Motels are typically one or two-storey suburban structures announced with outlandish neon signs thatbelie the humbleness of the accommodations on offer. This basic rule certainly held true for the majority of Toronto's motels, which were once to be found in abundance in Etobicoke and Scarborough, the latter of which still boasts a dying strip of these roadside businesses.
Back in the early 1960s, however, there was one significant exception. The Four Seasons Motor Hotel opened at Jarvis and Carlton streets in 1961 and served as the first property in what would become a luxury hotel chain with almost 100 properties worldwide. No ordinary motel, it was designed byarchitect Peter Dickinson at the behest of company founder Isadore Sharp.
Dickinson borrowed from the hallmarks of motel design, envisioning a low rise structure that surrounded a central courtyard and pool. The ads of the day were true; it was Toronto's first downtown motor hotel, but the idea wasn't to provide cheap accommodations. On the contrary, this was to be an urban oasis, far more similar to a resort than your typical hotel of the time.
"People who came from out of town, they didn't know Toronto," Sharp told the New York Times in 2009. "What they saw was a charming little hotel, like an oasis, with a swimming pool, a courtyard. You create your own environment. It's all in the way you market the product."
The concept proved popular from the outset, and Sharp and Dickinson quickly paired up to build something even more grand on an empty plot of land at Eglinton and Leslie streets in the form of the Inn on the Park. This property also had motel-like elements, but added two high rise hotel towers (the second one was built in 1971) to increase the total number of rooms to over 500.
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