In October 2014, Solares co-founders Tom and Christine gutted and redesigned their 900 sq.ft. home in the Roncesvalles neighbourhood into a beautiful, open concept, high performance home. They saw huge potential in the rough-around-the-edges, oft-overlooked house, in a friendly neighborhood close to the Solares Architecture office and local schools, shops, and parks. So the couple bought it, began their formidable renovation plans, and only 8 months later the building's transformation from a small, nondescript house to the home of their dreams was complete.
The airy and open first floor hosts a large sitting area, a dining room area and a kitchen with a large kitchen island. A powder-room was added on a landing between the first and second floors, and the master bedroom, children's bedroom and play room are nestled on the second floor, alongside the large bathroom plus bath and laundry. The basement was underpinned and finished as a separate, 450 sq.ft. rental unit with lovely high ceilings and large windows, most notably a full-height bedroom window (a valued rarity in basement apartments!) for extra income.
Tom and Christine acted as both the clients and the architects in charge of the home’s design, with Tom taking the role of the project’s general contractor. Our underpinning and heavy structural work was done by Tall Basements, our landscaping was done by Remi Cormier of R Environs Inc., and the interiors were finished by Paul Drummond from Modern Dwellings.
For insulation, we used spray foam created by Icynene and installed by Rich Krechowicz of CallRich Eco Services, a Toronto spray foam insulation service company. After our initial insulation, we always test our air barrier using a blower door test, with help from Bluegreen Group, a green building consulting group located in Toronto. Shervin Akhavi helped us find any microleaks using infrared cameras, which we then patched up with acoustical sealant.
Paul Shrigley and Matthew Witt of Shrigley, Garcia & Associates designed and installed an innovative and compact HVAC and plumbing system perfect for the small and well-insulated space.
Our lovely paint job, on both the home's interiors and exterior was done by the Painting Hub, and our lovely green roof was installed by Skyspace Green Roofs, to make use of all the unused, second-floor sunlight.
The finished product boasts an incredible 84% reduction in energy use, a final air leakage rate of 2.08 ACH, and a final EnerGuide rating of 83, almost triple its original 38. Tom, Christine and their two young children could not be happier in their compact, high performance, urban home.
We’d also like to credit Derek Monson of Monson Photography for the photographs.
