Still modern after all these years
WHOEVER BUYS STRIKING HOUSE AT 45 AMELIA, DESIGNED IN THE MID-’50S, WILL BE FOURTH OWNER
IN 1976 CHICK HOLTON
bought the striking modern house at 45 Amelia for one reason: he wanted to be closer to work.
Chick took a look at the outside and signed on without viewing the interior.
“He didn’t even set foot in it,” says his son, Andy Holton.
Chick was the president of National Paper Goods, and the commute from Burlington to his company on Queen Street North was getting on his nerves.
“But my mother did have a peek inside before we moved in,” Andy Holton remembers.
Chick, his wife Gabby Holton and youngest son Andy moved from a six-bedroom, three storey house in Burlington to the one floor, wide open-contemporary house on Amelia near the Queen Street Hill. The forested escarpment was at their back, the city unfolded beneath them to the front, and Chick could be at work in five minutes.
They stayed in the ahead-of-its time house for 42 years. Chick loved the glassed in sunroom in the winter, playing bridge with a fire flickering and deer grazing, and Gabby loved the open concept design with wall to wall windows offering views of the woods.
The Holtons were just the third owners of 45 Amelia; this summer Gabby moved into a retirement home and next week the house will be for sale. The asking price is $1,299,900.
Architect Jerome Markson designed the house in 1955, when he was just starting his career. His aunt and uncle, George and Jesse Goldblatt, hired him to build something special on a wonderful piece of property. The Goldblatt family business was International Iron & Metal, which would become Intermetco.
Markson liked the idea of using steel “expressively” in the design and construction of the house. So he created a low, sleek box, framed in steel and tucked into the wooded escarpment hillside, where the rigid lines of the house played off the organic shapes of the land.
Inside, the same streamlined vision governs the house. From the unadorned terrazzo floors and absence of mouldings to the copious built-ins including cabinets, closets, a buffet and bar, it’s a haven for minimalists.
“The thing I liked best was, there was no lawn to cut.” ANDY HOLTON Chick and Gabby Holton’s son Gabby loved the open concept design with wall-to-wall windows offering views of the woods.
“My aunt, just like my mother, was ultra neat, where everything was always put away,” Markson says.
Markson is 89, and closed his architecture business in Toronto last year after 63 years. Though he acknowledges the house on Amelia (he also designed two others on the street) was built a long time ago, the important elements still stand out. The L shaped floor plan created a courtyard where “you feel like the house wraps around you when you are sitting.”
And by building the house on a raised terrace, the front entrance is elevated in a dramatic way.
“The doors that people go into are more important than garage doors,” Markson says firmly.
The house is 2,200 square feet with a big master bedroom and walk-in closet at one end, and a small galley style kitchen at the other. In between is the elegant living room with floorto-ceiling windows and a dining room separated by open book and display shelves. Concealed in the black walnut built-ins are stereo speakers and space for a television, touches ahead of their time in 1955.
Andy Holton was just 13 when he and his parents moved in.
“The thing I liked best was, there was no lawn to cut.”
Diane Brown is the sales representative with Coldwell Banker. She’s been selling real estate for 33 years and calls 45 Amelia one of her favourite properties.
“It’s a work of art.”
As the house is emptied and readied for sale, bits of history emerge. A beautiful photo spread in a 1963 magazine called Ontario Homes and Living praised “the bold architectural lines of the house.” A real estate brochure from 1973 hailed the luxurious contemporary residence for its coveted wooded setting. The house was listed then for $185,000.
It’s all flattering for Markson, but he said the goal was always to make the client happy about where they live.
When told that Gabby Holton was 95 when she moved out, he was pleased.
“It just shows you that modern houses are good for you.”