Liberty Village

Liberty Village takes its name from Liberty Street — reportedly the route walked by inmates released from two 19th-century prisons that once stood there, a darker origin story than most Toronto neighbourhoods can claim.

Two prisons

Toronto Central Prison opened in 1873 at Strachan Avenue and King Street West as a maximum-security men's institution, gaining a reputation for brutal discipline under warden William Stratton Prince before closing in 1915; most of its buildings were demolished around 1920, with only the 1885 chapel surviving. Nearby, on land now occupied by Lamport Stadium, the Andrew Mercer Reformatory for Women opened in August 1880 as Canada's first women-only prison, imprisoning women under "incorrigibility" laws for offences like vagrancy until it closed in April 1969.

Factories and war production

Once cleared, the former prison lands were absorbed into Toronto's industrial west end. Rail access drew manufacturers including John Inglis and Massey-Harris, producing goods from household appliances to, during the Second World War, Bren machine guns. Decline set in from the 1970s as shipping shifted from rail to truck and production moved offshore, leaving much of the area's factory stock vacant by the early 1990s.

Lofts, condos and tech offices

Cheap rents drew artists into the empty warehouses through the 1980s and 1990s, setting the stage for formal redevelopment. From the 1990s through the 2000s, developers converted factory floors into loft condos — the Toy Factory Lofts at 43 Hanna Avenue won a 2005 industry award for condominium project of the year — and added new towers alongside them. Today the neighbourhood mixes converted industrial buildings with condo towers and has become a hub for Toronto technology and digital-media firms.

Sources

• Heritage Toronto — Bad Girls: Andrew Mercer Reformatory for Women
• Heritage Toronto — Bad Girls: Central Prison
• BlogTO — A Short and Violent History of Toronto's Central Prison