What to know
- An architecture expert says many of Toronto’s awkward condo layouts stem from years of investor-focused development, where maximizing bedrooms, dens and amenities often took priority over livability.
- Building infrastructure also forces architects to adapt unit layouts, resulting in oddly shaped rooms and unconventional floor plans.
- While unusual layouts can frustrate buyers and renters, smaller units are generally more affordable and can be more energy efficient because they have less exterior frontage.
- BDP Quadrangle says it designs projects “inside out,” starting with functional living spaces before shaping the rest of the building to create more practical homes.
- With purpose-built rentals on the rise and the condo market evolving, the expert expects developers to place greater emphasis on designing homes that better meet the needs of people who actually live in them.
Those who have rented or bought a condo in Toronto have probably come across an unusual layout, from strange living room shapes, to impractical spaces, sliding bedroom doors, or micro dens, and one expert is explaining what’s behind them.
The city’s layouts have often sparked conversation among tenants or buyers in the city, with many wondering what could be behind the often impractical spaces.
Toronto has some of the worst condo layouts on the planet.
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Now Toronto spoke with Sami Kazemi, principal at architectural and design firm BDP Quadrangle, about what could be behind the non-traditional condo layouts in the city.
Development projects are disconnected from final consumers
According to Kazemi, there are several factors behind the unusual condo layouts observed by Torontonians, including a major disconnect between those developing units and those living on them.
As explained by him, usually the real-estate market includes a healthy balance between property investors and homebuyers looking to live in their purchased homes. However, over the past two decades, the market has been overly focused on investors.
But investors view the homes they buy differently from someone looking to actually live in them.
“Investors, unlike end users and unlike rental buildings, think in different ways. They think in terms of checklists…[They] want X number of units to be under 599 square feet, whatever that magic number is, so that they can hit a certain sales price. And within that, they want a checklist [with] as many bedrooms as possible, as many washrooms as possible, as many dens as possible, even when it doesn’t necessarily make sense,” he explained.
Meanwhile, Kazemi says these things don’t necessarily translate into what end users need or want in a condo, as they usually focus on how the space fits into their lifestyle, and not in terms of price per square foot or a checklist of items.
The end results are units that often look impractical or strange to renters or buyers.
“You end up with these units that are good on paper, so it’s got two bedrooms, but one of the bedrooms is on glass. It’s got a den, but the den is really small, and as a result, the living room is really small. It’s got two washrooms or three washrooms, but that takes away space from everything else,” Kazemi said.
In addition to layouts being disconnected from what is expected by end users, Kazemi explained that they also need to shift in order to accommodate other things in the building.
“[It] is all driven by the back of house elements that fit into your floor plan, which is your elevators, your garbage chutes, your mechanical shaft, your exit travel distance, your corridors. It’s like a puzzle where you need to fit everything together,” he said.
In order to accommodate all these elements, unit floor plans need to be altered, leading to unusually-shaped living spaces or bedrooms.
Are there any advantages to unusual layouts?
Although renters and buyers might find some Toronto condo layouts impractical, they do come with a few advantages.
Firstly, Kazemi explained that smaller units usually come for a more affordable price point, which is reflected on end users and buyers.
In addition, they are usually more environmentally friendly, especially those that have less window or frontage surfaces.
“The frontage is where you lose all of your heat in the winter and where you gain all the heat in the summer. So, the more frontage you have for the square footage that you’ve got, the more you’re actually spending on energy costs,” he added.
Will this trend continue?
In order to support more practical layouts, Kazemi said BDP buildings are usually designed starting off with the unit layouts, and then moving externally.
“If you take it as a starting point that you’re thinking of these condo units as homes, and this is where people will be living and spending a lot of time, and you design the ideal suites and try to fit this around it. That’s where you design inside out. I think you have a much better chance of getting a good outcome,” he said.
With the market facing a slight shift over the past few years, Kazemi said he anticipates an overall “reset” in the market, in which more developers will be designing properties considering end users’ experiences.
“There’s also a larger shift towards purpose-built rental from condos to rentals. Condos will probably come back, maybe not as strong, maybe they will. But no matter how they come back, this shift to rentals brought the entire industry back to basic principles, which is we’re designing homes for people,” he added.
