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186 Balmoral Ave.

What: A three-storey detached brick house constructed in 1914, with four bedrooms and six bathrooms.

• Living space: about 4,000 square feet above grade
• Lot size: 58 by 135 feet
• Asking price: $1,549,000
• Taxes: $10,569 (2008)
• Agent: Douglas Gubitz, Chestnut Park Real Estate Ltd.

Amenities: The house has many original features, including a vintage coal-burning fireplace in the master bedroom, and exposed brick where previous owners attempted a renovation that would have opened up the home from the main floor to the attic.

The finished basement features a recently built nanny's suite with a kitchenette, bathroom and pine-ceilinged living space, as well as a separate entrance.

Last year, the owners replaced all the old wiring, and added a new hot water/gas heating system.

The restaurant-style kitchen features stainless-steel countertops and appliances, and an original wood-burning fireplace. It opens to a rear mudroom that could be torn down to enlarge the part of the cooking area that now doubles as a dining room.

***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Yes, fans, Peter Gabriel ate here.

There's no commemorative plaque (as yet). But this beaux arts house, owned by an award-winning record producer with a string of high-profile credits to his name, shows plenty of evidence of a lifetime in the rock 'n' roll business.

Born and raised in Dundas, Ont., owner David Bottrill lived and worked in London until just a few years ago. There he established a reputation producing major label releases for such pop artists as metal band Tool, alt-rockers Placebo and King Crimson. Most notably, Mr. Bottrill has worked for many years with British rock musician Peter Gabriel. He produced his 1986 studio album, So, featuring the mega-hit, Sledgehammer, driving it to blockbuster status.

Relocating to Canada in 2004, the year prior to his marriage to Tanya Reuben, Mr. Bottrill purchased the Balmoral Avenue property in 2007.

He says he was attracted by its proximity to Brown School, where he and his wife enrolled their young daughter.

Another selling point was that the property came with a 400-square-foot coach house (with two-car garage) that Mr. Bottrill had planned to convert into a recording studio.

When a neighbouring property wouldn't release additional land for the expansion/renovation, Mr. Bottrill relocated his recording studio to Queen and Dufferin streets, calling it Rattlebox Studios. This is where, he says, "I'm hoping to revitalize the recording industry in Canada."In the meantime, music continues to flow throughout the 4,000-square-foot house, from the newly finished basement straight up to the 10-foot cathedral ceilings.

On the main floor is the an intimate music room, complete with a piano, that is lined with vintage record jackets of recordings by the Beatles, Pink Floyd and Van Morrison.

As well, the backbeat decor includes a number of framed music awards, reaped by Mr. Bottrill during a career that started more than 20 years ago under the tutelage of internationally acclaimed Canadian music producer, Daniel Lanois.

But the pièce de résistance has to be the rare, large-scale colour photograph of John Lennon and Paul McCartney during their Maharishi days that adorns a capacious living room that also boasts an original wood-burning fireplace and leaded windows on three sides.

John is peering over his guitar into the lens of Paul Saltzman, the Canadian director and producer, while Paul gazes dreamily into the distance. The duo are in pastel close-up. Totally Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.

Surrounding them is an eclectic collection of hand-carved string instruments, in addition to a rhinestone-encrusted electric guitar setup sitting in a corner like a piece of eye-catching sculpture. An antique gramophone occupies an opposite wall.

"It's a creative house, great to write and compose in," Mr. Bottrill says, noting that as a producer he often rearranges clients' work. "There's abundance of natural light because of all the windows."

While a New World zing permeates the Old World house, it's not the first time celebrity has visited the vine-covered brick three-storey.

Built in 1914, it was originally the home the John Gerald FitzGerald, a Canadian health-care pioneer who founded the world renowned Connaught Laboratories, Toronto's first supplier of low-cost vaccines.

Mr. FitzGerald also established the University of Toronto School of Hygiene, and was dean of the U of T medical school, as well as scientific director of New York's Rockefeller Foundation, the first Canadian appointed to the position.

Able to demonstrate a link between some mental illnesses and their bacterial causes, the celebrated scientist broke new ground at a time when Freud was actively promoting repressed desire as the root of insanity. Says his grandson, James FitzGerald in a 2002 Toronto Life article about his illustrious ancestor, "He was a world authority in his field, a heroic figure."

His wife was the late Edna Leonard of London, Ont., heiress to her family's foundry fortune. She used to travel often to Europe where Mr. FitzGerald studied at the Pasteur Institute in Paris and Brussels, among other research labs, and brought home to Toronto a number of continental design influences for her house.

These include an outdoor porticoed entranceway that recalls the gentle archways of Florence, and, on the inside, original wood crown mouldings and a hand-carved decorative railing adorning the central staircase.

The floor plan consists of a side door opening to a hallway with rooms on either side. The centre-hall plan, also known as a hall-and-parlour plan, is common to American colonial architecture of New England.

Given that Mr. Fitzgerald used to frequent Harvard as a visiting scholar, it is tempting to think that the home's architectural style stems from those science-focused excursions. The design certainly feels salubrious.

The house flows from downstairs to upstairs, and from room to room, with few restrictions. Hardly any walls exist on the third level, which was opened up entirely to create an enormous master bedroom with ensuite and outdoor terrace.

The view includes landscaped gardens where Mrs. FitzGerald, a noted patron of the arts, used to stage open-air concerts. And so the sound of music comes full circle.

Mr. Bottrill might have built on that concert tradition if he were to stay in the house. But his wife is an avid horsewoman with a dream to open an organic farm. He is now relocating to a home on the range. The band will surely follow.

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Correction: The Silver Spoon restaurant is open and operating in Toronto on Roncesvalles Avenue. Incorrect information appeared in a Globe Real Estate story on February 6.

Editor's Note: This online version of the story has been corrected.