4. The Studio Building - 25 Severn Street

The studio building is a quintessentially urban structure but imagine it’s 1914, when it was built. There were no skyscrapers, the subway did not exist, and Severn Street, this stub of a road the building is located on, ran right up to Yonge Street. Facing north with big windows to allow in a flat, even light, the building was co-founded by Group of Seven member Lawren Harris and was meant to be a place where artists could live and work affordably.

Various members of the Group of Seven lived and worked in this bucolic setting. Tom Thomson, an associate of the collective, eventually used a refurbished utility shed out back during the winters, often snowshoeing down Rosedale Valley at night. The shed was moved and today can be visited on the grounds of the McMichael Gallery in Kleinberg.

The valley Thomson snowshoed was much different from the one you see today. Apart from burying Castle Frank Brook, the ravines of Toronto have been filled with infrastructure, some hidden and some visible, like roads, railways and massive underground trunk sewers.