Tuscani01
Senior Member
It's empty, so I assume they have already found a new building.
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The Tenor (10 Dundas St E, Ent Prop Trust, 10s, Baldwin & Franklin)
It's empty, so I assume they have already found a new building.
Irishmonk
Senior Member
Scientology moves in, then apply wrecking ball.
MetroMan
Senior Member
Actually, do share please. I'm sure many of us would like to see how much worse it could've been. Put in perspective, as bad as this is now, it could've been much worse.
I don't think this building is going anywhere given the complexities of ownership, the long lease for the theatres and the deal requiring access to Ryerson for classes during the day, so I think lipstick on a pig is the only way to improve it. The new screen proves that this is possible. Is it a beautiful building? No. But does it look significantly better now that they removed that clutter of old signs and replaced it with a single, large, clean high quality display? Yes! I don't know if anyone here would argue to go back to that clutter. So, yes, it's possible to make this building better. Further cleaning up the signs and replacing them with high quality displays and/or creative signs for brands will help. Cover up more of the blank grey spaces.
Inside, what dooms this place is the lack of finishes. It's really that simple. Imagine the interior of this building with drywalled ceilings and pot lights, and high quality finishes on the walls and railings.
Secondly, it's the tenants. This building should be an entertainment complex, period. No Dollaramas and HomeSense. Replace HomeSense with a large restaurant overlooking the square and Yonge St. One level up, reconfigure the foodcourt in one half and on the other half along the windows, branded fast food mini restaurants with their own seating. One more floor up: it's perfect. The Milestones and Jack Astor's are laid out perfectly with patios overlooking Yonge and the square respectively. The theatre entrance is perfect. Other than the finishings on the walls and ceilings, I would barely touch this floor.
Back to the outside, even though the movie theatre is the raison d'être of this building, it's barely acknowledged. Replace the LED ticker above the doors with a movie marquee displaying show times. Add movie posters outside by the doors.
The retail available at street level makes perfect sense. They're not directly connected to the inside and can be seen as external to the entertainment complex so any retail type is fine.
This building has an identity problem which hurts its branding. If people knew that Metropolis (yeah, go back to the original name) is the place you go for food and entertainment in the Yonge-Dundas Square area, then it could start attracting and retaining the right type of tenants.
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AHK
Senior Member
From today - Public announcement of Little Canada coming to 10 Dundas:
Little Canada Announces the Successful Completion of Financing, including an Over-Allocation Amount
Feb 12, 2020, 06:00 ET
TORONTO, Feb. 12, 2020 /CNW/ - Our Home & Miniature Land Inc., dba Little Canada ("Little Canada" or the "Company"), is pleased to announce it has successfully completed the previously announced $12,500,000 preferred share ("Preferred Share") financing (the "Offering"). Due to excess demand, the Company additionally expanded the financing ("Over-Allocation Amount") by $1,500,000, or 12%, which has now been successfully completed. Total Preferred Shares issued equaled 5,600,000 at a price of $2.50 per Preferred Share for gross proceeds of $14,000,000.
"A pivotal point in creating an astonishing experience of Canada was reached by securing the lease at 10 Dundas Street East. In addition, our over-subscribed capital raise was a great success," said Founder and President Jean-Louis Brenninkmeijer. "I am delighted after nine years in the making, we now have everything in place to bring Little Canada to Toronto's many diverse communities, a friendly and welcoming place, accessible to everyone." "I am also honoured to have the support of now over 200 investors, made up of many that followed-on into this round, in addition to over 75 new investors".
"Once Little Canada successfully secured its world-class location, the supportive community surrounding the company, investors small to large, with a heavy focus on families, came forward to help make this business vision a reality" said Bill Tharp, CEO of Tangerine Tango, who led the financing. "Jean-Louis and the wonderful Little Canada team assembled are building out a sound, alternative-investment business that leads with a heart – a truly Canadian, double-bottom line investment scenario".
Use of proceeds includes attraction and facility fit-out and construction, attraction destinations build-out and installation, attraction operations and marketing and working capital to expand the organisation and market the attraction for opening.
About Little Canada
Little Canada, an awe-inspiring new attraction that takes visitors on an immersive journey through Canada in miniature, is set to open in summer 2020 in the heart of downtown Toronto at 10 Dundas East, Yonge-Dundas Square.
Little Canada Announces the Successful Completion of Financing, including an Over-Allocation Amount
Feb 12, 2020, 06:00 ET
TORONTO, Feb. 12, 2020 /CNW/ - Our Home & Miniature Land Inc., dba Little Canada ("Little Canada" or the "Company"), is pleased to announce it has successfully completed the previously announced $12,500,000 preferred share ("Preferred Share") financing (the "Offering"). Due to excess demand, the Company additionally expanded the financing ("Over-Allocation Amount") by $1,500,000, or 12%, which has now been successfully completed. Total Preferred Shares issued equaled 5,600,000 at a price of $2.50 per Preferred Share for gross proceeds of $14,000,000.
"A pivotal point in creating an astonishing experience of Canada was reached by securing the lease at 10 Dundas Street East. In addition, our over-subscribed capital raise was a great success," said Founder and President Jean-Louis Brenninkmeijer. "I am delighted after nine years in the making, we now have everything in place to bring Little Canada to Toronto's many diverse communities, a friendly and welcoming place, accessible to everyone." "I am also honoured to have the support of now over 200 investors, made up of many that followed-on into this round, in addition to over 75 new investors".
"Once Little Canada successfully secured its world-class location, the supportive community surrounding the company, investors small to large, with a heavy focus on families, came forward to help make this business vision a reality" said Bill Tharp, CEO of Tangerine Tango, who led the financing. "Jean-Louis and the wonderful Little Canada team assembled are building out a sound, alternative-investment business that leads with a heart – a truly Canadian, double-bottom line investment scenario".
