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32 Comments March 15, 2007 at 9:44 am

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The Best Place to Live in Toronto

2007.3.15.epitome.jpg
This Torontoist loves seeing this building every time she rides her bike down Huron street. It must be the best place to live in the city, after all, it’s the epitome of apartment!
If you, or anyone you know, lives here, or if you’re a babysitter or painter or window washer and you’ve ever had occasion to go inside one of the units, could you let us know if it lives up to its promise?

Comments

Andres

I went to look at an apartment there this past fall. The place was not nice. The common areas were worn out and the lower floor apartments were in dire need of a reno. Some of the upper floor apartments looked a bit better but I think the name is a bit misleading.
anon

Not to mention the fact that you get to live across the street from the NDP’s first family.
Marc Lostracco

Kudos, at least, to the property management for resisting hideous signage on a nice old building and keeping it old school.
Carly Beath

Have you seen the Wellesley Transglobe building lately, Marc? There’s a new sign on the lawn! And it’s bigger than all the other ones! It’s for an aluminum company, so I don’t know if it’s temporary or permanent, but it’s godawful.
Disparishun

But isn’t an “epitome” a prototypical specimen or typical example? The epitome of an apartment should be unbelievably average, not super-great. If Andres’ description is right, then the building probably lives up to its name…
jennifer castle

muchos cockroachos.
chris

i actually live there! yeh, it’s worn down and bugs exist. and the heating really sucks … but just about everybody else i know who lives here are some of the nicest people i’ve ever known. the building manager is great guy too.
some of the apartments have been recently renovated and are really great (i’m friends with the guy who did the renos). i live in the old part of the building attached to the back. it’s an old victorian with a couch-house. that’s the part with character: high ceiling, gorgeous moulding, big windows. and the best part is the courtyard between the building and the couch-house which becomes the summer hangout place.
regardless of all the little things, i love living here. when i was looking for a place before moving to the city, i walked by this building and just fell in love with the character. great spot to live…
stop by any time, Dory (apt214)!
chris
downtown gal

when i was apartment hunting, i thought this place was cheap for the price. it wasn’t pretty – a hole-in-the-wall bathroom (you had to step up to go into the shower, if i recall). it was a small crappy space, not much of an apartment. some units have a small balcony, which is nice. if i was a student on a budget, maybe…
elliot

A friend lives in the basement there and it’s probably the sketchiest place in the world but I really wish I lived there.
http://www.torontoist.com Dory Kornfeld

Thanks for the offer, Chris, I may take you up on it someday…
chris

not a problemo, dory!
chris
Brad

What are the rents like?
chris

for a bachelor ~$700, 1-bdrm >$900 depending on which one, and the penthouse apt is ~$2000 I think. the penthouse is really frickin’ nice from what I’ve heard but I haven’t been up to see it yet. my rent’s $975 but I have access to the backyard…
Pandora

My mom’s friend lived here when I was a kid and I also always thought there was something fantastic about the name (though I didn’t know what it meant and believed it to be pronounced “ep-it-TOME”) and that it was a lovely old building. It was pretty crappy inside though, as some have commented, but I think it was mad cheap, unlike now that the UofT ghetto has taken over Chinatown.
jrochest

I’ve known two people who’ve lived there, and both had the worst cockroach problem ever. I remember helping my buddy move and literally watching them drop off furniture as we picked it up.
Maybe it’s improved, but still.
stacy

I also looked at a unit there last fall, according to the building manager it used to be a very posh hotel in the early 1900s. It has that awesome old-hotel vibe, but the bug problem seemed pretty clear even from a cursory glance around the place.
a.

i used to live there about 5 years ago. at the time i guess it was better maintained because in the entire two years i lived there i never saw a single cockroach and the heat was working perfectly. it was worn down and the apartments were minuscule (the shower was a contortionist’s box and the “kitchen” had a miniature two burner stove with an oven so small that most cookie sheets wouldn’t fit into). but the rent was cheap and the location amazing for a student. plus all my neighbors were a hilarious bunch of freaks which made the place more interesting. though i guess that would be a red flag for those looking for something more “respectable”.
chris

well, i haven’t seen any roaches for ~year. occasionally i’d see one but not for awhile. the sizes of the kitchens are quite variable. i knew a few people (including myself) that have 4-burner stove and good size kitchen.
tammy

