Two years ago I wrote, “This home in the right hands with some attention to detail and TLC, could be utterly majestic,” about 465 Broadview Ave.
And I don’t normally say “I told you so,” but, in this case, well, I told you so.
The heritage home was originally built in 1906 by Henry Simpson, and when it was last on the market in 2022 had been in the same family for over 50 years.
The foyer with the original wood door.
So it needed some work, to say the least, but it had so much potential.
The living room with new panelling.
And that potential caught the eye of the owner of gordongroup design, Gordon Shearn.
“I had seen the original article in April 2022 and had thought that the house looked amazing but it was priced way more than my budget,” Shearn told blogTO.
The dining room.
“We had been looking for something great with little success, so [I] suggested to my realtor (Sotheby’s Daena Allen-Noxon) we go see it. We really thought it was for inspiration.”
The primary bedroom.
But it was love at first sight.
“Once I walked in I realized I was in deep trouble and was going to have to try and secure it.”
A sitting room or play room.
A mere 36 hours later Shearn had won a small bidding war with a pitch to the estate of the owner that he wanted to restore the house.
The primary suite has a fireplace and a lounge area.
And then a whirlwind renovation started.
A bedroom on the top floor.
“This house had great bones but needed everything, so we needed to take it back to the brick,” explained Shearn.
The original staircase and archway.
They did salvage and protect a ton of elements in the house, like the main staircase and the arch to the living room.
The games room with the salvaged fireplace and dining room pocket door.
They also salvaged paneling, casing and trim, along with the original dining room pocket door and the original living room fireplace was moved to the games room in the basement.
The upstairs landing.
“All the doors in the house were salvaged and given a light refinishing so that they maintained some of their original charm and patina,” added Shearn.
The new family room.
However, there were definitely some major updates.
There are still distinct rooms but large archways let the rooms flow seamlessly together.
“The intention was to make the house seem like all the rooms and pieces could have always been here while actually making them friendly for modern life,” he said.
The new kitchen.
Shearn and the team removed the back servant staircase and used that floor space for a powder room and butler’s pantry.
The backyard patio.
They also added a four-storey addition onto the back of the house to connect the house to the backyard, as well as make room for a new family room and the primary suite.
A home office.
And where they added new trim or casing Shearn told blogTO they did their best to replicate the original, using three types of material to build it up so it matched.
The garden suite.
They also turned the old garage into a garden suite with a kitchen, bath and laundry.
The primary bathroom.
And then built a whole new garage, a move that might seem odd but at the time the new garden suite bylaws hadn’t been passed.
A home gym in the basement.
“In the end a new space from the ground up had too many restrictions and so we decided to reuse the existing garage and rebuilt it within to create a 480 square foot fully self contained unit,” explained Shaern.
The garden suite and the new garage.
But you’d never know that they weren’t both originally there because they clad them in the exact same material to make them feel like they belong together.
A home theatre room in the basement.
The whole renovation process was completed in record time because Shearn spent seven days a week at the site.
He and his family moved in last August.
A patio overlooking the park.
“We’ve loved living here and the energy of the street and the park across the road,” said Shearn.
But after almost one year of living the dream, Shearn is putting his dream home back on the market.
The breakfast nook.
“After 20 years of building dream homes for other people under my company the gordongroup we have now enjoyed building dream homes for us. The reality, however, was always that at 5,750 square feet was always going to be to big to be our forever dream,” he explained.
Another bedroom with access to a patio.
“It will be hard to let this one go but surely there’s another dream around the corner.”
The old garage.
465 Broadview Ave. is listed for $5,900,000.