The Carson Luxury Apartments
Converted from a 70’s style hotel, The Carson is now an innovative luxury apartment building in downtown Ottawa, designed with the creative community in mind. The vision was to transform a tired former hotel to a contemporary, amenity-filled rental apartment. The target audience desires living an urban lifestyle, while reducing their carbon footprint by using communal zones as their main “living rooms”. Distinctive custom art pieces were incorporated as statements including a moss wall, a graphic world mural, and an artistic mural of ‘Mr. Carson’ himself by Montreal artist Melissa del Pinto. Pop art walls are some of the design’s other imaginative features focused on creating a sense of community within the building.
Design details
Located centrally in Ottawa at 141 Cooper Street, this design takes you out of your urban living space into eclectic and flexible common zones. The Wi-Fi lounge is a creative area to socialize with your neighbours or with friends on-line. You can also warm up by the fireplace and admire the details hidden within the mural of Mr. Carson. The modern ‘pop culture’ party/games lounge can be used to socialize with friends. A new gym accommodates the fitness addicts. For avid bike riders, there is a bike storage room with washing stations and a repair station incorporated. Laundry becomes another social activity in the luxury laundry lounge, complete with soft seating and televisions for watching or playing games. Finally, a co-working space is provided including a self-serve café, and comfortable places for the remote worker or student to work and meet.
Each apartment unit has features such as contemporary, neutral paint colours, brand new laminate wood flooring, modern fixtures, and stainless-steel appliances. Each unit was renovated with kitchen upgrades/retrofits, and new LED lighting fixtures throughout. Corridors were refreshed and three additional units were provided meeting updated accessibility features. Many units include large attached balconies.
This apartment experience is unique to downtown Ottawa and provides a modern space for a flexible community to live, work and socialize in. The design is original, artistic, creative and enables residents to utilize every square foot to relax, work, exercise and connect.
Sustainable features
Provision of comfortable and diverse common spaces allows the tenants to live in smaller private units. This results in an overall reduced carbon footprint for the tenants. Sustainable features were incorporated into the design including the selection of non-toxic, low/no-VOC products. Elements of beauty and biophilia were emphasized throughout the design.