A delightfully complicated Mimico house from 1910

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“So this is my favourite picture of Dr. Woods and his wife,” says Andrew Vanderwal as he straightens in his chair and reaches for a photograph. It’s a domestic winter scene containing four people; Etobicoke dentist Dr. William J. Woods in a long coat and bowler at right; at centre is a sleigh containing two bonneted babies; and, at left, facing the camera wearing a fancy hat and a stern expression, Dawn Woods.

“Now you notice that the picture has a tear right down the middle? I don’t know when that tear occurred, but they had an unhappy end to their marriage.”

Since the Woods had three girls and a boy – Josephine, Grace, Georgina and Robert – this photo was likely taken just before Georgina’s birth, and just after they’d moved into their new house at 41 Superior Ave. In 1910, there would be many happy days on the sand at Mimico Beach still to come, which, in the early decades of the 20th century, could be seen from the top floor of the big house.

“When mamma wanted the kids to come home she’d put a towel out the window and they could see it,” Jan Vanderwal says with a chuckle.

The Vanderwals come by this information and pile of historic photographs on their dining table honestly. In 2010, they purchased the house from Michael Malone, son of Grace Malone (nee Woods), who not only grew up there, but moved back with her children when she was widowed early in life (Ms. Malone died on Jan. 24, 2004 in her 98th year).

And if that isn’t enough history: during their first two years of marriage, the Woods likely had a subscription to The Ladies’ Home Journal, and, further, stashed away the July, 1905 issue. In its pages was an article by architect William G. Rantoul (1867-1949) of Boston titled The $3,000 House that Won the $1,000 Prize. In it, the architect describes his winning entry – the magazine called for a “house for a young couple, one child and a servant” that would cost no more than $3,000 to build and boasted “the largest prize awards ever” – as one of “absolute simplicity throughout.”

“The house is treated in a broad, simple manner,” continued the architect in a self-aggrandizing write-up. “The low, sweeping roof, with its wide-projecting eaves, is accentuated by the chimney, which makes the composition most attractive.”

Toronto architect James Layrock Havill obviously agreed, because when the Woods handed the magazine to him in 1909, he did very little to change Mr. Rantoul’s design.

Today, facing the triangle of land created by the intersection of Stanley and Superior avenues, No. 41, however, seems less “simple” than its neighbours. To wit, the wide, two-storey bay, those “projecting eaves” above them, the slightly hidden and shadowed front door, and the building’s rhythmic massing that juts in and out as it turns to face Stanley Avenue, it’s all quite delightfully complicated, interesting, and almost Frank Lloyd Wrightian.

Open the door and one enters a pokey little foyer that forces a visitor to turn right and pass the ornate staircase in order to enter the living room (the only other option and one enters the kitchen which, in 1910, was for the servant). And, should one stop to admire the curving treads at the bottom of that staircase, one would never suspect that the Vanderwals have expended great effort into reinforcing everything with (hidden) threaded rods and brackets.

That’s not all they’ve done. Since the house had been divided up into separate apartments – Grace Malone lived in one of them – the Vanderwals spent considerable money removing walls to turn the house back into a single-family dwelling. “Sometimes they only closed in doors,” Mr. Vanderwal says. “There were a couple of walls we had to remove, and we removed walls for other reasons as well.”

Walk into the living room and one is gobsmacked by cove ceilings, cypress trim, and – wow! – a fireplace set into a cozy inglenook with built-in benches. Ask about the original radiators and the Vanderwals will tell you that they’re now fed by a high-efficiency boiler in the basement, and that some of the low-hanging pipes were replaced and tucked into the space between the floor joists. The dining room, too, looks as if the past 114 years never happened – it helps that there is period-appropriate furniture – while the kitchen, thankfully, is up-to-date.

Also completely modernized is the basement, which had never been finished until the Vanderwals took ownership: it now sports a media room, bar, pool table and, where the cistern was, a wine cellar complete with a jail door salvaged from the Don Jail.

While Mr. Vanderwal suggests much of the 1929 addition and the second-floor rooms have also been “modernized,” this writer thinks that, with a few tweaks, the large primary bedroom could easily look more Prairie Style. And the now-empty third floor, with its wonderfully angled ceilings and original built-in drawers, would make for a very nice teenager’s retreat or a yoga studio.

The empty-nesting Vanderwals, you see, have subdivided their large lot and are putting finishing touches on a new, smaller house next door, which they hope to move into later this year. That means Dr. Woods’s house will be offered up for sale within the next few weeks. Hopefully, it will attract a new owner who will also delight in the photos and blueprints Mr. Vanderwal is now gingerly placing back into a folder.

“If we didn’t buy this house it would’ve been torn down for sure,” finishes Mr. Vanderwal. “[Mr. Malone] was very happy the house was preserved.”

According to Michael Harrison’s History of the Town of Mimico blog, Dr. Woods dabbled in architecture and designed the 1926 St. Leo’s Roman Catholic School at 165 Stanley Ave. just down the street. However, a 2020 City of Toronto heritage report on the collegiate Gothic building and its later additions states the architect of the 1926 portion as “not known.”