Use of proceeds includes attraction and facility fit-out and construction, attraction destinations build-out and installation, attraction operations and marketing and working capital to expand the organisation and market the attraction for opening.
About Little Canada
Little Canada, an awe-inspiring new attraction that takes visitors on an immersive journey through Canada in miniature, is set to open in summer 2020 in the heart of downtown Toronto at 10 Dundas East, Yonge-Dundas Square.
JasonParis
Moderator
They've moved to Corktown.
steveve
Senior Member
Yesterday:
isaidso
Senior Member
That NE corner has always felt proportionally awkward. It needs to be at least 50% taller. Wrapping around to the Yonge Street side would help too.
isaidso
Senior Member
They seemed so pre-occupied with the advertisements on the exterior that they forgot to design an actual building... or assumed they didn't have to. I suspect they'll eventually cover every square inch of the exterior to hide the tin can behind it. The interior is equally bad. As you alluded to the finishes are non-existent. I'm not sure installing proper finishes would be enough though. It's a terribly disjointed space..
I went twice when it first opened but haven't been back since. I hated every second I spent inside it. The building could have been a feather in Toronto's tourism cap instead of the embarrassment that it is. It's astonishingly terrible inside.
AlbertC
Superstar
Toronto’s Little Canada installs sign - constructconnect.com - Daily Commercial News
TORONTO — A new Toronto tourist attraction currently under construction reached a project milestone recently with the installation of its new exterior sign at 10 Dundas St. E. across from Yonge and Dundas Square. Scheduled to open in 2021, Little Canada
canada.constructconnect.com
TORONTO — A new Toronto tourist attraction currently under construction reached a project milestone recently with the installation of its new exterior sign at 10 Dundas St. E. across from Yonge and Dundas Square.
Scheduled to open in 2021, Little Canada will feature a detailed, animated miniature world covering notable landscapes and cityscapes from across Canada. At launch, Little Canada will open with five destinations including Little Niagara, Little Toronto and Petit Quebec and a sixth, Little North, will be under construction.
“As we prepare to welcome visitors to Little Canada next year, we are working hard to create a safe, memorable experience for everyone,” said Jean-Louis Brenninkmeije, Little Canada executive, in a Nov. 16 brief. “The safety of our employees and guests will always be our top priority and we look forward to opening when the time is right.”
Little Canada will continue to expand year-after-year by adding new destinations until the experience covers all of Canada.
Richard White
Senior Member
Toronto’s Little Canada installs sign - constructconnect.com - Daily Commercial News
TORONTO — A new Toronto tourist attraction currently under construction reached a project milestone recently with the installation of its new exterior sign at 10 Dundas St. E. across from Yonge and Dundas Square. Scheduled to open in 2021, Little Canada
TORONTO — A new Toronto tourist attraction currently under construction reached a project milestone recently with the installation of its new exterior sign at 10 Dundas St. E. across from Yonge and Dundas Square.
Scheduled to open in 2021, Little Canada will feature a detailed, animated miniature world covering notable landscapes and cityscapes from across Canada. At launch, Little Canada will open with five destinations including Little Niagara, Little Toronto and Petit Quebec and a sixth, Little North, will be under construction.
“As we prepare to welcome visitors to Little Canada next year, we are working hard to create a safe, memorable experience for everyone,” said Jean-Louis Brenninkmeije, Little Canada executive, in a Nov. 16 brief. “The safety of our employees and guests will always be our top priority and we look forward to opening when the time is right.”
Little Canada will continue to expand year-after-year by adding new destinations until the experience covers all of Canada.
This a tourist dependent attraction.. tourists that probably won't be coming in sufficient quantities untio 2022.
Why they are they still considering opening is beyond me when tourist oriented businesses across Toronto are closing?!
I wish then well.
Northern Light
Superstar
It certainly will be a challenge; but do they actually have any alternative? Rent at Yonge/Dundas isn't likely to be cheap.
You have a burn-rate for cash; if no revenue is coming in.
Better to lose a little, than a lot.
Richard White
Senior Member
I would assume their only alternative would be putting it all in storage and opening at a later date in Niagara Falls.
At this point they would probably get more tourists and cheaper rent in Niagara Falls. Plus they have the border right there.
marcus_a_j
Senior Member
I can imagine a lot of locals checking it out before the out-of-towners return in droves. If tourists aren't coming to Toronto, we're not going anywhere either. We can be tourists in our own City.
ShonTron
Moderator
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By late spring 2020, there will likely be vaccination programs rolled out. That does not mean that it will be business-as-usual yet, but it will mean that there can be some relaxing of restrictions, with health workers and the most at-risk populations hopefully protected. I'd like to think that indoor spaces where crowds can be controlled with things like timed tickets and continued mask wearing will be able to open. Walk-through attractions, like the aquarium, like Little Canada, like the AGO and ROM will be lower risk than sports venues, theatres, and packed night clubs.
I don't see concerts and sports venues filling up until about this time next year, though. I don't see mass tourism happening until at least then too.
Yup. Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg, (Germany's #1 tourist attraction), which had allowed people to wander freely prior to the pandemic, introduced lanes on their floors make it more orderly, while at the same time dropping the number of tickets they sold per hour. That allowed them to reopen safely (until a more recent month-long total lockdown in Hamburg). The bulk of their staff, like Little Canada's, are employed creating the models, so those people are being paid whether or not the doors are open… so finding a way to safely open those doors is important. If we get a chance to see it without crowds, so much the better, while we wait for the populace to be generally vaccinated and for tourism to resume.
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