I recently attended the opening of the Yorkville Plaza Private Estate Residences. It was a beautiful event with white glove service catered to perfection with wonderful food and wine on the 32nd floor overlooking all of Yorkville and Toronto in a truly luxurious suite.

From the moment you walked through the doors you felt you were getting special treatment and a level of superior service. It was definitely a “Luxury” affair in a “Luxury” building.

I started thinking about the prevalence of the word “Luxury” in our current culture. It seems to be everywhere. It seems that every new condo project that comes to market is called a Luxury building. Perhaps it’s time to re-define the word “Luxury”. It’s become so common to call things luxury that the residences we viewed last night were actually called “Super Luxury” and I can understand why.

How do you differentiate yourself from all the other so-called Luxury buildings many of which are nowhere near what I think of as luxurious.  

To me luxury is something that you don’t have to scream about because you can see it and feel it. It starts with a creative, unique design that is executed with quality workmanship and the finest materials and attention to the smallest details. The luxury is reflected in the pride that was taken in creating the “art form” whatever it might be. Whether you are talking about a purse, a dress, a pair of shoes or a new condo project, they’re all a form of art.

In our throw away society that is so concerned about having the latest trend, the focus on quality and lasting workmanship seems to have given way to finishing a project as quickly as possible and being trendy. The problem with trends is that they change quickly and almost before you can finish a large project, there is a new design trend.

How many developers out there are truly concerned about how the final product reflects on their reputation for quality or pride of workmanship and how it will weather the years? I guess time and history will speak for itself.