In 1946, a newlywed architecture student from Zurich, named Sonja Bata, first gazed on the farmer's fields in Eastern Ontario where she and her new husband would build their lives after the Second World War.
Sixty years later, Mrs. Bata, almost 80 and matriarch of global shoe giant Bata Ltd., has extraordinary plans for those fields - 1,500 acres of land, with an abandoned shoe factory, that she owns around the former company town of Batawa.
When Mrs. Bata surveys this site 90 minutes east of Toronto, she dreams of condos in the old factory, hundreds of houses in tasteful modern styles, large parks, a retail destination, and homes for retired farmers and refugees from the city.
"We have big plans but we have to find out what the market will absorb," says Mrs. Bata, who last year bought the factory and land from Bata Ltd., which had closed the 60-year-old plant in 1999.
That closing, a huge economic blow to the area, meant the breakup of an industrial complex where more than 1,200 people once made shoes. It was where a young Mrs. Bata joined her husband Thomas and 100 of his Czech shoemakers, who were rebuilding the Bata family business in Canada after the Nazis had stormed through Czechoslovakia in 1939.
But today, the shoe industry has largely departed Canada for the Third World, and old plants must be torn down or converted to other uses.
Mrs. Bata's mission reflects both an obligation to the community bearing the family name, and a labour of love for a former architectural student who has never practised her craft.
"I still have an image of architectural purity. Today, you go to the suburbs and you have that fake stone and fake brick - it's horrible," Mrs. Bata says.
Mrs. Bata lives in Toronto now, although she and her 91-year-old husband Thomas still have a home at Batawa.
She does not dream of building faux French chateaux or English country houses, but of creating interesting, modern and affordable dwellings that align comfortably with the natural surroundings of forest and fields.
"That's the fun I will have with it" she says, flashing her trademark glittering smile.
If she gets her way, she will pull off one of Canada's most ambitious brownfield conversions, as well as establish a model for bottom-up municipal planning with input from local citizens.
The project is still in its formative stages but no one discounts the iron will of Sonja Bata, who has been a force in her family business, and spearheaded the landmark Bata Shoe Museum in downtown Toronto.
She said other family members - the Batas have four children - insisted it would be mad to tackle a shoe museum. But she was determined to prove them wrong and to put it on a secure financial footing. "They warned me it was a liability and that Batawa is a liability."
It would be easy to conclude that Mrs. Bata got a sweetheart deal on the property because she is a prominent player in the family shoe company. Yet, she maintains, "they gave me a lousy price on the land. There was no haggling because they had an offer, and I said I would match the offer." She won't discuss the price. "I write this off, because if I were to calculate it, I would get very upset."
Yet others see the two senior Batas as implicit collaborators. "She and Mr. Bata still have a bit of a heart for the area," says Bob Lockwood, a councillor for the nearby village of Frankford in the municipality of Quinte West. "She told me they want to do something for the area before they leave this earth."
Mrs. Bata expects the development to ultimately make money, "but probably not during my lifetime." She admits that, as an intensely personal project, it will be more costly than the normal subdivision.
More than making money, she gets excited about the planning process. She enlisted her prominent architect friend Eberhard Zeidler to help prepare the first drawings.
"When I phoned Eb - he is my age, he said: 'Is this a labour of love?' and I said 'yes, it is.' "
She likes nothing better than to roll out blueprints, and talk about building styles that fit into the environment, maintenance-free construction materials, and dwellings that sit back from the roads.
But she insists she will rely on the advice of people in the Batawa area. The village, once a collection of hastily constructed wartime homes, is now an attractive neighbourhood of more than 100 individually owned homes, located off the main highway. A number of the original Czech families still live there.
"Unless people are participating, they are not going to maintain it," Mrs. Bata says. "I think the people must feel, 'This is my town.' "
At a town hall meeting this past spring, Mrs. Bata unveiled plans to develop the land and tear down the factory, but some local people suggested she convert the factory into condos. They said retired farmers would prefer apartments in their own community, rather than moving away to larger centres.
So now the five-storey factory is rezoned residential and Mrs. Bata is talking to several potential partners in the condo project, one of which is doing a market survey. Up to 75 apartments could be built, and she expects single-family houses could follow in stages according to market demand.
In addition, she is looking to develop land for retail, recreation and industry. Part of the former Bata complex is already occupied by an auto parts plant owned by Linamar Corp. Also, there are plans to improve a small ski hill, located on her land but run by volunteers.
Less certain are Batawa's prospects for snaring a proposed municipal recreation centre for Quinte West. Mrs. Bata offered to donate land to put the centre in Batawa, but decisions have been deferred until after local elections this fall. Some members of council prefer the much larger town of Trenton as a site.
Meanwhile Quinte West is grappling with upgrading Batawa's water and sewage systems, including the addition of water meters, which were never required during its history as a company town.
Mrs. Bata continues to pour her passion and money into the area where as a 20-year-old, she first came to live in a small bungalow. "Maybe the development will be a little bit more expensive than if we just did it for financial reasons, but I think we will succeed."