Kensington Market - Little Italy - Little Portugal : Featured Stories

SummerWorks has moved to the Ossington Strip, one of the city's biggest cultural hubs. We talk to the festival's Artistic Producer about how the arts have changed and shaped the neighbourhood since he first moved there in 2002. 

From the food incubator at Toronto Underground Market to its soon-to-open standalone Kensington Market shop, Seven Lives knows the business of reincarnation. The fish taco shop represents the latest in a growing number of Toronto eateries taking fate into their own hands by launching their businesses in unconventional ways.  

The Depanneur might look like a mere Dundas West hipster hangout. But behind the scenes, its unusual business model defies what it means to be a restaurant.

Toronto's farmers' markets reflect the character of their 'hoods just as much they reflect what local producers have on offer.

A love of West Coast hacker culture prompted Eric Boyd to fashion a line of wearable technology that lets people know what your body is up to. Could it bridge the gap between stylistas and geeks?

Makom wants to restore Kensington Market's robust Jewish culture with their participatory congregation. They hold services in members homes, artist studios and, guided by Jane Jacobs' adage that "new ideas need old buildings," in the historic Kiever synagogue.

Double Double Land in Kensington Market blurs the lines between art gallery, event venue, community hub and soon enough, international artist residency. How one second-floor studio apartment changed the face of the Toronto art scene, one Pay-What-You-Can event at a time.

A mile of pipe zig-zags under College Street in order to transfer heat from the Earth into the rooms of "the greenest hotel in North America." For general contractor Anthony Aarts, an innovative project like this is the build of a lifetime.

Part workshop, part tree house, and part revolutionary lair, the Toronto Hacklab is a home for geeks that mixes the urge to create with the ideals of a venerable movement. Also, there's a laser in the bathroom that plays the theme from Super Mario Brothers.

Furniture-maker Lubo Brezina is busy turning other people's junk into functional art and furniture on Dundas West.