Mass Timber Meets Heritage: Toronto’s 60 Bowden
16 minutes ago
5 min read
Twin towers. Brick. Stained glass. And south of them, eight storeys of mass timber.
At 60 Bowden Street in Toronto's Riverdale, the new building is adjacent to the 1931 Danforth Baptist Church rather than on top of it, tied to the old walls at grade by brick taken from the site. mcCallumSather designed the 35,000 sq ft, 50-unit affordable housing project with ERA Architects as heritage architect. The lesson is very straightforward: keeping a building and keeping what it is for are two very different things.
Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Rendering by mcCallumSather
It started with a congregation. In 2014, Danforth Baptist Church and WoodGreen Community Housing submitted a development application to replace the 1911 Sunday School building and much of the church with an 8-storey seniors' housing development. Many members had a spiritual call to do something about the housing crisis in the community. They no longer needed all of their buildings for their original purposes.
The new building will have affordable studio and one-bedroom apartments for residents aged 59 and over (one of the fastest-growing and most vulnerable groups in terms of housing need). WoodGreen will operate it and provide personal support workers, social workers, recreational programming, and shared amenity space.
And the church retains its place. A commercial kitchen. Gathering spaces. A landscaped courtyard. Still room for church services and a food bank.
The City of Toronto dealt with the application in 2015 by designating the property under the Ontario Heritage Act. A layer of legislative protection was put in place—nothing to the roof or exterior. The City had extensive discussions with heritage staff and community stakeholders. A compromise was reached.
“One of the greatest challenges was balancing the congregation’s vision of integrated affordable housing, while retaining meaningful portions of the existing church,” - Nolan Cipriano, architect and associate at mcCallumSatherof.
Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Rendering by mcCallumSather
The façade, twin towers and stained glass windows are all retained. The new mass timber structure rises above. The design team considered sightlines, setbacks, and materials with one objective in mind: the church remains the focus.
A subtle sawtooth articulation provides visual interest, improves daylighting and thermal performance, and reduces solar gain. It also keeps the church tower in front.
“To integrate the new housing into the existing low-rise neighbourhood, the massing is positioned south of the retained church, while the existing Bowden tower is preserved. These heritage elements are tied together at grade with reclaimed brick from the site, while new porcelain cladding creates a contextual presence and elevates the design beyond a simple glass-and-metal box.” - Nolan Cipriano.
Within the affordable housing element, the team has specified a mass timber structure with modular, prefabricated elements, geothermal, green roofs, radiant in-floor heating and cooling, and a high-performance envelope. All of that is intended to reduce future energy and maintenance costs. The existing building is also being upgraded with insulation and ventilation of the sanctuary roof, new windows and removal of all barriers to universal accessibility.
Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Kevin Holland Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Fab Structures
The timber went up in Jan/Feb. Hard winter. Nine calendar weeks, 41 working days, about a floor a week.
Crews lifted hundreds of CLT panels and Glulam columns, plus thousands of metal connectors and fasteners, onto a complex infill site in a dense urban area. The flat-panel, modular approach meant assembly was very quick, and tolerances were very tight.
7-ply CLT floor panels are supported on Glulam columns in a point-supported system, which provides both capability and architectural expression. Element5 supplied the floor and core panels as well as the columns, plus the CLT elevator and stair cores. Fab Structures prefabricated wall assemblies form the envelope with the windows in place.
Light, prefabricated systems interface with the existing fabric without adding undue load.
Prefab improved coordination, minimized construction waste, and completed the enclosures much faster. Environmentally harvested wood has lower embodied carbon than conventional materials. Site disruption was minimal. Quality and safety were maintained at the required levels.
Heritage generally means the older buildings and their characteristic features. You preserve them, and you preserve the carbon that's already been embodied in them. Preservation and environmental protection are in the same direction.
Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Loftin Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Loftin Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Timber Panel Group
Heritage planners also talk about 'intangible heritage', i.e. the ethos, the culture, the way of working of the organization itself, which may well be the reason for the need for a new size or type of building. Social and cultural sustainability can conflict with green sustainability.
“The challenge for everyone working with places of worship is conserving their intangible value as third spaces, while also doing our best to manage aging and functionally obsolete infrastructure,” - Samantha Irvine, a principal at heritage specialist ERA Architects.
Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Element5 / Lee Scott &Chris Loftin Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Element5 / Dennis Bott
Across Canada, older church properties are valuable, underused assets in established communities. Over the past 30 years, Québec's Ministère de la Culture et des Communications has spent $427 million to protect, transmit, and enhance religious cultural heritage, mainly by reusing underused places of worship. Before 1995, the ministry paid for church upkeep and waited for a religious revival. That didn't happen. The ministry changed its approach and began looking for other uses.
Some of the denominations in Canada are actually growing. They don't fit into historic buildings. They need sophisticated audio-visuals, air conditioning, and a lot of parking. Shrinking ones are finding creative ways to generate revenue from their properties by bringing in compatible uses and new occupants.
Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Loftin Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Loftin Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Loftin
Samantha Irvine highlights: “Churches, just like all buildings, are an economic expression of their time.”
Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Fab Structures Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Timber Panel Group Toronto’s 60 Bowden. Photography by Loftin
Credits & Informations
Client: WoodGreen Community Services
Location:Toronto
Developer: Assembly Corp. Inc
Architect: mcCallumSather
Heritage Architect: ERA Architects Inc.
General Contractor: Loftin Management
Engineering Consulting: Thornton Tomasetti
Builder Materials: Fab Structures
Mass Timber Supplier: Element5
Rendering: mcCallumSather
Photography: Element5, Fab Structures, Loftin Management, Timber Panel Group, Kevin Holland
