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King Swede East

By Marc Lostracco

IKEA_bike.jpg
King Street East is known for its high-end furniture retailers like Roche Bobois and UpCountry, so it’s a bit of a surprise to see the logo for everyone’s guilty pleasure, IKEA, on a classy King Street storefront.
Torontoist reader Sofi Papamarko asked us to investigate this mysterious downtown presence of the eco-conscious Swedish giant, suggesting that it could be an office furniture location or a boutique IKEA (similar to the Leon’s planned for the Roundhouse or the downscaled Brick store at College Park). The windows at 143 King Street tease a date of July 31, 2008—which curiously is the same day that IKEA releases their annual catalogue.
“It’s not a store,” a rep for the company told Torontoist, “but it is a place where customers can check out products from the 2009 catalogue.”
A furniture showroom where you can’t buy anything on-site is an interesting concept, but it’s also smart: the showroom can be tailored to the dense condo market (which demands smaller items and is more likely to request home delivery), but it also avoids the bad press surrounding warehouse-style box stores in the city core. Plus, it’s right on the spårvagnen, er, streetcar line, so no trips out to Etobicoke or North York just for a look-see at the Poopli pencil holder.
Aesthetes rejoice, for the store boasts none of IKEA’s trademark blue-and-yellow, but subtle gold logos decaled on the windows, appropriate for the historic architecture between Jarvis and Church.
We’re curious to see what exactly appears on July 31, as three floors of the building are under heavy construction inside. The showroom is a contrast to the premium-priced wares of King East strip, and if you ask us, det är bra!
Photo by Marc Lostracco.

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  • David Toronto

    I gather that this is analogous to the storefront
    operations of Eaton’s and Simpson-Sears in smaller centres.
    One could go to the store and look at some of the smaller goods and samples of larger articles such as furniture. One would order from the catalogue and come back to pick up or have the articles delivered.

  • Marc Lostracco

    David Toronto: That reminds me of where I grew up out in the country—we had a little window in the Purina feed store where you’d go over and select items from the Simpsons-Sears catalogue and it would get delivered a week or so later and you’d have to go to the back of the feed store and pick it up. And then there was the amazing Consumer’s Distributing…

  • David Toronto

    Mark Lostracco: In some of the larger centres like Kingston and Peterborough, there would be a walk-in store and some merchandise would be available for purchase on-the-spot.
    Consumer’s Distributing had wares in stock–at least where I shopped–and one could take home most purchases immediately.
    By the way, I wonder if ConDisCo ever paid its $5 million printing bill it had with Quebecor.

  • Gloria

    I like the subdued logo; it’s nice to see a business adjusting to a neighbourhood aesthetic, rather than plunking down without compromise (particularly jarring when they gut buildings of historical style).
    I noticed this in New York — in Manhattan, there exists some of the classiest McDonald’s and Home Depot signage I’ve ever seen in my life.

  • uskyscraper

    Ah, an update on the old Consumers’ stores. I loved visiting those places as a kid and flipping through the toy section of their catalog.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumers_Distributing

  • johnpee

    I hate those Poopli kids.

  • paigesix

    I LOVED the Consumers Distributing catalogs! I would always flip through them and pick items for elaborate room and office designs I made up on paper… ah! And yes, the TOYS. It was like online shopping before online existed.