 Degrees required halting work and recalibrating. "It was a unique experience for everybody involved.”
Tarek and Charles on 12 Degrees' rooftop, boasting one of the city’s best skyline views. Tarek won’t dish on how much he and his partners paid for the property, but says “a lot of guys took a run at it.” There was a major hurdle, though: the owners lived in Switzerland. “You couldn’t get to them.” Tarek persevered, though, and eventually tracked them down, and was able to make a deal. “Getting to the family was key,” he says, as was the fact that while competitors were pricing their bids for a six-storey townhouse complex, to match the scale of properties across the road, “we took a different view, a more aggressive approach.”
Construction is underway on BSäR's latest project, The Hill, a nine-storey condo at 925 Eglinton Ave W, just west of Bathurst Street. The glass and limestone mid-rise, also designed by Charles Gane, will have 91 units and, Tarek reveals first to Bisnow, a 10k SF Shoppers Drug Mart. The Hill replaces local institution China House and a Green P parking lot (the condo will have 68 parking stalls.) Site assembly was a big challenge, says Tarek, but with the Crosstown LRT being built right outside the door, the timing couldn’t be better. And BSäR's in talks to acquire more sites along Eglinton. “We’re not done with that street.”