Me, I lived there about 10 years ago in both the coach house AND the main building. HOO yah the couch house was WAAAY nicer than the main, with many fewer varmint. I was in the coach house with my single mom friend and her toddler and it was a titch scary some nights with the goings on in the alleyway. In the main building my apartment was not only roach-infested, but also mouse-infested. Now…I’ve lived in a lot of shit-holes so I have to say, this was by far NOT the worst…and, apparently, my room was above the furnace or boiler room or the Mouseketeer club or something. So, I do have one of my favourite mouse-y stories from the Epitome. One day a friend who was visiting opened my fridge and a mouse appeared to fall out of the fridge at her feet. She screamed like a little girl* (*to be said with an Arnold Schwarzeneger accent.) The mouse was NOT inside the fridge. It had been on the moulding (word?) of the fridge door….so when the door was opened – plop! Good times. I still really liked it though, as it was cheap and I too had some friends in the building and my chum was in the coach house. She said we were like Rhoda and Mary Tyler-Moore (only more low class I guess) and I had to be Rhoda. It was also great to be right by the market. I don’t think it is possible to have get a place in/close by the market without having some vermin.
http://www.robscleaningservice.com theocrat

We’ve never cleaned windows here, but we sure would like to get the chance to.
Robert Lamb
Window Masters
http://www.robscleaningservice.com
James

I would have been concerned about those icicles falling on my head!

But I hear most apartments have roaches particularly downtown ones. Is this true?

I could find anything about this on the moving to Toronto page.
vanessa

I moved into one of the sketchy basement apartments in september. The carpets are stained and crappy, the shower looks like it was in the set of some crazy 70′s slasher/porn set and the hallway smells. However, the location is great and the price is right for a broke ass student. what more could you ask for?
Inquirer

I have recently come to view a vacant unit and I was told the building is under new management, how is that working out?
chris

GREAT. the new management seem to be really good and are getting things done. dare i say, they actually seem to care, unlike the previous management!
s

Mid 90s= CH+bldg. CH=bugs,clanging rads (earthquakes 24/7). Spent alot o’ nights @ Grossman’s Tavern! Bldg=better. Laundry was where PH must B now. No bugs. Rent=$509. Epitome’s only bad? Alot of artistic angst I guess: Suicide 2 doors down. Found out that Death smells like coffee. Couch stained like furniture wood stain. Landlady crocodile tears: “He could’ve come talked to me. I was always here…” Anyone so damn depressed, considering off-ing himself, is not gonna go ‘talk’ to his landlady?! Sigh.. Anyway- if any, the ol’ Epitome is full of Love Ghosts only…
So Kids, listen up! : If Love suddenly invites u 2 dinner @ the E, make sure u do at least 2 out of 3:
1) Accept
2) Make Love All Night Long
BUT (if u really wanna do it right) the next morning, when u find Love wrapped around u: “I feel so close 2 u, never felt this way” -
3) DO NOT BOLT!
DO NOT become scared & stupid & do-everything-u-can-do-to sabotage Serendipity. Let Love In Already!
(but use a condom,k?)
Tales echo from Historic Epitome’s walls. Write Some More.
Peace.
justine

Hey, I just bought a basement apartment, I’m moving in mid July. I think that the building is great! It has an old elegance to it, and the new management has definitely done things to improve it. the property manager is a genuinely nice guy. I like that its small, I am a student attending OCAD in the fall, and for the price and the location, I know I couldn’t have found anything more perfect. Bring on the roaches and the mice! It’s all part of the experience.
chris

welcome, justine!
stop by to say hi anytime: 214
justine

Thanks! haha.. I’ll be moving stuff in as of mid-july
Darren L.

I went there to take a look and there was a homeless guy sleeping on the front steps, needless to say I turned right around.
chris

well, Darren, considering it’s near College&Spadina, odds are good that will happen. this ain’t Newmarket, baby. you have CAMH and a mission at C&S and a liquor store just down the street. it’s called downtown. you live in a major metropolitan city. there are homeless people.
justine

signing first and last month’s rent today… i hope i see the homeless man.. we can be friends.
http://www.multicity.ca/ Long Distance Movers

Toronto movers is their years in the business as this will help you in determining their experience in this field.

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