Distillery District

Just east of downtown, cars give way to cobblestones, and rows of tall red-brick Victorian buildings line pedestrian lanes filled with cafes, galleries, and shops. This is the Distillery District, a preserved quarter of nineteenth-century industrial buildings reborn as one of the city's most charming corners.

The district was once a great whisky distillery, among the largest in the world in its day, a complex of brick warehouses, mills, and workshops built in the nineteenth century. When the distilling ended, the buildings survived, and the whole quarter was restored rather than torn down.

Today it is a car-free pedestrian zone, its old industrial lanes given over to art galleries, design shops, cafes, restaurants, a brewery, and studios, so the rugged brick architecture now houses a creative, leisurely village in the middle of the city.

The Victorian buildings themselves are the draw as much as the shops, some of the best-preserved industrial architecture of their age on the continent, all weathered brick, iron, and timber, atmospheric and photogenic.

The district has become a centre for the arts, with galleries, public sculpture, theatres, and frequent events and festivals, so there is usually something happening among the old warehouses.

In winter it hosts a popular holiday market, when the lanes fill with stalls, lights, and a great tree, drawing crowds into the cold and giving the brick quarter a festive glow, one of the city's seasonal highlights.

It is a place to wander slowly, coffee in hand, browsing the shops and galleries, watching the light on the old brick, rather than to rush through, and the lack of traffic makes it calm and easy on foot.

The cafes, restaurants, and brewery make it a fine place to eat and drink, and many visitors come as much for a long lunch or a drink among the old buildings as for the galleries.

The district sits a short way from the lake and the old town, so it pairs naturally with the waterfront and the St. Lawrence Market quarter in a day exploring the historic east of downtown.

Its appeal is the meeting of grit and polish: heavy industrial architecture, carefully restored and filled with art and good food, a former factory quarter turned into a place to linger.

A few practical notes. The district is free to wander and pedestrian-only; come by day for the shops and galleries or in the evening for the restaurants, and in winter for the holiday market. It is a short walk or tram ride from downtown.

Wander the cobbled lanes among the red-brick warehouses, browse a gallery, and settle in for a coffee or a meal, and the clever rebirth of an old factory quarter becomes a pleasure in itself. When you step back toward downtown, the brick and cobbles give way to glass and traffic once more.