This $5 million Toronto home got the ultimate modern glow-up
Toronto houses often get torn down because they're falling apart, wildly outdated or simply too small for the people buying them.
But sometimes a perfectly decent house gets sacrificed in the name of a serious glow-up.
And 27 Berkinshaw Cres. is a pretty spectacular example of owners who opted to upsize.
The family room.
The North York property last sold for $1,423,000 in 2019, when it was home to a fairly typical three-bedroom home.
The dining room.
And honestly, there wasn't anything particularly wrong with it.
The double-height dining room.
The old house was fine, with a renovated kitchen and bathrooms and a fresh coat of paint. It was perhaps a little 2000s-coded, with beige walls, honey oak hardwood floors and the kind of suburban interiors that would've looked right at home on HGTV circa 2008.
But apparently the new owners weren't interested in settling for perfectly liveable.
The kitchen.
Fast forward a few years and the property is now home to a completely custom, ultra-modern residence with more than 5,000 square feet of living space.
A home office.
The transformation comes courtesy of Arklab Design Build, which basically took the property from conventional suburban sidesplit to architectural showpiece.
The primary bedroom.
In fact, the finished product was impressive enough to be featured on Amazon's Luxe Listings Toronto.
The exterior of the house.
From the street, the new home is almost unrecognizable compared to what stood here in 2019. Gone is the relatively modest sidesplit, replaced by a much larger contemporary home with huge expanses of glass, clean lines and a dramatic modern facade.
The foyer.
And things only get more dramatic once you step inside. A solid mahogany front door opens into an interior filled with soaring ceilings, warm wood and seemingly endless natural light.
The dining room and central staircase.
One of the biggest showstoppers is the double-height dining room, which gives you a sense of just how massive the house is.
The sculptural staircase.
Nearby, a sculptural red-oak staircase with glass railings winds its way upstairs and basically functions as a piece of art in the middle of the home.
Two kitchen islands.
The kitchen is equally over-the-top. Instead of one kitchen island, you get two enormous ones, because apparently one island simply wasn't going to cut it in a house like this.
Integrated appliances.
The home also features Wolf and Thermador appliances and plenty of space for serious cooking and entertaining.
The family room fireplace and bar and wine display.
The adjoining family room centres on a three-sided gas fireplace and includes a custom bar and wine display.
The living room.
And because one statement fireplace also apparently wasn't enough, the living room has its own architectural ethanol fireplace.
The primary bedroom built-in entertainment unit.
Upstairs, there are four bedrooms, each with its own ensuite, meaning nobody has to fight over the bathroom in the morning.
The primary ensuite bathroom.
The primary suite is, naturally, the fanciest of the bunch. It comes with two closets, a custom entertainment unit and a heated ensuite with a skylight over the shower.
The lower-level bathroom.
The lower level keeps the luxury going, with soaring ceilings, polished concrete floors with radiant heating, two additional bedrooms, a wet bar and a walkout to the backyard.
The powder room.
The home also features plenty of high-tech touches, including smart-home controls, built-in speakers, security cameras, battery-operated blinds, and PDLC window film that can switch between transparent and opaque for privacy.
The backyard.
Even the exterior surfaces have received the same luxury treatment.
The backyard.
The front porch, walkway and driveway are heated, which means whoever buys the place can presumably retire their snow shovel. There's also a two-car garage and enough driveway space for another four vehicles.
The primary bedroom ensuite.
The result is undeniably a massive upgrade from the little sidesplit that occupied the property when it last changed hands.
Floor-to-ceiling windows bring in tons of natural light.
Of course, the asking price has also received a fairly dramatic glow-up. At $5,188,000, the property is now listed for roughly $3.8 million more than its 2019 sale price.
One of the walk-in closets in the primary bedroom.
Obviously, that's not exactly an apples-to-apples comparison considering the property now has an essentially brand-new custom home sitting on it.
The porch off the family room.
Still, it's quite the transformation in just seven years.
The back of the house.
And while the old 27 Berkinshaw Cres. was perfectly fine, the new one is FINE.
