If you live here, you already know the Yonge Lawrence Village strip and you already know the ravine. You probably do not think of them as the same walk. That is the quiet argument of this post: in Lawrence Park, the shops and the forest were designed to be a single loop, and the fall of 2026 has reshuffled both ends of it in ways worth paying attention to before the leaves drop.
The strip runs north and south. The ravine runs east from Yonge and drops south under Mount Pleasant. Put them together and you have a two-hour Saturday that touches a rebranded fine-dining room, a 1933 formal garden, and one of the last old-growth stands in central Toronto. Most residents walk one half or the other. Almost no one walks both in a single afternoon.
The ravine chain, in the order it was meant to be read
The city calls this the Northern Ravines & Gardens Discovery Walk. It starts at Lawrence Station and, per AllTrails, runs about 5.3 miles out and back through four connected ravines. In sequence:
- Alexander Muir Memorial Gardens at 2901 Yonge. Formal terraced beds, maple-leaf motif, stone-and-wrought-iron gate on Yonge. This is the western gateway.
- Blythwood Ravine Park, dropping south from the Gardens along the former path of Burke Brook, now channelized as the North Toronto Storm Trunk Sewer.
- Sherwood Park, entered by crossing Blythwood Drive. This is the payoff.
- Sunnydene Park, the eastern terminus toward Bayview.
Sherwood is the section most residents underrate. The lostrivers.ca survey of the ravine records Red and White Oak, White Pine, Hemlock, Beech, Black Cherry, and Sugar Maple on the slopes, with up to 130 vegetative species in total. That is not a landscaped park. That is a remnant of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Forest that once covered the region, fenced in sections to protect ground vegetation from erosion. In the second week of October, when the Sugar Maples turn and the Red Oaks go rust, this is the best half-hour of walking inside the old city.
Two practical facts that shape when you go. The City of Toronto notes ravine trails are unlit, which makes daytime the only real option once the clocks change. Sherwood Park is the designated off-leash zone inside this chain, so if you have a dog, this is the leg of the walk that earns the trip.
The Gardens are older than the subway that displaced them
A short digression that pays off if you take out-of-town guests here. Alexander Muir Memorial Gardens was created in 1933 by public subscription, on the west side of Yonge across from Mount Pleasant Cemetery. In 1951, to make room for the Davisville subway yard, the Toronto Transportation Commission moved the entire park, stone walls and plantings included, north to its present location. The cost of the move exceeded CA$100,000 in 1951 dollars, roughly $1.19 million in 2025 terms. Edwin Kay's original symmetrical design was replicated at the new site, and in 1990 an international jury named it one of the 25 best pre-1985 urban design projects in Toronto.
The plaque at the Yonge entrance honours Alexander Muir, who composed The Maple Leaf Forever in 1867. If you have ever wondered why the maple leaf shows up on the gate, the terrace wall, and in the tree selection, that is why. Down Alexander Muir Road on the south side of the Gardens sits the Lawrence Park Lawn Bowling & Croquet Club, which is still operating and still one of the more genuinely eccentric neighbourhood assets in North Toronto.
What actually changed on the strip this year
The biggest shift on the dining side of the neighbourhood happened at Avenue and Lawrence. The restaurant that opened in 2024 as LSL, the collaboration between chefs Christian Le Squer, Masaki Saito and Didier Leroy, no longer exists under that name. Per blogTO's June 2026 reporting, Leroy separated from the partnership in late 2025, and Le Squer and Saito rebranded the room to Onze in early 2026, though the two remaining chefs are no longer working in the kitchen day to day. Leroy's next Toronto project was still unannounced at the time of that reporting.
If you have not been back since the change, the practical implication is that the reservation you might have made a year ago is now for a different restaurant with different food. That matters more here than it would in most neighbourhoods because Avenue and Lawrence has a thin bench of tasting-menu options and the LSL/Onze address was the most prominent one.
The rest of the strip is essentially unchanged, which is its own kind of information. Along Yonge and up Avenue Road you still have:
| Room | Address | Why it holds up |
|---|---|---|
| Tutto Pronto | Yonge Lawrence Village strip | Southern Italian, second-floor event space, rooftop patio |
| Trio Ristorante & Pizzeria | Yonge and Lawrence | Wood-burning oven, family-run, holds up for group dinners |
| 12 Tables | Yonge and Lawrence | OpenTable's romantic pick for the pocket |
| Francobollo | 1959 Avenue Rd | OpenTable's Best Restaurant in Yonge and Lawrence |
| Pii Nong Thai | 3321 Yonge | Yonge Lawrence Village BIA Summerlicious participant |
| Grazie, Aafrien, Darna | Yonge corridor near Eglinton | Neighborhood workhorses on the southern edge |
The Yonge Lawrence Village BIA's directory at ylvbia.com is the working list if you want the full inventory of shops and services along 3300-block Yonge, including the LCBO at 3372 Yonge, which is a Vintages location with a tasting bar. Worth a stop on the way home from the ravine.
A Saturday that uses both ends
The point of stitching this together is that you can. A workable version, in order:
Morning coffee somewhere along the 3300 block of Yonge. Walk south to 2901 Yonge and enter the Gardens through the stone gate. Drop into Blythwood Ravine on the south side, follow the trail under the Mount Pleasant Road viaduct, cross Blythwood Drive into Sherwood Park, and pick whichever bank of the channel you prefer. If you have the legs, continue to Sunnydene and Bayview. If not, turn around at the boardwalk in Sherwood and come back the same way. You are two subway stops from home and you have not touched a car.
Lunch works best back at the Yonge and Lawrence intersection. Dinner is where the Avenue Road end of the neighbourhood earns its place, either at Francobollo for something quieter or at Onze if you want to see for yourself how the room is running under its new name.
Practical notes worth knowing before the leaves drop
- Toronto parks are closed between midnight and 5:30 a.m. This applies to the ravine.
- Trails are not lit. Peak color plus early sunset means an afternoon start is safer than an evening one.
- Water fountains are limited inside the Gardens and rare in the ravine. Bring a bottle.
- Dogs must be on leash except in Sherwood Park's designated off-leash zone.
- The most useful transit anchor is Lawrence Station on Line 1; the 97B bus stops a minute from the Gardens at Chatsworth Drive.
- Access from the east end is the parking lot at 51 Alexander Muir Road, or street parking near Bayview and Blythwood.
Why the loop matters more than any single stop
Neighbourhood identity is usually described in categories: schools, streets, housing stock. In Lawrence Park the actual daily texture is the geometry of a two-hour walk that connects a formal 1933 garden, an old-growth ravine, and a compact commercial strip with one restaurant that has changed hands and a dozen that have not. Newcomers walk one leg. Long-time residents walk the other. The season for walking both is short, and it is now.
If you are thinking about how this neighbourhood fits a longer plan, whether that is staying put, right-sizing within Lawrence Park, or looking at what else in central Toronto reads this way, Shaheen & Company works this pocket closely and would be glad to talk. Contact Us when you are ready.
