A home of catwalks in Toronto's Annex evokes New York – but with more natural light

Globe and Mail

2 days ago

90 Madison, Ave., Toronto
Asking price: $5,369,490
Lot size: 40 by 127 feet
Property taxes: $26,916.32 (2025)
Listing agent: Motria Dzulynsky, Re/Max Professionals
Take a simple idea, such as wanting more light, and then keep pushing on what that can mean – what you're willing to spend to get it – and what you end up with can be something far from the same-old, same-old.
That's what happened with 90 Madison Ave., which is a fusion of a classic Annex-style Toronto brick mansion – on a street filled with similarly large brick homes – with a huge addition built around a three-storey-tall atrium focused on maximizing the available light.
'Where I grew up in the East Village in New York, natural light was rare,' said owner Roxanne Chemych. 'The railroad apartments we lived in never allowed us to see sunshine or light.' (Railroad apartments are a type where the rooms connect one after the other like a series of train cars, from the front door to an exterior, or even interior light-well, window.) The renovated house on Madison was to have no shortage of windows.
'We'd often wear sunglasses in our living room, the afternoon sun just really streamed in. You felt like you were outdoors,' said Ms. Chemych. She compares the feeling to being in a ski chalet or a backcountry cottage, which the couple decided they didn't need to build: 'We had one every day in our urban home.'
Before buying 90 Madison, they had lived across the street, in a heritage-style house that coupled dark wood with modest exterior windows and long hallways between rooms. Ms. Chemych would look at 90 Madison, with the creaky old garage sitting next to it, and imagine the possibilities.
When they bought it in the early 2000s and took stock of the original interiors they came up with an idea: What if we kept some of these spaces and melded them with something entirely new? 'We felt there was potential,' she said. 'We always wanted to custom-build our home and once we had children it was time; we needed the extra space.'
Today, the addition is actually taller than the original. And, while parts of the Victorian mansion are woven into the fabric of the new home, there are still two separate apartments in the original building.
'The primary home is 3,200 square feet, and the two other apartments if you added them you could make it into a 7,000-square-foot mansion,' Ms. Chemych said. It's either a nice income stream, or a potential for expansion. 'I'm from New York, I'm used to people in my apartment building,' she said.
There are two entrances to the home, up the original Victorian staircase which shares a common lobby with the apartments, or through the back under the five-vehicle car port, which also provides access to the elevator at the rear of the building.
'That came about because my mother had a terrible accident, she lost her legs, and the plan was to have her stay half with me, half with her brother,' said Ms. Chemych. As it is, the elevator now provides an accessible connection to all three levels of the new addition (handy for hauling in groceries and suitcases too).
The main floor of the addition is a massive interior volume; a three-level atrium with a window wall on the back of the house that climbs up to the roofline. There's also an office that faces the street.
There's a lot of brushed steel, thanks to two suspended catwalks that connect the rear elevator to the rest of the home. The second-floor catwalk starts above the kitchen and extends at an angle to the rear; the third-floor catwalk is shorter and connects to the upstairs bedrooms. Both have perforated steel grates for floors, so light still filters through these spans.
Stairs done in the same material connect levels, starting just off the kitchen and winding around a corner to a second-floor space that extends into the original Victorian home: a bedroom on the back (with ensuite bath) and a den/library space that's open to the atrium. The catwalk runs past this upper den, and then a section of it loops back to connect the den to the primary suite and also to the second set of stairs, clinging to the wall of the atrium as they climb to the third and final floor.
The primary suite also makes use of the Victorian's second floor for its ensuite bath, which connects to the new structure via a short set of stairs. The bathrooms eschew the steel and glass and go for stone and water for whimsy.
'We spent a lot of time in Turks and Caicos Islands – so we took the bathrooms and put in beach stones and beach pebbles and waterfall faucets and rain head showers,' said Ms. Chemych. 'We couldn't reflect it everywhere – I'm not going to put palm trees in the house – but for us also the beach was really important.'
The primary bedroom has a wall of glass doors under a sheltered balcony: All three levels have the same balcony across the front of the new structure. This bedroom is the same basic size as an almost identical one above, but it shares its bathroom with the second bedroom on that level that has large angled windows that look down into the atrium. This is an interesting adaptation of the railroad apartment: sure this room has no exterior windows, but the light flowing into the atrium is a good substitute for the open-air version.
Having a network of walkways hanging in a huge open volume of space provided a lot of interesting entertainment options.
'The kids would have treasure hunts, laser battles on the catwalks,' said Ms. Chemych. They even turned the catwalk into a stage for bands to perform on, and also turned the atrium into an art gallery for special functions. The windows provided sunlight during the day, but at night they also provided an excellent backdrop for a bedtime story. 'We'd curl up on the couch – when the moon is full it's almost as if you're sitting outdoors. Those are wonderful memories I'm going through right now.'
With the kids out of the house it's a lot of space for just two people, and it's time for a downsize, but she's also hoping to stay in the area. 'I feel the most comfortable in the Annex. I love the energy, the different people … you can walk out the door and steps away you have everything at your feet. I used to take a stroller for a walk in the middle of the night and I felt safe,' she said.