Spadina House re-opened on Monday after a 10-month closure for its first comprehensive renovation since the house was converted from a private home to a museum in 1984.
The
museum's $600,000 renovation, handled by general contractor COSAR, includes a refocusing of the museum on the 20th century.
"The first restoration in 1984 focused on three generations," says museum administrator Karen Edwards. "Each room was a different generation. That kind of jumping around was sometimes difficult to interpret."
The house's former owners, the Austin family, left the museum about 100 boxes of documents, including invoices, grocery bills and even unused rolls of wallpaper, and a lot of the time during the closure was spent poring over those boxes, and creating exhibits and props for the house to show as clearly as possible what life was like for this prosperous family throughout the 20th century.
Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Karen Edwards
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