Trump hotel opens in Toronto

The Trump tower is in Toronto's financial district.

PopGoesTheNews.com With today's opening of the Trump International Hotel and Tower at the corner of Bay and Adelaide St, one of the world's most recognizable surnames is gracing the side of a Toronto building for the first time.

Donald Trump lent his name to the development (he doesn't own it) and is expected to grace its black granite lobby with some of his offspring in March when the hotel throws an opening bash.

Toronto's Trump joins similarly branded hotels in New York, Chicago, Waikiki, Las Vegas and Panama.

Boasting 261 hotel rooms and more than 100 condos, the Trump International Hotel and Tower is the second of four new luxury hotel-condo projects on the Toronto skyline — it follows the Ritz-Carlton and precedes the new Four Seasons and Shangri-la. (Anyone who suggests the city can't support a little more than 980 luxury hotel rooms has never been to Chicago, Miami or Paris.)

Officially, the Trump stands 257 metres—  making it the fourth tallest building in Canada behind neighbors First Canadian Place, Scotia Plaza and Brookfield Place — but when you add in the height of its distinctive spire, the Trump jumps to second place. With fewer than 60 floors, though, it's not even in the top 12 if you're strictly counting floors.

Guests are greeted by doormen in a covered driveway featuring a mosaic entitled "A Smaller Piece of Something Larger" made of porcelain, stone, glass and gold by Canadian artist Stephen Andrews. Inside the elegant lobby is a 1,300-pound cherry blossom sculpture of Swarovski crystals and SUITS Lobby Lounge, which is targeted at the neighborhood's financial workers.

The sitting area, bathroom and bed of a typical room at the Trump hotel.

The hotel rooms are spacious (the smallest is 550 square feet) and decorated in neutral black and white with touch-control lighting and drapes, docks for mobile devices and 40-inch TVs that are laptop compatible. The bathrooms are equipped with double sinks, soaker tubs and rainfall showers. Rooms have Nespresso machines and are stocked with regional beers and plenty of locally-sourced snacks.

The Trump has made sure that beds are not visible from doorways and that all desks face out windows — two touches designed to make guests forget they're in a hotel room.

Among the hotel's amenities are a 60-foot indoor salt-water pool, fitness centre, a two-level Quartz Crystal Spa as well as The Stock Restaurant on the 31st floor. Services include 24-hour in-room dining, overnight laundry and dry cleaning, nanny services and personal shoppers.

Of course, Trump style doesn't come cheap. The hotel is offering special rates for the month of February — a Valentine's stay can be had for as little as $375 — but rooms during the busy summer months start at $425. (Planning to stay there during TIFF? Rooms start at $850 a night or you can bed down in the 4,000 square-foot presidential suite for $20,000 a night.)

Toronto has long suffered a dearth of world-class hotels. Though it boasts the nation's biggest (the Delta Chelsea on Gerrard St.) and some spiffy historic ones (the Fairmont Royal York and Le Méridien King Edward) Canada's largest city was infamous for not having a five-star hotel until the Hazelton Hotel opened on Yorkville Ave. in 2007. But with fewer than 80 rooms there, many of the rich and famous have had to settle for the less-luxurious – and aging – Four Seasons and Park Hyatt or the 28-room Windsor Arms. And despite the Hazelton's sister hotel SoHo Metropolitan and some charming boutique hotels like the Drake and Gladstone, hipsters in Toronto could only watch as Montreal got both Canada's only W Hotel and its only W-inspired airport property, aloft.

Things starting looking up for the city last year when the classy Thompson Hotel chain chose Toronto for its first international property – the 102-room Thompson Toronto on Wellington at Bathurst. It joined two Le Germain boutique hotels (one in the Entertainment District and one in Maple Leaf Square) in adding a touch of style to the hotel scene.

Last February, Toronto got the country's only Ritz-Carlton (Montreal's century-old Ritz-Carlton hotel is not part of the chain) on Wellington St. It has 267 rooms. Both the Four Seasons Hotel & Residences on Bay at Yorkville Ave., with 253 rooms, and the 202-room Shangri-la Hotel at the corner of University and Adelaide, are scheduled to open in late-summer.

Fun facts about hotels in downtown Toronto:
• One of the first luxury hotels in Toronto was the Rossin House at the corner of King and York St. Built in 1856 (and renamed Prince George Hotel in 1909) it had 252 rooms, making it the largest hotel in the city at the time.

• The Clarion Hotel on Sherbourne is a Victorian mansion that was the home of famed writer Ernest Hemingway and his wife in the early 1900s.
• The Four Seasons hotel chain was founded in – and still based in – Toronto. It is partly owned by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Saudi Arabia's Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz. The first Four Seasons ever was a motor inn built in 1961 on Jarvis near Carlton.
• When the Sheraton Centre opened in 1972 it was called the Four Seasons Sheraton Centre (a partnership that lasted four years). It was the tallest hotel in Canada until the 53-story Hilton Fallsview north tower opened in Niagara Falls, Ont. in 2010.
• When it opened in 1929, the 28-floor Royal York Hotel (now a Fairmont) was the tallest building in Canada.
• Opened in 1903, the King Edward Hotel (now under the Le Méridien brand) is the oldest hotel still operating in Toronto.
• With nearly 1,600 rooms, the Delta Chelsea Hotel on Gerrard is the largest hotel in Canada. Built in the 70s, it was intended as a co-op apartment building.

Photos by Maurie Sherman. Exterior photo by John R. Kennedy. Click on photos to see full size.