Photo by Empty Quarter in the blogTO Flickr pool.

St. Patrick's Day events in Toronto go down at the Smiling Buddha courtesy of June Records, at The Flying Beaver, The Guvernment, Clinton's, F-Stop, The Horseshoe, and of course many more: check our St. Patrick's Day round-up post for even more options.

Toronto Fashion Week also begins today and runs through the weekend. Those in a party mood should hit up the launch party tonight at the Thompson Hotel with DJ Fizza providing the soundtrack. For more ways to get involved in Fashion Week check out this handy guide.

And don't forget that Early Monthly Segments celebrates its 5th anniversary with a screenings of a number of short films. For more events, click on over to our events section.

TOP PICKS

• Toronto Fashion Week
• Toronto Fashion Week Launch Party
• Early Monthly Segments #61 5th Anniversary Screening
• Elvis Monday
• New Music 101: Paul Hodge At The Controls

ST. PATRICK'S DAY EVENTS

• Shamerock - St. Patrick's Day Party
• F-Stop - Electric Shamrock Official St. Patrick's Day Party
• F*^@ It, I'm Irish.
• I'm Shmacked Canada // St. Patrick's Day @ The Guvernment
• Our Third Anniversary & St. Patrick's Day - at the Flying Beaver Pubaret
• Mary Margaret O'Hara with special guests at the Horseshoe Tavern

Have an event you'd like to plug? Submit your own listing to the blogTO Toronto events calendar or contact us directly.

Photo by Bruce K in the blogTO Flickr pool

This Week in Music rounds up the latest news, releases and concerts coming to Toronto.

Optical Sounds release free compilation
Toronto label Optical Sounds celebrated the release of their second compilation this weekend with a huge eight-band show. I hope that went... smoothly (do these things ever?). You can grab the whole thing for free on their Bandcamp, meaning you get songs from Toronto, Brooklyn, Boston, and Montreal artists like B17, The Auras, Prince Ness, Chevalier Avant Garde, MIMICO, Flowers of Hell, Tess Parks, the BB Guns, Ostrich Tuning, and the Disraelis (plus way more). Haven't heard of any of that? Well, the compilation is free and so too arguably is your will.

Dine Alone Records releases a free SXSW sampler
Dine Alone hosted their first SXSW showcase last Wednesday, and Dine Alone bands playing SXSW included Tokyo Police Club, Lucius, Noah Gundersen, Solids, The Apache Relay, Clear Plastic Masks, The Howlin' Brothers, Glass Towers, DZ Deathrays, Cerebral Ballzy, and Broncho. That's tons of bands. It kinda sounds like "dyin' alone records" when you say it out loud, but the whole comp (which you can download here) sticks with high energy jams you're more likely to pre-drink before roller derby to alone.

Stream the new Kevin Drew on NPR
The whole thing.

New Toronto vids

SlowPitch - Temporary Gateway
SlowPitch is calling this #afrofuturism‬. As always with this turntable master, it's very sci-fi and has no regard for trends or PR slickness. SlowPitch, you are a breath of refreshing martian air in this town.

Ice Cream - "Fired Up"
Meg Remy of U.S. Girls directed this new Ice Cream (TO's Carlyn Bezic and Amanda Crist) video, meaning it's a good week for Toronto music. Rookie snapped on the premier, the song has killer (speaking of) U.S. Girls-goes-tropical vibes, and the whole thing just feels right. Catch Ice Cream live this Saturday.

This week's hot ticket

Marker Starling at Twin Peaks Residency / March 22 / Handlebar (159 Augusta) / PWYC
All month, the Julee Cruise Ships are doing a Twin Peaks residency at Handlebar (playing your fave tracks from David Lynch's unfinished romp in the Black Lodge) joined by five different artists all together over the month, but Saturday is the one to hit if you're a true fan of Twin Peaks' aesthetic. Marker Starling, formerly known as Mantler, is an angel of strange, sincere nightclub kitsch. See below.

See also:

• BassWeek
• Foundry: Red Bull Music Academy Night
• The Dirty Nil
• Black Marble
• The Internet - Bizzarh - Ice Cream
• Foundry: DJ Harvey

Recently Announced Concerts

• Pup and Alvvays / March 29 / Toronto Public Library Yorkville Branch
• Petra Glynt & US Girls at First Thursdays / April 3 / the AGO
• Doom Tickler / April 12 / May
• Mount Eerie / April 20 / Soybomb
• Kitty Pryde / April 25 / Rockpile West
• Lana Del Rey / May 13 / Sony Centre
• Skrillex / May 30 & 31 / Echo Beach
• Murder By Death / June 13 / Lee's Palace
• Melissa Etheridge at WorldPride 2014 / June 20 / Nathan Philips Square
• Beck / June 27 / The Sony Centre
• Goo Goo Dolls and Daughtry / July 3 / Molson Ampitheatre
• Nine Inch Nails and Soundgarden / July 27 / Molson Amphitheatre
• Peter Hook & The Light / Nov 11 / The Danforth Music Hall

What we got up to this week

• The top 5 dance music labels in Toronto right now
• TIME returns with Grimes and Death Grips at Fort York
• No fun Toronto turfs Foundry from dream venue
• The top 5 acts to catch at BassWeek
• Kyary Pamyu Pamyu makes Toronto cute for a night

Photo of (the real) Julee Cruise

The Canadian Film Festival kicks off its 8th edition this Thursday, March 20th at the Royal Cinema. This year's line-up includes six features and over a dozen short films - all, as advertised, made by Canucks. Running the full gamut of genre fare to fictional dramas to documentaries, the festival offers Torontonians a glimpse of Canada's rising stars who were passed over by TIFF and Canada's Top Ten selection committees, for whatever reason.

