Ace Hotel Toronto

Ace’s first hotel in Canada is set in Toronto’s Garment District, close to the downtown core and innumerable local attractions. It’s a new build, but one with plenty of vintage inspiration, designed by Shim-Sutcliffe Architects and Atelier Ace. The curvaceous brick, concrete, and wooden forms feel retro-futuristic, and the lobby’s floor, if you look carefully, seems to hover in the air, suspended from the ceiling’s concrete arches by judiciously placed metal rods.

The rooms are a touch warmer and more organic, combining unpretentious bare wooden surfaces and vintage-inspired furniture with a bit of raw concrete and metal. It’s unique, but still identifiably Ace, and functionally, the rooms are true to the brand’s modus operandi: comfortable, but efficient, and anything but ostentatious.

Meanwhile the public spaces are not just photogenic but thoroughly inviting. The lobby’s bar serves craft cocktails, wine, beer, and light fare, and is hospitable to anything from a spot of work to some light revelry. For a proper celebration there’s Evangeline, the 14th-floor bar with its panoramic views of the city. And the hotel’s restaurant, Alder, where chef Patrick Kriss presides over the wood-fired grill.