One King West, Toronto

wylk · 2012-03-10T05:37:00+00:00

A Toronto hotel, One King West, includes a former bank (Dominion Bank, 1914). One floor below the main level there is a large vault with a 4-foot-thick door: It is peculiar because the bolts can be seen but the boltwork is hidden (additionally there are only 20 bolts instead of the more common 24). The only other one I’ve seen like this is in the Federal Reserve Bank in Cleveland (which has 16 bolts) and is made by York. So, tentatively, the Toronto vault is probably a York? I haven’t run across any patents for this style of boltwork. Can anyone help?

VaultDoors

The One King West vault door appears to be missing its glass panel. If you look at the inside of the outer most ring (towards the bottom) you can see what appears to be a track to hold the glass in place. Vault doors of similar design (Cleveland Fed and Equitable Bldg/Capital Grille) have glass panels installed to enclose the locking bolts. Unfortunately, I was unable to find any pics of the vault door with the glass installed.

wylk

VaultDoors wrote
The One King West vault door appears to be missing its glass panel…

True, I hadn’t noticed that. I checked all of my images and could not find one with glass. It would be nice to see it replaced but a piece that large might be a bit pricey to buy and have cut. Plus it would make the door much more difficult to photograph.

The Broker restaurant in Denver used to have its glass panel but it disappeared too, comparing older and newer images. Being in a bar I’d have to guess somebody accidentally broke it, and the staff thinks it looks better without the glass.

[unknown]

Adrian Weber

If I am not mistaken you can see the mirror effect of the glass in the drawing that wylk recently provided:

http://www.antique-locks.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=10101&d=1386440344

That should be enough to proof it or? 🙁nerd):

VaultDoors

I reached out to Matt Black, Marketing Director at One King West and asked about the glass panel and the clock.

He replied, "The glass front to the vault broke at some time between the end of active service for the vault and when construction of the new building took place. There currently are no plans to replace the glass as from a security standpoint there is no reason to keep the components behind glass and frankly it looks better to see the raw materials without impediments.

As for the clock, unfortunately I do not have any information on the clock beyond the picture you see there. I’m unsure where it went. I can tell you there is no electricity in that location, leaving me to believe it was probably added around when that picture was taken some time in the 60’s after the creation of battery operated clocks. There are no plans to replace the clock at this time."

VaultDoors

Perhaps someone can clarify an observation about crane hinges. One side of the hinge is attached to the door frame and the other side of the hinge is attached to the door itself. The ‘frame hinge’ opens and closes the door but what is the purpose of the ‘door hinge’? Does the door need to rotate so the pressure bar can make the tightest fit possible? Perhaps the door needs to swing away from its hinge for maintenance? This pic is not real but it shows a vault door swung away from its crane hinge.

The One King West vault door may be able to rotate slightly from its door hinge but does not appear to be able to swing freely away from it since the pressure bar overlaps the crane hinge and is attached to the frame on the left.

This emergency door hinge resembles a cannonball safe hinge and looks as if the door could spin 360 degrees - if the door was not too thick.

Paul Prescott

I can answer the question re the door hinge. I’ve only worked on one really big crane hinge door, and a couple of smaller ones, but yes the door hinge allows the door to enter it’s frame ‘parallel’ to the frame, this allows for very close tolerances to be maintained between the door and frame.

VaultDoors

wylk wrote
It’s my understanding that modern usage is more often “Safe Deposit” than “Safety Deposit.”

The “Safety Deposit Room” (as seen in the Realtor video) looks more like something the hotel installed for patrons rather than anything original. It might have originally been a “Coupon Room” or something else.

While the time lock currently has three movements, it probably originally had four (which was frequent on such large doors). I don’t have any old images to support this but here is a drawing that suggests four:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10101[/ATTACH]

That’s a great drawing. Do you have any other drawings/pictures/plans of the One King West door you can share that are not in my online gallery?

[unknown]

VaultDoors

wylk wrote
True, I hadn’t noticed that. I checked all of my images and could not find one with glass. It would be nice to see it replaced but a piece that large might be a bit pricey to buy and have cut. Plus it would make the door much more difficult to photograph.

The Broker restaurant in Denver used to have its glass panel but it disappeared too, comparing older and newer images. Being in a bar I’d have to guess somebody accidentally broke it, and the staff thinks it looks better without the glass.

Here is a pic of the Broker Restaurant vault architrave. The wall clock’s edge is visible in the upper left corner. There is a close up available here if you keep clicking on the picture.

[unknown]

wylk

VaultDoors wrote
Do you have any other drawings/pictures/plans of the One King West door you can share that are not in my online gallery?

Several. I’ll start with some historical images, though they are not of the door itself. I believe you posted one of these but it’s not in your gallery.

The above are clearly from the same photograph. Unfortunately the wide view is only 235×295 pixels while the closeup is 960×393. If only the wide view were available at the same resolution!

The above are also about transporting the frame/hinge. Somewhere I read that while it was slowly traversing Adelaide Street, the streetcar shown in the second image was delayed and the streetcar operator was so mad he left the car and almost got in a fist-fight with the owner of the moving company. The move also supposedly damaged the pavement.

Similarly, the above are all the same picture. The first two again show the result of cropping. In the third, somebody took the second image, cropped it a bit, and photoshopped text and models over it; notice you can still see the deposit box lid poking out of the right-hand model.

I’ll post a few more later today.

[unknown]

wylk

VaultDoors wrote
Do you have any other drawings/pictures/plans of the One King West door you can share that are not in my online gallery?