This year's opening night film is Craig Goodwill's feature-length extension of his own short film, Patch Town, which screened in TIFF's Short Cuts Canada program in 2011. The feature is described as a surreal vision of faux Russian folklore and a sharp satire of contemporary consumer culture. For more on the festival's line-up and schedule, or to buy tickets, visit the festival's website.

The Canadian Film Fest runs March 20th to 22nd at The Royal.

Kensington Market's set to get even more eclectic and colourful this summer: the Kensington Market BIA and Pedestrian Sundays are partnering up to start an outdoor art fair series on the last Sunday of each month from May till October. Organizers are encouraging any and all artists to apply with 2D or 3D work; this will be a curated deal, though I'd expect along with the general spirit of the market, "curated" won't have the usual cliched, gallery-esque airs of affectation.

While it's hard to imagine the sights, sounds, and smells of the unique scene that is the bustle of a car-less Sunday in the market, hopefully this news serves to remind that summer will definitely happen, and some brave people believe in the seasons changing so strongly that they're making plans for it (I'm doing the same, mainly by hoarding shorts and florescent tank tops. Don't judge). Artists and artisans have until April 7th to apply for their own 10x10 square foot space .

The Kensington Market art fair will take place May 25, June 29, July 27, August 31, September 28, and October 26 2014.

Photo by Jimmy Lu from the PS Kensington stream

This slick new spinning studio in Liberty Village is the place to go to break a sweat on two wheels. Just make sure you're the type who can handle some friendly competition.

Read my profile of Spinout Cycle in the fitness section.

Crossing the pothole-strewn intersection of Dovercourt and Geary this winter, one notices something that looks a bit out of place: streetcar tracks. They're not particularly conspicuous, but are easy enough to identify once you've spotted them and had a closer look. So what are they doing there? Prior to the construction of the subway in in 1954, Toronto had a far more extensive streetcar network than today. And Dovercourt, along with a host of others, was once one of the streets where you'd find old Peter Witt and PCC cars rumbling along.

With the rise of the automobile and, later, the arrival of the subway in Toronto (both the Yonge-University Line and Bloor-Danforth), the TTC abandoned a number of its old streetcar routes as part of a plan to ditch the fleet in its entirety by the 1980s. Routes on Bloor, Church, Yonge, Bay, Avenue Rd., Dupont, Harbord, and Mount Pleasant (to name only a few), were paved over at various points in the past.

Before the TTC went all the way through with its streetcar abandonment plans, an activist group called the Streetcars For Toronto Committee successfully campaigned the Commission to keep its fleet in the early 1970s. This bucked the trend insofar as most other North American cities did away with streetcar transit starting around the 1930s.

To get a sense of just how predominant streetcars once were in Toronto, this map of the network in 1945 (click for high resolution version) from Transit Toronto is good start. Nine years before the Yonge Line would open, the city is covered in streetcar tracks, some of which have complicated and meandering routes. It's rather remarkable to think about how vast the coverage was in the first half of the 20th century before the city was altered to accommodate the crush of car traffic.

So keep your eye out for old tracks peeking through the pavement -- there's lots of them.

Lead photo from the Toronto Archives

The best souvlaki and gyros in Toronto are no longer confined to a single stretch of Greektown. Tzatziki slathered skewers wrapped in pita and platters of shaved meat accompanied by feta topped salad and potatoes, are stars on menus at old school diners, Mediterranean restaurants and late night take-out counters that span citywide.

Here is where to find the best souvlaki and gyros in Toronto.

See also

The best late night souvlaki and gyros in Toronto
The Best Greek Restaurants in Toronto

Ornate triangular cutouts adorned hand-cut leather pieces -- and a prosthetic limb -- at VAWK's runway show on the opening night of World MasterCard Fashion Week.

As part of designer Sunny Fong's Middle East-inspired fall/winter 2014 collection, marathoner Amy Palmiero Winters walked the runway in a black sheath dress with a lightning-like triangle cutout -- and a metallic prosthetic leg intricately carved with a tile-inspired motif.

The piece was created by Fong in tandem with the Alleles, the winners of the Design Exchange's recent Emerging Designer competition, who specialize in intricate covers for leg prosthetics. Fong was a judge for the competition; after seeing their work, he invited them to make a piece for his upcoming show.

