Thursday, March 31, 2005
Frank Armstrong
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The Kingston Whig-Standard
One of the city's more majestic downtown heritage buildings will open its doors later this month for one last public viewing after five years of renovations.
Developer Kincore Holdings Ltd., which has combined the old British Whig building and the Ontario Bank building beside it into 33,000 square feet of retail and office space, will hold an open house April 9.
Kincore president Kim Donovan called the open house a community celebration and said he hopes thousands will come to see the “period authentic manner" restorations his company his made to the 110 year old building.
“The building is over 100 years old and it will stand for many hundreds more because of the fine quality of construction originally, plus the careful restoration the building has under-gone over the last five years," Donovan said yesterday.
The building has been empty since The Whig Standard moved its operations to the Woolen Mill in 1996.
Kincore bought the building in 1998 and restored its historical facade to authentic period detail in 1999.
At the front of the building overlooking Market Square, copper cornices and unique urns were hand-crafted to duplicate the originals and wood work was redone in cherry.
The building is now ready for tenants and a high quality national restaurant chain has already penned a deal to occupy the whole 8,000 square foot ground floor, Donovan said.
He can't disclose the restaurants' name because of a confidentiality agreement, but said it will open in mid-June and that it plans to operate a patio on Clarence Street.
“We're thrilled to have (it) as a tenant in this space because it's going to bring significant pedestrian activity and start to bring back the vitality to that part of downtown," he said.
The common areas of the four-storey building, such as the lobby, stairwells, washrooms and elevator, are all complete while the rest of the building is now ready for tenant improvements. That means Kincore will wait until tenants confirm they want to lease a space before renovation it for them.
Except for the ground floor, the rest of the building is set up for office use.
Each floor is about 8,000 square feet.
Kincore hopes one tenant will fill the entire top three floors, but it's prepared to rent each floor to a different tenant or even divide each floor for a number of tenants, Donovan said.
“Ideally, we would have one large tenant," he said.
A model suite on the second floor has been completed.
The roof has been designed as a common area with plants, water space, benches and areas shaded by a pergola and trellises.
The British Whig was built in 1895 on the site of the original, wooden, St. George's cathedral. Kingston architect Joseph Power designed the building for Edward Pense, owner and editor of The Daily British Whig.
In 1925, The Whig was purchased by Rupert Davies and amalgamated a year later with The Kingston Daily Standard.
This is Kincore's third open house since setting up shop in Kingston in 1995. In 1998, it held an open house in the Gourdier building at 78 Brock St., the building that contains Serendipity Lane, after renovating that building and its lofts.
Hundreds of people attended that event, but almost 2,000 attended the 1002 opening of the Brock Street Common, a common and limestone passage that link Brock Street with the Walkway that passes Chez piggy between Princess Street and King Street.
That heritage renovation created several high-end apartments and provided a home for Kingston Economic development Corp. and the Greater Kingston Chamber of Commerce.
The open house takes place April 9 at 310 King St. E., between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m.
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Open House at Home of Old Whig |
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