A Massey family gift built as U of T's answer to an Oxbridge student union
Hart House
Opened in 1919 as a gift from the Massey family, Hart House gave University of Toronto students a Gothic Revival hub for athletics, theatre, art and debate modelled on British collegiate life.
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Hart House opened in 1919 at the University of Toronto, a gift from the Massey family and named for Hart Massey, funded by the same fortune that built Massey Hall. Designed in a Gothic Revival style meant to evoke the collegiate architecture of Oxford and Cambridge, the building was conceived as a single hub bringing together athletics, theatre, music, visual art, dining and student debate under one roof, at a time when university life in Canada had little in the way of dedicated student space.
A long road to full inclusion
For over five decades after it opened, Hart House formally excluded women from most of its facilities, reflecting the gender norms of the university and era in which it was founded; that exclusion was gradually lifted only in stages through the 1950s, 60s and into the early 1970s, with full and equal access not achieved until 1972. Today Hart House remains one of the University of Toronto's most recognizable buildings and continues to run its original mix of athletic, cultural and debating programming for the whole student body.
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