Canada’s first cultural land trust purchase saves beloved arts spaces

After years of uncertainty, Inspirit Foundation has purchased two units at the Youngplace building in Toronto, allowing long-term creative tenants to remain in the building.

Since the purchase in January, the foundation transferred the units to the Community & Cultural Spaces Trust for community use, making it the first acquisition by a cultural land trust in Canada.

“There’s an age-old story where artists will move into an area that seems undervalued at the time, the neighbourhood will become cool, and people will take notice,” said Chris Lee, Director of Programming at Inspirit Foundation, a non-profit that funds media and arts for change.

“Eventually, larger developers come in, purchase spaces, and people get priced out of the neighbourhoods.” 

A creative hub in Toronto’s West End, Youngplace’s future was uncertain after its parent organization, Artspace, was placed into receivership due to massive debt in 2023.

The space houses artists and organizations, including the Intergalactic Arts Collective, the Centre for Indigenous Theatre, and Koffler Arts.

When the building officially went up for sale via a blind bid process in the fall of 2024, many tenants were able to find money to purchase their own units, some with help from $1.5 million allocated by the City of Toronto.

However, two organizations, Toronto Potters Guild and Paperhouse Studio, did not have that option. 

Inspirit purchased the units at market value, also with the help of city funding, to let those two long-time tenants keep their units, said Lee.

The Inspirit Foundation has owned its headquarters space at Youngspace for more than a decade. To preserve the building’s creative soul, the group took action, said Lee. 

“Our team was thinking: What’s our role in this process? Is there anything that we can do?” Lee said. “We looked at our own backyard – or building – and said, ‘Is there a way to help the tenants here?’” 

The purchase came after years of constant attention on the lack of affordable space for arts and cultural groups in Toronto, especially post-pandemic as leases have skyrocketed around the city.

Inspirit then quickly sold the units to the Community & Cultural Spaces Trust for less than they purchased it, transferring ownership to the trust organization dedicated to creating and preserving spaces for use by community arts organizations in Toronto’s Ward 9, directly adjacent to Youngplace in Ward 10.

“What this enables is that [for] the current tenants … nothing’s going to change for them. They can stay in their units. Their lease terms remain the same, which is really rare when units like these are purchased,” Lee said.

While this is the first instance of this model in Canada, it’s already expanding; 221A in Vancouver has been working to create an independent Cultural Land Trust (CLT) and finalized its business plan in 2023, with the aim of securing 30 properties in British Columbia by 2025.

“We’re going to see more of these [land trust acquisitions] hopefully happening,” Lee said. “There’s huge interest from cities and politicians to start making more of this happen … if many forces can come together, this is definitely doable.”