Rockwell Group, the leading New York-based architecture and design studio, has unveiled the interiors of the new 1 Hotel Toronto, Canada’s first mission-driven hotel that celebrates the beauty of Toronto’s natural environment and offers an urban oasis in the heart of the city and endeavouring to introduce the city to a new standard of a sustainable luxury experience.
The design concept for 1 Hotel Toronto reframes the city, turning its urbanism inside out, responding to the question “What if a luxury hotel was an inviting portal to the natural world, instead of a flight from it?”
The material palette for the hotel takes inspiration from the muted colours of Lake Ontario and the contrasting tones of the passing seasons and features reclaimed timber, native plants, board-formed concrete, and local marble.
Welcoming guests, the lobby is a warm and nest-like space surrounded by floor-to-ceiling glass windows, which create a light box at night, as well as a feeling of seamlessness between indoors and out. The entrance to the hotel is framed with a mix of granite and limestone boulders, maple trees, local plants, warm wood, and a trailing green canopy, all reminiscent of Canada’s natural landscape.
The lobby features 4.5 metre-high ceilings, reclaimed Elm wood flooring and shelving sourced from a dismantled barn in Ontario. Additional sustainable design details include a living green wall, found objects, local stone and reclaimed furnishings from materials such as elm wood and teak root.
A stone wall with wood-like striations – carved out of glacial activity along the Eramosa River – serves as the backdrop to an art installation designed by Toronto-based artists Moss & Lam behind the check- in desk.
The light and airy guestrooms feature sliding barn wood doors dividing the bedroom and ensuite. Rockwell Group added warmth to the Carrara marble bathrooms by utilising Hickory wood surrounds for the vanities. A natural wood accent wall is added behind the bed, with a leather headboard, while an art piece comprised of a fallen tree fragment, sourced by a local wood studio, completes the design.
1 Hotel offers an all-round dining and drinking experience, with a selection of two restaurants and two bars spread throughout the hotel. Read more about the F&B offering here.
“We have long admired 1 Hotels’ sustainable and eco-friendly ethos, and we are thrilled to have been given the opportunity to design the new 1 Hotel Toronto with a biophilic emphasis,” says Rockwell Group’s Founder David Rockwell, on the collaboration with 1 Hotel. “Our vision for the hotel invites guests to celebrate Toronto’s ecology through materiality and locally-made artwork.”
