Market Square, 80 Front St E: Jerome Markson’s Big Suites on the Market

Market Square is where I send downsizers who are leaving a house and refuse to shrink into a one-bedroom. Jerome Markson’s early-eighties mid-rise faces St. Lawrence Market across Front Street, frames St. James Cathedral behind it, and holds suites that start at about 1,100 square feet. It is the opposite of a new downtown tower in almost every way, and that is the point. I’m Jatin Dua, RE/MAX Quantum Realty.

A Jerome Markson building that frames the cathedral

Market Square was designed by Jerome Markson, the Toronto-born architect who received the RAIC Gold Medal in 2022, one of the highest honours in Canadian architecture. The Globe and Mail dates the design to 1980. It is a low complex built along the street line of Front Street, and it is arranged so that, seen from Front Street, it frames St. James Cathedral to the north.

Architect Paul Reuber once compared it to a touch of nineteenth-century Paris, and the comparison makes sense when you stand in front of it. The building behaves like a continuous city block that respects the cathedral and the market around it, rather than a tower dropped on a lot.

ACO Toronto’s TOBuilt database records the landscape architects as Johnson Sustronk Weinstein + Associates and notes that the property is designated under Part V of the Ontario Heritage Act, as part of the St. Lawrence Neighbourhood Heritage Conservation District. That status protects the context you are buying into, and it can also shape what the corporation may change on the exterior.

Suites sized like houses

Condos.ca puts suites at roughly 1,092 to 3,588 square feet. There is almost nothing else in downtown Toronto where the smallest plan is over a thousand square feet. These are suites for people who own furniture, host family dinners and want a separate kitchen rather than a wall of cabinets in the living room.

The Globe featured one owner’s suite of about 2,000 square feet with a solarium, a wood-burning fireplace, a separate kitchen and parquet floors, and noted eight-foot ceilings. That is a fair picture of the building’s character: generous rooms, older ceiling heights and early-eighties finishes in any suite that has not been renovated.

Expect to renovate or to pay for someone else’s renovation. The same article described the original finishes in that suite plainly, from carpet to almond melamine cabinets. A well-done renovation here can be transformative, but price the work into your offer if the suite is original.

Layouts in a building like this are also more varied than in a modern tower, where one floor plate repeats from bottom to top. Market Square’s low, wide form means suites differ in shape and exposure from one part of the complex to another. Walk several before you decide, and ask the listing agent for the original floor plan so you can see what a previous owner may have opened up or closed off.

What the fee covers, and what it does not

Condos.ca lists common elements, cable TV, building insurance, parking and water as included. Heat and hydro are not on that list, which is the opposite of several nearby buildings of the same age that bundle utilities in.

In a suite of 1,500 or 2,500 square feet, your own heating, cooling and hydro costs are real numbers. Ask the seller for a year of utility bills, and when you compare Market Square’s fee with another building, put those utility costs back in.

Parking being included is a meaningful plus at this address, where a parking space downtown is not cheap to buy or rent. Confirm that the specific suite has a space, and ask about lockers.

If the suite has a wood-burning fireplace, ask the corporation about chimney inspection and cleaning requirements, and tell your insurer about it.

Living on the market

The daily reality here is the St. Lawrence Market across the street, St. James Park and the cathedral behind you, and the theatres, restaurants and Financial District all within a walk. The Globe noted that the building has long drawn artists, creative professionals and empty-nesters, and that suites tend not to sit on the market for long.

It is not a quiet address in the conventional sense. Saturday market crowds, deliveries along Front Street and evening restaurant traffic are part of living here. Suites facing inward or toward the cathedral side are generally calmer than those on Front Street.

Market Square is one of two buildings with the name. The second, at 35 Church Street, has its own corporation, so make sure the documents you read belong to 80 Front Street East and MTCC-628.

What Market Square costs

Condos.ca puts the building average at about $742 per square foot. For a heritage-district address facing St. Lawrence Market, that is low, and the reason is simple: very large suites always trade at a lower price per square foot than small ones, and many suites here need updating.

No suites were for sale or for lease when I checked. That matches the building’s reputation for slow turnover, and it means you may need patience and a ready offer when the right plan appears.

The total price is what most buyers notice. At these sizes, even a moderate price per square foot adds up to a house-like number, so compare Market Square with a semi or townhouse in the east end, not with a one-bedroom tower suite. For a value check on a specific suite, I can pull comparables through my building sold report.

Building specifications

Amenities at Market Square

An indoor pool, a sauna, a squash court and two roof decks are a strong package for a nine-storey building. Pools and squash courts are costly to keep up, so look for them by name in the reserve fund study.

Jatin’s honest take on Market Square

Market Square — frequently asked questions

Looking at St. Lawrence, the Financial District and Downtown Yonge more broadly? Start with my Toronto community guide — the neighbourhoods, what each pocket is like, and how they compare.