108 RAGLAN ROAD - SOLD
The Essentials
This is one of those truly exceptional properties that just doesn’t boil down neatly to four-bedroom, two-bathroom detached brick home looking over McBurney Park’s shoulder. I need better words is how it feels, some alchemical way of communicating that 108 Raglan is surely the one you’ve been looking for, or should be looking for, and that I find it very hard to believe there will be a better house listed for sale in the neighbourhood this year.
The Bigger Picture
I am reminded, when I look at the main photograph above, of the cover of the sublime Yo La Tengo album, And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out, from way back in 2000. I was living in Toronto, harbouring dreams I still have, come to think of it, and along came this record - a soundtrack that year to many of my late night wanderings, an hour and a quarter of hushed lullabies and fuzzed-out atmospherics. The sounds still remind me of a garden party held below high tension wires, a gathering in which people fall for each other over drinks splashed into very tall glasses.
I don’t suppose that’s an opening that will resonate for you the way it does for me. I understand. But grant me this much: this faux-dusk image of 108 Raglan has the same sleepy vibe as the album cover, and the recycling bins tucked in beside the house are held, transfixed, by the light in a very similar way to the suburban dad caught in that starship’s tractor beam twenty-three years ago. Can you see it? There is the sense in both images of a pure moment caught in the camera’s net, a world and its mood pinned perfectly, like a butterfly to a board.
Those of you still with me are wondering, I imagine, what this has to do with selling houses, and, shouldn’t I have trained myself out of this sort of digression by now? Well yes and no. My point (I think) is that this new listing on Raglan has an archetypal heft, it comes mighty close to epitomizing for me what’s possible when we talk about a home (as opposed to just a house). It connects, in its grace and in the way it stands protectively over the street, with everything good in the world. This may well come across as dismissable hyperbole, I get that, but this truly is a rare offering, a leader among the red-brick flock, and almost certainly the best house you’ll see listed in this neighbourhood this year, and probably next as well.
The very good pictures and excellent virtual tour will get you some of the way there, but you’ll want to visit the house to register its full impact. That’s why I’ve decided to host an open house on Saturday April 29. I want to listen in as you discover the place for yourselves, see the look on your faces as you move from room to room, as if at a gallery opening for your favourite artist.
Among highlights of the show, as far as I’m concerned:
— The six steps up to the front porch with its tiled floor. It is like the observation deck top of a New York skyscraper. The city spread beneath your feet at this altitude and as fine a way to begin the day as I can imagine.
— The courtyard behind the house, with its towering brick walls, its April birdsong, like the patio to your favourite restaurant, only without the paparazzi.
— The white walls and toffee floors, the quartz counters cool to the touch. On some visits the house registers like a museum set up to display only the very best colours and textures. A curated collection of the finest swatches.
— The skylights upstairs, pouring light onto books.
— The way the fourth bedroom is hidden away at the back of the house rather than on the second floor. It has the second bathroom beside it. Install a kitchen in the basement below it and you’ve made something distinctly European, a two-storey suite like something that might open onto Hyde Park.
A more regular sort of description of 108 will appear on Realtor.ca this morning, it’s the CBC version of machinesforlivingin. One or the other will surely send you running to the weekend open house. And if you prefer to contemplate spaces more quietly, away from the hubbub, call your realtor. If you don’t have one of those, call us. We’ll open the door for you and then stay out of your way.
The iGuide Virtual Tour
Click below for the self-guided our, still images, floor plans, measuring tool and much, much more.
