Hotel review: Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel (and nearby attractions)

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Note: This post contains affiliate links. A friend and I stayed at the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel and visited Little Canada at no cost for review purposes. Neither the hotel nor the attractions mentioned reviewed or approved this post. All opinions are my own.

Cover photo of the lobby garden and waterfall courtesy of the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel.

Heading to Toronto for a short getaway and looking for a downtown hotel in a great location? If a bit of a splurge is in the cards, I can highly recommend the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel. With roughly 1,300 rooms, it’s one of the city’s larger hotels and a popular location for conferences, weddings and other events. And in 2022, it underwent a massive renovation to celebrate its 50th anniversary—a project that refreshed just about everything from the lobby restaurants to the rooftop lounge.

A friend and I stayed there recently and agreed that the location is top notch. Steps from the Osgoode TTC subway station, the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel is directly across the street from Nathan Phillips Square and Toronto City Hall. We were also able to walk easily to the CF Eaton Centre, the Hockey Hall of Fame and Little Canada. I’ll tell you more about these nearby attractions at the end of this post, but first, I’ll tell you why we liked this hotel (and one aspect we found odd).

My favourite part: The Club Lounge

I’ll admit it: I’m a sucker for those hotel packages that give you access to a private lounge filled with nibbles and drinks. And the 43rd-floor Club Lounge at this downtown Toronto hotel is one of the best I’ve seen.

First of all, it’s huge. Unlike some lounges, which seem to have been wedged into a windowless underused meeting room as an afterthought, this 15,000-square-foot (1,400 square metre) space just goes on and on.

When you step off the elevator, there’s a welcome desk. Once you’ve proved you have the secret password (well, OK, just the right level of room) to come in, you can turn left or right. To the left is a smaller, quieter section; to the right, an expansive room with a large bar. Both sections include floor-to-ceiling windows that give you a bird’s-eye view of Toronto’s skyscrapers and attractions. And in both, you can enjoy a complimentary breakfast and late afternoon/early evening canapés, as well as all sorts of drinks. You’ll have to pay for the alcoholic drinks—in the $10 range for draft beer, $15 to $20 for a five-ounce glass of wine, and $20 to $25 for most cocktails.

The food is plentiful and good. At breakfast, choices included eggs, sausages, hash browns, croissants, bagels, danishes, juices, yogurt parfaits, fresh fruit and cheese. The evening snacks were tapas-style treats such as herbed roasted mini potatoes, charcuterie, samosas and dessert squares. In fact, one evening, we nibbled so many appetizers that we didn’t feel like dinner.

Whatever you eat and drink, you can choose to consume it at long marble communal tables in the centre of the room, under a coffered ceiling set with mirrors, or you can head to one of the small tables around the edges of the rooms and along the windows, some with tub chairs or plush couches.

The restful part: The rooms

Our Club Level room at the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel was spacious and comfortable, at roughly 300 square feet (27 square metres). It had the usual array of hotel amenities, including a coffee maker, ironing board, hair dryer and safe, along with a big TV with lots of cable choices. The mini-fridge and free bottles of water were nice touches you don’t always get in posh hotel rooms, and I liked the warm-oak-scented Gilchrist & Soames hand wash and body lotion in the bathroom. The beds were comfortable, and our view looking southward toward the CN Tower and Lake Ontario was great.

A word on views: You can choose from a variety of vistas when booking your room, such as a view of Toronto City Hall and Nathan Phillips Square, of the hotel’s interior garden, or of the indoor-outdoor swimming pool.

And a word on room location: If you’re overly bothered by noise, request a room far from the elevators. There was a constant low whoosh and hum from the elevators running along the wall behind our TV and dresser. It didn’t keep me from sleeping, but I did notice it.

The odd part: The restaurants

If you’re not staying on a Club Lounge floor, you still have two dining options at the Sheraton Centre Toronto. They’re both worth checking out, but their concepts aren’t immediately apparent at first glance.

Posh and clubby: 43 Down

Tucked away in a corner of the lobby is 43 Down, which we decided to try for dinner. Unfortunately for us, I hadn’t done my advance research properly, as it turns out that 43 Down is primarily a bar, which also serves a small menu consisting mainly of shareable plates to accompany its wines, beers, spirits and craft cocktails.

