Neighbourhood Profiles

Wychwood Park

Wychwood Park is an exclusive enclave of sixty homes tucked away in a private ravine setting atop the rolling wooded hills of the Davenport Ridge.

This community is unique in that it has its own executive council that overseas the private roads and parkland within the Wychwood Park neighbourhood. The price for this privacy is a special park tax paid by every Wychwood Park home owner. This tax varies depending on the size of each property.

HISTORY

Wychwood Park was founded by Marmaduke Matthews, a landscape painter who purchased land here in the 1870's with the hope of establishing an artist colony at Wychwood Park. Matthews named Wychwood Park after Wychwood Forest, located near his childhood home in Oxfordshire, England.

In 1874, Matthews built the first house in the community, at number six Wychwood Park. The second Wychwood Park house, at number twenty two Wychwood Park, was built in 1877, by Matthews' friend Alexander Jardine.

Matthews and Jardine jointly bought the land that abutted their estates and in 1891, registered a plan of subdivision for what is now the Wychwood Park neighbourhood.

Wychwood Park is historically significant for the architecture of its homes, and for being one of Toronto's earliest planned communities. The Wychwood Park neighbourhood was designated as an Ontario Heritage Conservation district in 1985.

**The Toronto neighbourhood text profiles, sketches and maps displayed on this web site were originally published in “Your Guide to Toronto Neighbourhoods”, are © Maple Tree Publishing Inc. and have been reproduced by Toronto Real Estate Board under license.