Eco-Home for Sale 

Toronto Modern Eco Scandinavian Style Custom-built Home

Every aspect of this home and the property has been thoughtfully and passionately planned to bring together eco-conscious living, cutting-edge sustainability and functional comfort.

Rarely found in a neighbourhood filled with 100+ year old homes, this home is so special that beyond the build, you can "feel" this house when you stand in it. It's peace and comfort.

At approx 3000sqft of living space with soaring ceilings heights over 3.5 stories, 3 bedrooms upstairs plus one on the main floor, a den on the top floor, and 3.5 bathrooms, including an ensuite for the primary bedroom. The minimalist lines create a calm, airy atmosphere where form, function and eco-conscious living all come together beautifully. Now, let us tell you why it's so eco... buckle up, this is so exciting!

Custom-built in 2009 by sustainable architect McCallum-Sather, the footings and foundation up to the second floor are Nudura’s Insulated Concrete Form walls. Unlike the brick or frame houses in the surrounding neighbourhood, the thermal mass of these 10" walls provides superior comfort and energy savings, with no thermal-bridging between the exterior and interior, there is a consistent indoor temperature which improves energy efficiency. The one-way family street is a joy to live on, but the ICF walls are unmatched with how quiet and peaceful the interior of your home is. Not to mention, they can withstand hurricane winds, are approximately double the fire rating of most area homes and are more rodent and insect resistant than traditional homes. The outside is finished off with beautiful Hardie Board siding that is a concrete fiberboard, with superior durability, weather resistance and low-maintenance.

Looking to the top of the house, you’ll find a distinctive split roof design. There is a bank of south-facing windows that collect light year round, and redirect it down to the second *and* ground floors of the house. You hardly need to turn on a light during a sunny day! But this light shaft also serves an important role for passive ventilation and cooling of the house. With the roof top windows open, rising warmer air can leave the house, while drawing cooler air in through the abundant number of lower windows. In the center of the house is an architectural ‘notch’ which serves both to help define the interior spaces and provides additional light and air into several rooms while being fully protected from the rain.

With the unique roof design and the lack of “thermal bridging” found in this home, it keeps quite cool and comfortable in the summer months, but if the days become too hot or humid the house’s powerful Friedrich split ductless cooling system can efficiently create a cool and dry environment.

There are 5kW solar array panels that were installed at the end of 2023 and are owned and not leased. The house’s steel roof by London Eco Metal was added at this same time to make sure the roof would outlast the panels, the solar panels generally have a lifespan of at least 30 years. Most solar installations are not capable of providing ANY power to the home when the power goes out. That is because when the main power grid goes down, solar panels automatically power down so as to not electrocute the teams working to restore the power. In the event of a longer term outage, the system at 146 Ashdale is rare and can actually be safely detached from the grid and provide up to 2kW of AC power back to the house until the main grid can be restored. Now, 2000 watts is not a huge amount of power and does require the sun to be shining brightly, but in a crisis, the difference between a little electricity and no electricity can be… significant. In the meantime, you have a 200amp panel + and 80amp panel if you wanted to consider adding an EV charger, and by selling back to the grid, you’ll enjoy rebates that significantly reduced monthly hydro bills, with 2024 costing just less than $500 for the entire year.

Two core philosophies of the house design were durability and indoor air quality. Both of which were improved by careful selection of natural materials with minimal to no off-gassing. There is no particle board, MDF and veneers used in the house, and all low VOC paints and stains were used avoiding formaldehyde bearing materials. One of our favourite things are the wood floors, and almost all of the baseboards & trim came from a company called Logs End. They specialize in creating lumber products from trees that sank in the Ottawa River 1-200 years ago. This means no new trees needed to be chopped down to create the flooring and recovering those logs from the river also helped to restore the original ecology of the river bed. Ashdale’s solid wood floors are 3/4” thick which means they can be sanded down and refinished at least two times instead of being thrown away.

All the common places you would expect to find low quality materials will not exist in this home, with an eye on keeping the air clean of pollutants the interior doors are all solid wood doors from MadaWaska doors, the extra wide staircase and railings are solid maple, the kitchen cabinetry and counter tops are solid maple. All the wood has also been lovingly white washed, this allows the natural wood grain to show through, but also gives a warm finish and is a protective sealant.

Let's talk comfort! There are 15 zones of radiant in-floor heating throughout the entire house, allowing for more precise adjustment of room temperature. The colder it gets outside, the warmer your toes will feel! Radiant floors create a comfortable environment by heating you instead of trying to heat the air around you making it much more efficient than a typical forced-air furnace. If you wanted the primary bedroom to be a little bit cooler than other rooms you can just turn down the flow rate for that bedroom’s heating loop.

There is a small Viessmann on demand high-efficiency boiler that heats both the water for the radiant floors and the hot water for the house, making it more efficient to have just one system that could need future replacement. The holding tank for the hot water for house usage is stainless steel but does not have a heating element that could break, so again, it is going to last a very long time!

For many homes vinyl window frames are an economical choice but they also release phthalates and are environmentally toxic both in their manufacture and disposal. That is why they opted to use only fibreglass windows. Fibreglass windows are extremely durable, and can be disassembled and re-assembled if you ever need to replace a window’s glazing. Fibreglass is also recyclable at the end of its life.

The indoor air is being constantly refreshed with the house’s VanEE Gold series Heat Reclamation Ventilator or HRV. An HRV is a clever piece of equipment that not only exchanges stale indoor air for fresh outdoor air, it also transfers most of the heat from the outgoing air to the incoming air, without mixing those air flow. This system maintains healthy CO2 levels throughout the home. Designing a home with clean, natural airflow requires thoughtful planning and a deep understanding of air movement to create Passive Ventilation. I'm telling you, the air tastes better in this house!

There is more, so much more! Custom designed copper sinks throughout that are antimicrobial, highly durable, and stunning! The landscaping around the house is designed to be a cool, green and shady oasis, with a pollinator garden and free draining surfaces allowing water run-off that gets past the rain barrels and green-coverage to easily get to ground, not the street, minimizing the impact to the city's overrun sewage systems. Low voltage wiring, LED's around the house, a sump pump and backflow valve, Weiser SmartKeyTM locks (allowing you to rekey your own locks), exterior stairs to the basement for potential in-law suite, natural products and cleaners used throughout, it is even a vegan home that has never had animal prepared in the home.

As you take in this how considerate the owners and builder were of the environmental impact, long-lasting durability, function and beauty of this home also notice, the almost 100 year old original front door and brass numbers which were restored to their previous roles in the new house. The minimalist lines create a calm, airy atmosphere where form, function and eco-conscious living all come together beautifully.

To top it off, you are in the Leslieville neighbourhood in Toronto with French immersion schools, the Equinox Holistic Alternative School, parks galore, divine restaurants, TTC/Transit, and family friendly community! Walk to the Beaches, The Danforth, short jaunt to get to Tommy Thompson Park or the Don Valley Trails. This is the home you did not think you could find in Toronto!

$1,849,000

VISIT 146Ashdale.ca for more information, photos and video!

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Please mention you saw this at EcoProperty.ca.