Rosedale is likely the most pres­ti­gious and afflu­ent neigh­bour­hood in Toronto. The neigh­bour­hood arose on the site of the for­mer estate of William Bots­ford Jarvis. Rosedale was named by his wife, grand­daugh­ter of William Dum­mer Pow­ell, for the wild roses that grew there in abundance.

Rosedale might just be Toronto’s most majes­tic neigh­bour­hood. Tucked away and sur­rounded by two tran­quil ravines, Rosedale’s mean­der­ing tree-lined streets can seduce you and make you quickly for­get that the city cen­tre is just moments away.

It is located north of down­town Toronto and is one of the city’s old­est neigh­bour­hoods. Cer­tainly also one of the wealth­i­est and most highly-priced neigh­bour­hoods in all of Canada. It is known as the area where the Toronto’s “Old Money” lives, and is home to some of Canada’s rich­est and most famous cit­i­zens, includ­ing Ken Thom­son who was the rich­est man in Canada at the time of his death.

Map of Rosedale and Neighbourhood

Rosedale’s bound­aries con­sist of the CPR rail­way tracks to the north, Yonge Street to the west, Bloor Street to the south, and Bayview Avenue to the east. The neigh­bour­hood is within the City of Toronto’s Rosedale-Moore Park neigh­bour­hood. The neigh­bour­hood is divided into a north and south por­tion by the Rosedale Valley.

Homes in Rosedale are grand and his­toric, full of dis­tin­guished char­ac­ter. Though they may not be as large as some newer estates found in more sub­ur­ban Toronto area locales, Rosedale homes abound in exquis­ite details and tra­di­tional beauty.

Dat­ing from as far back as the mid 1800s, Rosedale res­i­dences are mostly two and three storey detached designs, some of which fea­ture car­riage houses that are the size of a more typ­i­cal sin­gle fam­ily Toronto home. An array of archi­tec­tural styles can be found, includ­ing Vic­to­rian, Edwar­dian, Geor­gian, and Tudor.

Rosedale Real Estate

The occa­sional con­tem­po­rary new house might catch your eye, but these tend to be con­structed with care­fully selected mate­ri­als to blend in with the sur­round­ings. Lux­u­ri­ous Rosedale con­dos and mod­er­ately priced co-ops com­plete the Rosedale real estate spectrum.

For the high net worth indi­vid­ual who keeps an office in down­town Toronto, Rosedale is a per­fect res­i­den­tial address. The finan­cial dis­trict just min­utes away by car or sub­way, with mul­ti­ple sta­tions nearby. Shop­ping is plen­ti­ful in the fine estab­lish­ments at Sum­mer­hill, at Yonge and Bloor and in the bou­tiques of nearby Yorkville. Delec­table eater­ies also await along Yonge Street and in Yorkville. Rosedale is also home to Whit­ney Pub­lic School, a junior school with an excel­lent rep­u­ta­tion for aca­d­e­mics, arts, ath­let­ics, and com­mu­nity involvement.

South Rosedale was first set­tled by Sher­iff William Jarvis and his wife, Mary, in the 1820s. Mary Jarvis, whose fre­quent walks and horse­back rides blazed the trails for Rosedale’s mean­der­ing streets (which are one of the area’s trade­marks), named Rosedale as a trib­ute to the abun­dance of wild roses that graced the hill­sides of the Jarvis estate. The Jarvis Fam­ily sold the Rosedale home­stead in 1864, which led to the res­i­den­tial devel­op­ment of the area soon after.

Rosedale is built among three ravines, pre­served as park­land. Rosedale has con­vo­luted routes through the neigh­bour­hood and other phys­i­cal bound­aries, and thus it has low lev­els of vehic­u­lar traf­fic. Even though Rosedale is located in the mid­dle of Toronto, vir­tu­ally no vehic­u­lar traf­fic can be heard due to the abun­dance of trees and foliage that sur­round the com­mu­nity. The homes are mostly sin­gle fam­ily detached dwellings.

Chor­ley Park circa 1930

A note­wor­thy piece of Rosedale’s His­tory, is that is was home to Ontario’s fourth Gov­ern­ment House. The house was called Chor­ley Park, and it was built for the Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor in 1915. Truly one of the most ele­gant and mas­sive homes ever on Toronto, it was a crim­i­nal shame when it was demol­ished in 1960 by the city of Toronto to save money. It is now a pub­lic park of the same name.

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Con­tact the Jef­frey Team for more infor­ma­tion – 416−388−1960

Lau­rin & Natalie Jef­frey are Toronto Real­tors with Cen­tury 21 Regal Realty.
They did not write these arti­cles, they just repro­duce them here for peo­ple
who are inter­ested in Toronto real estate. They do not work for any builders.
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