In terms of drinks, you can choose anything from a $15 glass of Niagara pinot noir or a $10 Ontario beer to one of 18 single-malt scotches, three Japanese whiskeys, or a variety of sherries and tequilas. Money no object? Add a two-ounce glass of Rémy Martin Louis XIII cognac to your bill for $600, or spring for a bottle of Penfolds Napa Valley Bin 98 Quantum Cabernet Sauvignon for a cool $2,000.

Not surprisingly, we instead opted for one cocktail each, along with two shareable plates—four small but excellent Portuguese-style salt cod cakes and a bulb of burrata cheese with winter squash and crostini, which was a bit bland but still enjoyable. (The food menu changes frequently, so these items from our winter visit are no longer offered.) Adventurous diners may be tempted by current dishes such as charred Atlantic octopus with fried lentils, or braised lamb neck tostadas with blistered shishito peppers.

The bar has a somewhat clubby, masculine decor, with lots of dark wood and subdued lighting. I’d recommend it for a pre-dinner drink or a nightcap, rather than a meal.

Open-concept and eclectic: Dual Citizen

On the last day of our weekend visit, we discovered that what we had mistaken for a lobby coffee bar and takeout spot was actually a full-service restaurant with a wide range of inventive, international food choices.

We lined up at the counter of Dual Citizen to buy something for lunch, only to learn that the counter service is limited to coffee and other drinks, and takeout items such as muffins and potato chips. The staff directed us to the tables scattered throughout the lobby (which I hadn’t realized were part of the restaurant), where we could get sit-down service and more options, such as tuna poke bowls, burgers, charcuterie and grilled tandoori chicken flatbread. I opted for a simple but delicious mixed-greens salad, which was so fresh-looking that a woman passing by asked me if it was worth ordering. (It was.)

Crucially, for those arriving late or leaving early, the restaurant is open seven days a week from 6am to midnight. Most menu items are available all day; in addition, breakfast dishes such as chia-seed pudding, omelettes and red velvet pancakes are served daily from 6am until 10:45am.

The fun parts: An indoor-outdoor pool and more

Want to work off all that food and drink? The Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel has a fitness centre, of course, but it also has a year-round, indoor-outdoor pool. In winter, you could stroll across the street, rent skates and take a few spins around the rink in Nathan Phillips Square.

The hotel is also known for its lush courtyard garden and burbling waterfall, shown in the photo at the top of this post. Both have been an integral part of the property since it opened (originally as a Four Seasons) in 1972.

If work is your idea of fun, you could pull up a seat at one of the lobby’s Community Tables, found in many Sheratons. The long oak tables feature task lighting, phone chargers and convenient laptop power outlets, so you can work on that next big proposal while watching the world go by.

Finally, if you take an escalator down from the lobby, you’ll reach an entrance to Toronto’s PATH system, a 30-kilometre network of underground tunnels connecting hotels, office buildings, shops and attractions—such as the CF Toronto Eaton Centre, Roy Thomson Hall and the Scotiabank Arena—to each other. If you’re visiting in winter, as we did, you can get to all sorts of places without bothering with coats, mittens and boots. (I won’t say it’s simple, however. We took the PATH to the Hockey Hall of Fame and made several wrong turns that required some backtracking. Whether that was due to poor signage or poor navigational skills, I’ll leave you to decide. I think it was a combination.)

And, speaking of the Hockey Hall of Fame…

The nearby parts: Hockey, shopping and miniature landscapes

The Hockey Hall of Fame

I’d been to the Hockey Hall of Fame years ago but my friend hadn’t, so we decided to make a pilgrimage from the Sheraton to the home of the Stanley Cup. Like everything these days, the hall is not a cheap outing, with adult tickets going for $25 a pop (youths aged four to 13 get in for $15, while visitors 65 and up pay $20).

What I know about hockey would probably fit on a tabletop hockey game puck, but I still found it fun to check out a recreation of the Habs’ dressing room, complete with stalls dedicated to greats such as Guy Lafleur and Jean Béliveau. We also watched people testing their slap shot skills in a game simulator and explored a surprisingly fascinating display of 90 hockey masks (yes, Jacques Plante’s was there). The Esso Great Hall, where the Stanley Cup is on display, is worth a visit in its own right; it’s in a former 1885 bank building under a stunning, carefully restored stained-glass dome.

