Nasmith Avenue

Nasmith and Gifford - the new kids on the block

Of interest, however, are the two "new" streets in the area, Gifford Street and Nasmith Avenue, both laid out, south of Spruce Street, following the removal of the Toronto General Hospital buildings, in the 1920s.

The small, comfortable houses on these streets, while maintaining the small-scale and high density approach of their Victorian predecessors, reflect a number of characteristics which differentiate these new homes from Cabbagetown houses which had gone up before:

• the trend away from flamboyance and ornamentation;
• utilization of new, improved building materials, sanitary conveniences, fire and safety measures and other developments of their period;
• no-nonsense practicality, reflected by the functional and frank use of materials;
• platform frame, as opposed to balloon frame, construction, solid brick walls and low ceilings;
• characteristic horizontal orientation of house facades, wide dormers, rectangles, heavy porches supported by solid round columns; and
• spatial changes due to driveways for motor vehicles.

While the houses on Gifford and Nasmith represent an historical departure from previous Victorian architecture in other parts of Cabbagetown, that makes them no less interesting from an architectural and social point of view, nor does it depart from the charm and comfort of the houses individually, representative of their period, or from the pleasant, welcoming and lowscale street-life amenities which the streets reflect.

From the Cabbagetown Preservation Association...

Strongly influenced by the Arts and Crafts Movement, many Cabbagetown houses built in the 1905 1930 period are called Edwardian although they have distinctly Southern Ontario characteristics. Most prevalent in Cabbagetown is the largely unornamented Tuscan variation in which gabled semi-detached and detached houses are fronted by porches supported on Tuscan columns or half columns. A similar type occurs in several non-gabled versions, in which a bay is applied above the porch, often aligned with a roof dormer. Several houses occupying the old Toronto Hospital site and along Wellesley Street, take these forms.