Commercial design and permits in Toronto. Offices, shops and services.

It depends on the whole building, not your unit. For offices, personal services and shops, a designer who is not an architect may design the work only if, after it, the building has no more than 3 storeys and no more than 600 m² of floor area above grade, measured to the outside faces of the exterior walls, or to the centre line of a firewall that no access opening or building service passes through. Only floors above grade count (grade is the lowest of the average ground levels along each exterior wall), so most basements are left out, but a walk-out lower floor can count. A 200 m² unit in a 2,000 m² plaza is over the line unless a firewall of that kind separates it. So is any building that holds a restaurant, bar or other gathering place, whatever its size (for a small restaurant, see the next question). Over the line, an architect and an engineer design it; interior work that does not affect, and is not likely to affect, the structure, a fire safety system (such as sprinklers or the fire alarm) or fire separation, a main entrance or public corridor, an exit or an exterior wall, and adds no floor space such as a mezzanine, can still be drawn without an architect. In a building that size the Building Code may still call for an architect's and engineer's general review (site reviews during construction).

Not a new restaurant, and in a conversion to one only the interior work the Act allows without an architect. The Architects Act counts the consumption of food or drink as an assembly use, and a building used for assembly needs an architect and an engineer at any size; for a restaurant for up to 100 people in a building of no more than 3 storeys and 600 m², an OAA Licensed Technologist may design it instead. Turning a shop or office into a restaurant is a change to an assembly use, and where the work touches the fire separations, exits or anything else on the Act's list, the design comes from one of them. Inside an existing restaurant, interior work that does not affect, and is not likely to affect, the structure, a fire safety system or fire separation, a main entrance or public corridor, an exit or an exterior wall, and adds no floor space such as a mezzanine, can be drawn without an architect, as in any building, though the Building Code may still call for an architect's and an engineer's general review (site reviews) in an assembly building.

An engineer, or a designer registered in that class. Structural design is its own class under the Building Code, and heating, cooling and ventilation for a shop or office falls under Building Services, because it follows Part 6 of the Code even in a small building. Ontario's public registry (QuARTS) lists the firm's classes as House, Small Buildings, Large Buildings and HVAC-House, and HVAC-House covers houses only, so those drawings come from the engineer or designer who signs them, coordinated with ours.

It depends on the kind of work. The by-law lists no exemption for a new stand-alone commercial building. An addition to a commercial building under 600 m² outside the front yard can be exempt, and so can an interior conversion of up to 1,000 m² to a use the zoning already permits, if neither includes one of the uses the by-law excludes. Even then, approval is required where the Official Plan calls for a right-of-way widening (of the street or lane). The City can also require it where the Chief Building Official, with the Executive Director of Development Review, finds the work may benefit from review of its effects on adjoining lands, health, safety, accessibility or access to its entrances (unless a final minor variance or consent condition already secures it), or where it lies within 300 m of a railway line (not one used only by urban rail transit) or 120 m of a wetland, the Great Lakes shoreline, an inland lake or a river or stream valley.

The Zoning Use Review ($214.79 in 2026) answers one question, whether a use is permitted at the address, without drawings, and does not look at parking, loading, the building or the conditions attached to the use; drive-throughs, patios and uses not on its form go straight to the ZAP. The Zoning Applicable Law Certificate (ZAP) reviews the actual drawings against the zoning and other applicable law, with up to three reviews, and a permit application is not complete without it. Its fee ($888.14 up to 300 m², $1,863.82 above) is credited against the permit fee when the certificate is filed with the application within a year of being issued.

Toronto Building's targets, for a complete application with an issued ZAP: 15 business days for a building within Part 9 of the Code (up to 3 storeys and 600 m² on its largest floor), 20 for a larger building under Part 3 (30 for a complex one). Interior alterations of up to 600 m² to offices, shops and restaurants with fewer than 30 seats, with no change of use or patron (customer) area, no active permit for the building's shell and no heritage approval needed, can go through Express Services, where the City says an examiner reviews an application sent with all the required documents within 3 days. These are the City's times, not ours.

Our drawings carry BCIN 25897 – 41741 with the designer's name, signature and statement of responsibility, as Toronto Building requires. Where the law calls for an architect or engineer, they design and seal their part and sign the Commitment to General Reviews, and the Building Code lets only an architect carry out the general review of work built to an architect's design, and only an engineer of work built to an engineer's design.