A look inside the luxe life at Trump
Multimillion-dollar suites styled to get ‘juices flowing and enthusiasm going’ for downtown tower
Much like the man whose name adorns it, the granite-and-glass Trump International Hotel & Tower is an attention getter.
A 65-storey downtown Toronto tower with 118 condos (maximum six units per floor) plus 261 hotel-condos, the Trump project included a celebrity appearance by Donald Trump and was launched in 2004 at Bay and Adelaide Sts. It was completed in 2012.
All residential units are accessed from the airy 32nd-floor sky lobby, with a 24-7 concierge.
At the top of the building — and price range — is the $37.85 million, 11,755square-foot super-penthouse. The threestorey suite, with 2,091-square-foot wraparound terrace, is unfinished to give its eventual suitor a blank canvas. But that’s not the case with the four model suites — they’re decked out and dolled up to provide prospective purchasers a dose of aspirational inspiration.
Meet the people, and see the suites, inside the tower.
Ceo Neil Labbatte
Talon International CEO Neil Labatte took over as head of Toronto’s Trump International Hotel & Tower in 2013, and has been a steady hand guiding the project’s residential suite sales.
Asked what sets his company’s project apart from the city’s other luxury hotelcondo developments, such as Shangri-La, Ritz-Carlton and Four Seasons, he points to its location.
“We’re in the middle of the downtown core, and I think it’s one of the more interesting evolving neighbourhoods,” says Labatte. He notes the plethora of new restaurants and high-end retail coming into the area, such as Saks Fifth Avenue at the Hudson’s Bay building on Queen St., and Nordstrom at the Eaton Centre; plus all the new office buildings that are going up around the downtown core.
Labatte spoke to the Star in the Trump
“A branded luxury property like this has to meet the five-star standard.” NEIL LABATTE HEAD, TRUMP TORONTO
tower’s model penthouse, a 4,413-squarefoot unit on the 55th floor. Designed by Emy Frau Hamamy of Hamamy Design, with Helen Gertchikova of Urban Tailor, the penthouse features pop art, cowhide chairs, and a tuxedo-pinstripe-wall-papered front entrance — and comes with a price tag of about $9.5 million.
“Maybe some people can’t afford such a big unit, but they can at least see the potential of what they could do with their unit,” Labatte suggests.
“We thought this would get their juices flowing and the enthusiasm going.”
Is it working? Labatte notes that more than half of Trump’s118 residential condo units are still available, but that the level of interest in the project “is evolving and getting stronger.”
Talon has put in place a rental program that guarantees investors who own units at Trump a 3-per-cent return on their equity for three years.
“To take the risk out,” he says, until they see for themselves the high rents their units can command.
Labatte, a former NHLer who played for the St Louis Blues before getting into the development game — and who now sits on the board of the NHL Alumni Association — notes that several pro hockey players have come looking for units at Trump to rent for this fall, and a number of pro athletes already live in the building.
One thing Trump owners can count on, Labatte says, is that the property will always be maintained to the highest calibre. “A branded luxury property like this has to meet the five-star standard,” he says. “So this building will always be more cutting edge and grand than you’ll find with a typical condo.”
Owner John Hutson
Having lived in a lovely large home in Rosedale, John Hutson admits the idea of moving into a condo made him a bit nervous — even as he was pondering purchasing a unit at the Trump International Hotel & Tower at Bay and Adelaide Sts. But Huston’s fears vanished the moment he saw the suite he would ultimately end up buying: a spacious 3,000-squarefoot, two-bedroom unit on the 49th floor, with two fireplaces and a library. “There was enough flexibility with the space that you could make it very much like a Rosedale home,” says Hutson, a partner with Deloitte Canada. “It had high ceilings, so you could put chandeliers in; if you have rugs, they could all fit, too.
“It felt very un-condo-like,” he adds. “I just couldn’t get that same feel from the other places I visited.” He liked things so much at Trump Tower, he also ended up buying a hotel-condo there, too, plus another condo suite that he now rents out.
“It’s very attractive for business people,” he says. “And we have a number of pro athletes living in the building, so it’s been very easy to rent out.”
Abig bonus is the building’s centreice location, Hutson points out. It’s right in the heart of the Financial District and a short stroll from the Entertainment District, the waterfront and all of Toronto’s major sporting venues — a place that’s per- fectly positioned for his lifestyle. “I work in the financial industry, and it’s steps away from the Air Canada Centre and Rogers Centre,” he says. “It’s essentially the hub for so many things I like.” And having a condo on top of a hotel is a big bonus. If you need to order food, or have a “relatively spontaneous party,” you can get catering quickly from the hotel. And if you need tickets for a show or a big game, the concierge service at Trump is “amazing,” says Hutson. “They’ll help you out in any way.”
Suite owners get discounts on services at the Trump spa, as well as at the building’s two restaurants, including the newly opened America, run by INK Entertainment and Oliver & Bonacini Restaurants.