Riverdale Dormer House

Located in the Toronto’s east-end community of Riverdale, this residential house, faces a favourite neighbourhood park. Post Architecture was brought in to dramatically open up the house to exterior the views, while collaborating with a team of engineers, builders, and designers to make the century- old house perform to modern standards. Accommodating a modern aesthetic is not easy to achieve in old masonry structures without major intervention, but also requires sensitivity when introducing it to the streetscape: modern dormers replaced the traditional gabled ones, and the new metal-clad third floor addition was built respectful of the existing building heights and roof overhangs, to ease the transition. The new dormers are designed with deep overhangs on all sides to further moderate the views in (as well as out) and add privacy especially from the street level.

A number of other interventions were introduced as well to accommodate a more comfortable lifestyle: A radiant floor heating system was installed throughout the house, including in the newly-built garage; a hydraulic car-lift allows for 3 cars to park in the garage, or can be used to free up floor area as an extension of the rear yard; a custom wine cellar was built into the extension off the kitchen for perfectly stored wine, and ultra-sleek (commercial) return air vents and LED lights were used to be as discreet as possible and to support the art walls that enliven the spaces throughout the house.