From Olympic teams to the famous 1972 Canada Cup series and more, the Hall has exhibits designed to please just about every hockey fan. (Personally, I would have loved to have seen more attention to women’s hockey, but everyone will have their quibbles.)

Address: Brookfield Place, 30 Yonge Street.

CF Toronto Eaton Centre

I wasted many hours of my suburban Toronto youth wandering the galleries of the CF Toronto Eaton Centre. The first phase of this vast downtown mall, which stretches across two subway stations, opened in 1977. Since then, it has grown, changed and even outlasted its namesake department store. But today, as ever, it’s a magnet for teenagers, fashion lovers and browsers of all descriptions, with more than 230 shops, restaurants and services.

Tip: If you’re looking for the food court, follow the signs to “Urban Eatery” on the lower level.

Address: 220 Yonge Street, with direct access from the Queen and Dundas TTC subway stations.

Little Canada

One of Toronto’s newest attractions, Little Canada is so fresh off the drawing board that it isn’t entirely finished yet. It’s another pricy outing, with tickets priced at $22 for kids aged four to 12, $28 for students and seniors, and $32 for adults. However, I enjoyed it thoroughly.

The pet project of British-Canadian Jean-Louis Brenninkmeijer, this collection of detailed dioramas of Canadian scenes has been in the making since 2011. Its first elements—including miniature facsimiles of downtown Toronto, Parliament Hill, Niagara Falls, Stratford and Quebec City—opened to the public in 2021. The East Coast section is slated to open with a kitchen party celebration on June 2, 2023. Still in the works are tiny versions of the Rockies, Vancouver and more.

The streets are populated with thousands of tiny people. Buses, cars, bicycles, ambulances and streetcars glide silently around the miniature streets, and subways and trains clatter along tracks. Stadiums are fitted with individual seats. Some buildings have cutaways so you can see tableaux of imaginary domesticity—or vacations, in the case of the pint-sized Chateau Laurier Hotel—inside.

Don’t expect geographical verisimilitude here. In the Ottawa section, for instance, the CTV building in the ByWard Market overlooks a park with a giant projection screen, and both are directly across a wide street from the Canada Revenue Agency’s Connaught Building. In reality, there’s no park, and the CTV building is several blocks from the CRA.

And just west of Parliament Hill, a red-and-white train rolls smoothly across a bridge between Ottawa and Gatineau. Wishful thinking on the part of Little Canada’s builders, many of whom came from the model train hobbyist community? If so, I can’t blame them. In fact, I totally understand the need for a bit of poetic licence in an attraction like this. It’s like those movie montages at the Academy Awards—you just want the highlights in the most pleasing and efficient order. And that’s what you get.

I was endlessly fascinated by this miniature world, and if you’ve ever been captivated by a dollhouse or train set, I suspect you will be, too. And every 15 minutes or so, the entire attraction cycles from daylight to evening, so you’ll see streetlights switch on, witness the rainbow illumination of Niagara Falls and watch fireworks exploding over the Peace Tower where, apparently, it is always Canada Day.

Toronto Life published a fascinating story about the attraction’s construction.

Address: 10 Dundas Street East, across Yonge Street from the Eaton Centre.

The Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel: A great weekend base

In sum, if you’re heading to Toronto for a weekend of fun, the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel is a convenient and comfortable place to stay. It’s near lots of major attractions, the service is friendly, the rooms are comfortable and the Club Lounge is absolutely worth the splurge.

Tip: Three blocks of Queen Street just east of the Sheraton—from Bay to Victoria streets—will be closed to traffic until late 2027 due to subway construction. Keep this in mind if you’re driving to the hotel.

The map below shows the exact location of the Sheraton Centre Toronto, and you can book a room there—or at any of the other properties displayed on the map—just by clicking on the price icons. (Disclosure: I’ll earn a small commission if you do, at no extra cost to you.)

As the owner of Ottawa Road Trips, I acknowledge that the land on which downtown Toronto now stands has been the traditional land of the Huron-Wendat, the Seneca and the Mississaugas of the Credit for thousands of years. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to be present on that land. Ottawa Road Trips supports Water First, a non-profit organization that helps address water challenges in Indigenous communities in Canada through education, training and meaningful collaboration.

Looking for more tips on things to see and do in Eastern Ontario, the Outaouais, northern New York state and beyond? Subscribe to my free weekly newsletter or order a copy of my book, Ottawa Road Trips: Your Weekend Getaway Guide.