Here are a few more. After a while they start looking alike but sometimes you can spot interesting details.

Above, this looks like it was taken before the hotel moved in. You can just barely see the clock in the upper-right corner and there is a bit of rust that’s not there now.

Above, a couple of images by Jackman Chiu. I believe your gallery includes a third image by him. In the first one you can see his reflection in the glass.

Sometimes I wish we could take up a collection for a fourth (identical) time lock and donate it. But I wonder if they even have the key to the door.

Above, a nice almost-straight-on image of the doorway. Note (again) the area where the clock used to be and the frame-mounted controls. This is an interesting image because while it’s black and white, the Windows 7 thumbnail is full color.

[unknown]

wylk

VaultDoors wrote
Do you have any other drawings/pictures/plans of the One King West door you can share that are not in my online gallery?

Last batch –

Above, a couple of images from Flickr. In the first one somebody is being interviewed; the second one shows the pressure-bar attachment fairly well along with being a nice side view of the door.

Above, some posed (real?) wedding pictures. They really are different images but probably taken about 2 seconds and six inches apart. I just found these a few minutes ago while trying to research one of the other images.

Above, a fairly grainy image I found today.

[unknown]

VaultDoors

wylk wrote
Here are a few more. After a while they start looking alike but sometimes you can spot interesting details.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10353[/ATTACH]

Above, this looks like it was taken before the hotel moved in. You can just barely see the clock in the upper-right corner and there is a bit of rust that’s not there now.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10354[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]10355[/ATTACH]

Above, a couple of images by Jackman Chiu. I believe your gallery includes a third image by him. In the first one you can see his reflection in the glass.

Sometimes I wish we could take up a collection for a fourth (identical) time lock and donate it. But I wonder if they even have the key to the door.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10356[/ATTACH]

Above, a nice almost-straight-on image of the doorway. Note (again) the area where the clock used to be and the frame-mounted controls. This is an interesting image because while it’s black and white, the Windows 7 thumbnail is full color.

One of Chiu’s pics shows a service tag from Adanac Security. They were established in 1974 and appear to have serviced the vault door at least three times. I wonder if they removed the missing time lock.

[unknown]

VaultDoors

wylk wrote
Last batch –

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10357[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]10358[/ATTACH]

Above, a couple of images from Flickr. In the first one somebody is being interviewed; the second one shows the pressure-bar attachment fairly well along with being a nice side view of the door.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10359[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]10360[/ATTACH]

Above, some posed (real?) wedding pictures. They really are different images but probably taken about 2 seconds and six inches apart. I just found these a few minutes ago while trying to research one of the other images.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10361[/ATTACH]

Above, a fairly grainy image I found today.

Great pics, thx!

[unknown]

VaultDoors

wylk wrote
Here are a few more. After a while they start looking alike but sometimes you can spot interesting details.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10353[/ATTACH]

Above, this looks like it was taken before the hotel moved in. You can just barely see the clock in the upper-right corner and there is a bit of rust that’s not there now.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10354[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]10355[/ATTACH]

Above, a couple of images by Jackman Chiu. I believe your gallery includes a third image by him. In the first one you can see his reflection in the glass.

Sometimes I wish we could take up a collection for a fourth (identical) time lock and donate it. But I wonder if they even have the key to the door.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10356[/ATTACH]

Above, a nice almost-straight-on image of the doorway. Note (again) the area where the clock used to be and the frame-mounted controls. This is an interesting image because while it’s black and white, the Windows 7 thumbnail is full color.

Here’s a pic showing two of the movements (captured from a video):

[unknown]

VaultDoors

I compared the One King West time lock to the Yale & Towne Mfg Co. time locks in American Genius but I see elements of a few of their time locks in this design:

Triple L
Triple K
Automatic with Hollar’s Time Lock

The closest match from the book is the Yale & Towne Automatic with Hollar’s Time Lock. I suspect the fourth movement was replaced with an electric trigger which may explain the electrical contacts in the two locking bolts. The back plate of the missing time lock appears to be scalloped/Damascened which could help explain the order of events.

VaultDoors

Is it possible the automatic operating device/trigger is concealed within the half-ball structure behind the time lock case? Similar time lock mounts are also found in the Cleveland Federal Reserve and Equitable Bldg/Capital Grille vault doors.

VaultDoors

wylk wrote
It’s my understanding that modern usage is more often “Safe Deposit” than “Safety Deposit.”

The “Safety Deposit Room” (as seen in the Realtor video) looks more like something the hotel installed for patrons rather than anything original. It might have originally been a “Coupon Room” or something else.

While the time lock currently has three movements, it probably originally had four (which was frequent on such large doors). I don’t have any old images to support this but here is a drawing that suggests four:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10101[/ATTACH]

I found this pic on Mark Frank’s website that shows a time lock similar to the One King West time lock - a missing movement that may have housed an electric trigger:

[unknown]

Doug MacQueen

No automatic bolt motors on these doors. Doug

VaultDoors

VaultDoors wrote
I found a floor plan for the One King West vault area and added some detail. Please let me know if any terms are incorrect:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]10070[/ATTACH]

Here is a pic and video gallery I compiled for the One King West vault door.

The One King West gallery has been organized into Sets, this is the Collection address: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cantonviaduct/collections/72157639183617364/

[unknown]

VaultDoors

The Capital Grille/Equitable Bldg vault door appears to also have electrical contacts atop one of its locking bolts:

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