Minto Westside, 27 Bathurst St: Courtyard Mid-Rise with a Rooftop Pool

Minto Westside at Front and Bathurst is the building I show buyers who want CityPlace convenience without living in a 50-storey tower. It is a block-long mid-rise wrapped around a private courtyard, with a ninth-floor pool and a park on its western edge. It also has some of the smallest suites in the area and a fee that covers very little, and both matter. I’m Jatin Dua, RE/MAX Quantum Realty.

A block-long mid-rise, not another tower

Minto Westside takes up most of the block between Front Street, Bathurst Street and Niagara Street. Rather than one tall tower, Wallman Architects designed a long building that steps down from about 18 storeys on Front Street to about 14 along Niagara Street and Victoria Memorial Park. The listing data shows 17 floors and Wallman’s project page lists 19, so the count depends on which part of the building you measure.

The design draws on the brick warehouses of the old Niagara and Fort York neighbourhood, with retail along Bathurst and Front and two-storey townhouse units facing the park. It is meant as a transition between the CityPlace towers to the south and the low-rise streets to the north, and on the street it feels much more like King West than CityPlace.

Unit numbers carry an E or W suffix, which tells you which wing a suite is in. When you compare listings, compare the wing and the exposure as well as the floor.

The courtyard and the pool

The building’s heart is the landscaped courtyard on the second floor. As Minto describes it, the main courtyard has an outdoor fireplace, lounge seating, a bar and seating by a water feature, and a second courtyard on the east side is set up for private gatherings. Inward-facing suites look onto the courtyard rather than onto a street, which makes them noticeably quieter.

On the ninth floor there is a pool with indoor and outdoor areas, branded The Plunge Social, along with a bar and indoor lounges. The gym, branded Movement Haus, was planned at about 8,000 square feet and fitted with TechnoGym equipment. A rooftop pool in a mid-rise building is uncommon, and it is the amenity people ask me about first.

Minto registered the building with the Canada Green Building Council as a candidate for LEED Canada Silver, with a green roof and a rainwater harvesting system. Ask whether certification was completed; the plaque, or its absence, will tell you.

Small suites, and how to read them

Suites start at about 320 square feet, which is very small even by downtown standards. At the other end, few plans exceed 1,000 square feet. Most of what trades here is studios, one-bedrooms and compact two-bedrooms, and the current listings include a two-bedroom in the 600 to 699 square foot range.

A two-bedroom in under 700 square feet can work, but only if the second bedroom has a real window and fits a bed and a desk. Walk it with a tape measure. For a studio under 400 square feet, check that there is room for a bed, a sofa and a small table at the same time, and that storage is adequate. These suites are popular with investors because they rent quickly near the downtown core, but they sell to a narrower pool of buyers.

The townhouse-style units facing Victoria Memorial Park are the exception and are worth looking at if you want a two-level home with its own front door.

Front and Bathurst day to day

You are at the meeting point of three neighbourhoods: King West to the north, CityPlace to the south and Fort York to the west. Victoria Memorial Park sits on the building’s western edge, and Fort York and the waterfront are a short walk south. Retail in the base of the building and across the street covers day-to-day errands.

The neighbourhood around the building is still filling in. New towers keep going up along Front Street and Bathurst, which brings more shops and services but also construction and the chance that a view you are paying for gets blocked. Ask what is approved on the sites around your suite before you buy.

Front and Bathurst is also a busy intersection, with streetcar and traffic noise on both sides, and suites facing Bathurst or Front will hear it. Courtyard and park-facing suites are the quiet ones. The data panel on this page has transit and walkability details.

What Minto Westside costs

The building average is about $909 per square foot. That is in line with newer buildings in King West, and the small suites push the per-square-foot figure up, because the kitchen and bathroom cost the same to build whatever the suite’s size.

At the time I wrote this, two suites were for sale and two were for lease. Asking prices ranged from about $628,000 to $810,000, with fees from about $475 to $783 a month. Across current listings the fee averages about $0.78 per square foot.

Read that fee carefully. It includes only common elements and building insurance, so heat, cooling, water and hydro are likely on your own account, and parking is not listed. When you compare Minto Westside with an older building quoting a higher fee, add your utility bills back in before you decide which is cheaper. For actual sold figures, use the aggregate data on this page or ask me for a building sold report.

Building specifications

Amenities at Minto Westside

The pool and the courtyard are what you are paying for here, and they make a mid-rise feel like a resort building. Because the fee includes so little, more of it goes to running these spaces, so check the amenity budget and booking rules in the status certificate.

Jatin’s honest take on Minto Westside

Minto Westside — frequently asked questions

Looking at King West, Liberty Village and CityPlace more broadly? Start with my Toronto community guide — the neighbourhoods, what each pocket is like, and how they compare.