BILLY ‘ACES’ COUPLE’S TOWNHOME DREAM
Development in inner-city community of Currie offers perfect location, contemporary appeal
For Trinh Pham and Alan Coreas, it was love at first sight when they saw the show suite at Billy, a new townhome development in Calgary’s inner-city community of Currie. The couple, who are getting married this summer, had mortgage pre-approval and had checked out single-family homes in several northeast communities in their price range, as well as townhome projects on the west side and northwest before deciding on Billy.
It took almost a year for them to find their perfect home. On the weekends they would tour show homes, comparing and contrasting home designs and communities and getting a feel for what was available.
“But nothing really felt right until we saw Billy,” says Pham. “It’s like buying a wedding dress. You try them all on and then, when you find the right one, it’s like ‘Yes! This is it.’ You just know.”
Billy is comprised of a collection of 65 two-, three- and four-bedroom three-storey townhomes, ranging from 1,230 to 1,518 square feet. The townhomes are arranged in pods of two, three, four and five. Chris Brumwell, vice-president of communications at Anthem Properties Group, the developer behind the project, says that the inspiration behind the name Billy was William Avery “Billy” Bishop, one of Canada’s best-known flying aces. It’s a theme that melds with Currie’s redevelopment of the former Canadian Armed Forces base.
The couple chose the B2 model, a 1,461-sq.-ft., three-bedroom, 2.5-bathroom plan with a double-car garage. The home is part of a pod of two — “it really has more of a duplex-type of feel,” says Coreas.
“It’s big and bright with so many windows and it isn’t the typical long and narrow floor plan with the kitchen in the middle. They always feel so skinny and tight. We wanted something more open and that’s exactly what Billy had,” says Pham, noting that the configuration is more square.
Billy’s exteriors have a clean and contemporary appeal.
“We describe the architectural esthetics as the warm simplicity of a modern farmhouse given the Scandinavian treatment: clean lines, soaring windows and double-car garages,” says Brumwell.
They had a few must-haves on their list, starting with an open floor plan with lots of windows, followed by a two-car garage — Pham’s not a big fan of scraping down the car in cold weather — and, the couple wanted extra storage for holiday decorations and sporting equipment.
Most importantly, they wanted a home of their own, where they could entertain family and friends.
Pham loves to cook and a gas range was top of mind, as was a “proper hood fan.”
“One of my pet-peeves is a microwave hood fan. It doesn’t work that well and when you take things like hot soup out of the microwave and it’s above your head, it’s a little bit scary,” she says with a laugh. A big gourmet kitchen, an island and a dining room large enough to accommodate an over-sized table was also important.
“Having the three bedrooms is also really nice. It gives us room to grow,” says Pham, while Coreas is happy to have a big terrace to barbecue on.
The couple was familiar with Currie, as they’d been living in a rented two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment condo in the community for more than two years and they really enjoyed the community — its accessibility and central location close to restaurants and amenities, as well as its abundance of green space and parks.
“For me, location was really important,” says Coreas, who works at the University of Calgary’s Foothills Campus as a research assistant. “I didn’t want a long commute, and Trinh and I really like living centrally.”
Pham works as a teacher at a school in the far northwest and is OK with a longer commute — “it gives me time to decompress after the day.” She also notes that with the opening of the final leg of the ring road, her commute time has decreased to 20 minutes from 30. But for her, being close to downtown was important, as was being close to shopping, coffee shops and restaurants.
This busy couple, who are self-professed “indoor” people — Pham posts that she would rather be looking at a mountain than climbing one — belong to fitness clubs close to Currie. They also enjoy hanging out in the parks in the area, especially the Bark Park, the community’s off-leash dog park. Once they take possession of their new home in August, they’ll have a fur baby joining them, Coreas’s family beagle, Dexter, so having that amenity in place was a big plus.
The duo had watched the activity happening on the Billy site, curious as to what was being offered and when the show home opened in October, they stopped in.
“We knew that it was exactly the floor plan that we wanted in the area that we wanted. We signed the papers two weeks later,” says Pham, noting that the sales people have been amazing. “It really feels big and scary to buy your first home and they were so comforting. They were like, ‘Don’t worry. We’ll guide you through the whole process.’ And, they really have.”