105-storey skyscraper taking over Toronto’s skyline will soon be Canada’s tallest

The Toronto skyline is currently getting a once-in-a-generation shakeup as an enormous 105-storey condo tower races skyward at 1 Yonge Street, soon to take the title of Canada’s tallest building.

The Toronto that many locals grew up with is already a distant memory thanks to a decade and a half of booming construction, but the huge development rising from the foot of Yonge Street is shaping up to be the most visible structure built in town since the CN Tower was completed in 1976.

It’s a project that’s been at least 13 years in the making.

The One Yonge site’s office tower and surrounding parking areas were purchased by Vancouver-based developer Pinnacle International for a reported quarter-billion-dollar sum back in 2012.

Pinnacle started construction on the massive complex’s first tower back in 2018, completing the 65-storey first phase in 2023. Work on the second-phase tower, which Pinnacle has dubbed the “SkyTower” is now well underway and quickly rising toward a record-breaking height of over 345 metres.

At that height, SkyTower would lay claim to the title of Canada’s tallest building. The current record-holder, First Canadian Place in Toronto’s Financial District, stands at 298 metres. 

However, it is more likely that SkyTower will snatch away the title of Canada’s tallest from 85-storey luxury condo tower, ‘The One,’ a few kilometres to the north on Yonge Street, which is fast approaching a final height of 308.6 metres and will temporarily be the tallest building in the country.

There’s still quite a bit of work left to do before the SkyTower can overtake the competition.

With forming of the SkyTower now approaching the 60th floor, the building has already created a dramatic presence on the city skyline. 

Approximately 50 more floors will be constructed above, bringing the building’s roofline to roughly eye-level with the CN Tower’s main observation pod.

It can’t really be understated how transformative an effect this tower will have on the Toronto skyline, set to form the punctuation mark in what will eventually be a corridor of new skyscrapers extending east from Yonge Street along Queens Quay and Lake Shore Boulevard.

The massive SkyTower’s steady ascent continues to overshadow the adjacent former Toronto Star building at 1 Yonge Street, though this longstanding landmark on the skyline will soon be demolished to make way for another phase of this mega-development.

Previous plans for the site included a commercial complex that would have retained and expanded the current brutalist building, though the project has taken a new direction amid a dip in demand for office space in the downtown core.

SkyTower will be bringing a location of Marriott International’s Le Meridien brand to Canada for the first time in over 30 years, with a hotel set to open within the base of the project in Fall 2025.

However, this may be a tough timeline to meet given the building’s current construction progress as of early 2025.