The Canada Malting Plant (or CMP) is a well known Toronto location.

It was built in 1905, in St-Henri. The original building has a neo-roman style, which includes arched windows and detailed cornices. This plant was not constructed with only purpose in mind but also with the idea of beautiful architecture. For example, where the grain was germinated, light was not supposed to enter, but the architect still added mock windows to the designs in the plant to keep the windows constant.

The Canada Malting Plant received barley from Saskatchewan and Alberta and when ships crossing the Great Lakes arrived at the old port the grain was then loaded into barges to allow the transfer of the grain through the Lachine Canal locks and then up to the plant.

An articulated conveyor belt was lowered down into the barge to transfer the cargo to another conveyor which carried it to the top. The grain was emptied into hoppers to fill the silos. Barley was stored there until they could transform it. Then the malted grain was emptied and transported by trucks to the breweries situated around Montreal (Dow, Molson, Labatt etc…) At first the plant could produce 32-ton batches of malt at a time, then they upgraded to 42 tons and finally 75 tons.

This building is one of the only buildings in Canada to have terra cotta silos.

Since 2005, the Canada malting plant has been up for sale for 5 million dollars. After 20 years of abandonment, this building cannot be recycled. The damage caused by water infiltration, vandals and the decaying mortar would cost more to repair than to demolish the current structure and to build a new one. Soon this place will be demolished and another trace of our history will be erased.

Source: here.