The owners purchased a traditional detached Toronto house consisting of a simple three storey rectangular floorplate clad in brick with a porch facing the street. As with most similar houses, with the depth of the floor plate and limited side wall windows, the houses are typically dark within.

Farrow’s approach was to ‘hollow out’ the centre of the house, from top to bottom thereby creating as it were two houses, front and back, surrounding an interior courtyard. The two blocks were linked by bridges and a stair with a fluid, almost ‘wisp of smoke’ form. The walls and underside of the bridges are class in white back painted glass, reflecting, sun, shadow and moonlight in ever changing natural patterns.

The front of the house retains its traditional form with only a slight hint of the new courtyard visible along the side of the house.