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Another helpful ingredient was time to think. ‘We lived for two of three years with the original kitchen,’ Mr. Round says. When they first moved in, they bought an Ikea kitchen for the basement apartment, ‘and it stayed in its boxes for two years,’ Mr. Round says. Their own kitchen took even longer, and they say that taking so long allowed their design ideas to ferment.
Another helpful ingredient was time to think. ‘We lived for two of three years with the original kitchen,’ Mr. Round says. When they first moved in, they bought an Ikea kitchen for the basement apartment, ‘and it stayed in its boxes for two years,’ Mr. Round says. Their own kitchen took even longer, and they say that taking so long allowed their design ideas to ferment.
(blackLab Architects Inc/)

Flair for budget hunting gives Toronto home a bespoke finish

ALEX BOZIKOVIC

 — Special to The Globe and Mail

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A young professional couple buys an old downtown house and sets to work. They put in a basement apartment; make evening trips to Ikea; learn to do some carpentry; have two babies amid the dust and half-finished projects. It’s an old story.

But here’s a new ending: the result is attractive and creative enough to qualify as real architecture. The credit is due to Tony Round and Andrea Kordos, of the young architecture firm blackLAB, who transformed an ordinary house on limited funds, using an architect’s sensitivity to details and an awareness of the whole picture.