Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn closing Bloor St. stores

As of early next year, Toronto's home cooks and decor aficionados will no longer be looking to Bloor St. for their decorative knick-knacks and Le Creuset crockpots. Williams-Sonoma Inc. has announced it's closing its Yorkville outpost, along with its sister home furnishing store Pottery Barn, at the beginning of 2015. The move will open up a massive two floors of retail space, amounting to 37,000 square feet, Retail Insider reports.

The company blamed the "rising costs of real estate" in the neighbourhood for the pullout; unsurprising, since stores on the strip of Bloor, west of Yonge, are tending more and more toward luxury clothing, as the upcoming replacement of the Roots flagship with a new Holt Renfrew's men's store shows. It's not yet known who might move into the space, but what I can predict is a closing sale for the ages.

Photo via Retail Insider.