The Bay Queen Street Store
Originally Simpson’s department store, this landmark building was a Bay store from 1991 to 2025. It was the first building in Canada constructed with a load-bearing metal frame.
Location:
At the north entrance to the Bay department store, Queen Street West, west of Yonge Street, Toronto
Themes:
Buildings and structures, Industry and trade
Plaque text:
Department stores revolutionized shopping in the late nineteenth century by offering selection, low prices and money-back guarantees. In 1895, Robert Simpson commissioned architect Edmund Burke to design his new department store at the southwest corner of Yonge and Queen Streets. It was the first building in Canada with a load-bearing metal frame and a façade clearly patterned on this internal structure. By 1969, Simpson's department store had been enlarged six times and occupied two city blocks between Yonge, Queen, Bay and Richmond Streets. Canada's oldest corporation and largest department store retailer, Hudson's Bay Company, acquired the building in 1978. A Bay store since 1991, it remains one of Canada's great shopping landmarks.
