The first surprise is the bridge.

Arching above the steel truss of the Queen Street Viaduct are the words “This river I step in is not the river I stand in.” Installed in 1996 by local artist Eldon Garnet and inspired by the philosophy of Heraclitus, it’s a meditation on constant change, and something I’ve missed in my previous visits to the city’s east end, which have always been on the subway. Today, however, I’m walking from Union Station and can see not only the bridge but also my destination just beyond it — the new Broadview Hotel, the latest incarnation of a landmark 19th-century building in the Riverside neighbourhood.

I’m still thinking about Garnet’s installation as I pass beneath the marquee lights of the Broadview’s entrance and into a cool, dimly-lit space that echoes with snippets of conversation from the café and bar on the north side of the lobby. The last time I was in Riverside, in 2013, the Romanesque-style building at the corner of Broadview and Queen still housed a down-at-heel strip club called Jilly’s, which the top Yelp review archived by Google helpfully describes as “the elephant graveyard of the adult entertainment world.”

In the intervening years, the property was purchased by a condo developer, Streetcar Developments, and underwent a restorative facelift to become the Broadview, a 58-room boutique hotel that since opening in July has become a neighbourhood hot spot, in large part thanks to its spectacular rooftop lounge.

“Before this project was even a possibility, this neighbourhood was changing and growing, and amazing things were happening,” says Murray Henderson, the Broadview’s general manager. We’re sitting at a table in the rooftop lounge. To the west, the towers of downtown are hazy silhouettes in the late afternoon sun; to the east, low red-and-brown brick buildings meld with a canopy of green. “It’s stylish, it’s creative, it’s colourful, it’s historic, and we just wanted to be a part of it.”