"It's actually quite part of the collection -- moreso than just, 'let's use your thing, and try to make it work,'" Fong told me in advance of the show last week. "Any other season, I don't think it would have worked."

For the duo behind the Alleles, McCauley Wanner and Ryan Palibroda, Fong's invitation to collaborate was a welcome seal of approval from the fashion world.

"Our whole angle and our whole drive behind it is, it's a fashion piece. It's not like another piece of medical equipment," Palibroda told me over the phone from Medicine Hat, Alta., where the duo is based.

They launched their business in October, selling a line of lightweight plastic covers (also known as fairings) that clip onto a wearer's existing prosthesis; while they mimic the natural form of a leg, they're carved with cutouts that resemble grids, honeycombs and fractals.

The Alleles began as Wanner's thesis project at the University of Calgary, as an exploration of functional fashion. She hit early resistance from program administrators:
"Supervisors were like, 'You're pairing something so frivolous with something so sensitive -- you're going to get laughed at,'" Wanner says.

"At the same time, the idea to give people options and choice," says Palibroda. "Now that it's out there, it's obvious. People are like 'How come no one's done this before?'"

So far, the business has been a success, partially spurred on by the relatively low pricing of the fairings, since the few other companies that make similar pieces often charge thousands of dollars. (The pieces currently available range from $350 models to a $799 version covered in dangling pearl beads.)

"It has this weird butterfly effect where it's a lot bigger of a thing than looking good. It makes people feel better about themselves, less self-conscious," Palibroda says. "We have a lot of people that are wearing shorts again, which is kind of amazing."

For the VAWK show, the Alleles and Fong collaborated over several weeks, sending images and ideas back and forth between Medicine Hat and Toronto; likes all their pieces, the Alleles manufactured the final prosthesis themselves in their studio. The duo says Fong understood their aesthetic and aims from the start.

"The way he's looking at this is so sophisticated," Wanner says. "It's kind of cool hearing him talk about our work. He was like, 'I like how your stuff -- you don't really notice it's there. It's just like the leg is kind of carved away a little bit and embellished.'"

"He really liked the subtlety of it," Palibroda adds. "It's one of the things where you could miss it if you weren't paying attention. That's kind of the point behind the whole thing. It's not for shock value. It's not to gain attention."

"And it's not to camouflage, either," Wanner says. "It's sort of, like, a piece of jewelry. An accessory."

No doubt, the Alleles' creation will net a few comparisons to the carved-wood boot prosthetics model Aimee Mullins famously wore in an Alexander McQueen show in 1998. For Fong, who's sent models of different ages and body types down the runway in previous seasons, it's less about stunt casting or shock value, and more about extending the fashion industry's narrow concept of "diversity".

"In the modelling world, diversity's always been cultural-based," says Fong, who became acclimatized to dressing women with different body types during his stint on Project Runway. "It just makes me think 'Why don't we show that more? Have our product be more relatable to the consumer, but still desirable. Still fantasy, but in part still reality."

Finding a model, Fong says, was actually tougher than actually getting the piece made. (The Alleles' usual female model, Michelle Salt, was busy competing at the Paralympics in Sochi.) But the Alleles and Fong eventually invited Palmiero Winters, an accomplished athlete and public speaker who lost her left leg below the knee in a motorcycle accident, to walk in the show.

Backstage before the show, Palmiero Winters said she was "honoured" to be involved; as the director of a foundation for kids with prosthetic limbs, she says this is the opportunity she's been waiting for to show the children she works with that they can be a part of the fashion world.

"We've seen a shift, a very large shift, over the last few years, as far as how people see prosthetics. A long time ago, it was something that wasn't put out in the open. It was very discreet. Now, it's more of bringing it to the front, the aspect of being confident in who you are," she said.

"It takes an absolute pioneer, and someone of the utmost confidence, to take those people who are different and put them out there, especially in the fashion world. I have so much respect for Sunny and McCauley and Ryan to take that first step to allow someone who is different -- visibly -- to be out there with everybody else."

Thanks to Yorkdale, celebrating 50 years of style, for sponsoring our coverage of Toronto Fashion Week.

Top photo via anyageo on Instagram. Backstage photo by by Mauricio Calero.

Photo by Calvin James in the blogTO Flickr pool.

Today in Toronto, Detroit rockers Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. and Chad Valley hit The Garrison for a much-anticipated show. Videofag in Kensington Market hosts Baltimore Based, an film exhibition of "moving image artists" currently living and working in (you guessed it) Baltimore, curated by Leslie Supnet and Clint Enns of Sight Unseen, a "nomadic" arts organization based in that city who are planning more region-specific events like this in the coming months. Also, it's day two of Toronto Fashion Week.

For more events, click on over to our events section

TOP PICKS

• Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. and Chad Valley @ The Garrison
• Regional Support Network presents Baltimore-Based
• Goethe Films Berlin On Film: Pool of Princesses
• Fashion in the Digital World 3.0

Have an event you'd like to plug? Submit your own listing to the blogTO Toronto events calendar or contact us directly.

No red cards were reported on DineSafe this week, but a few pubs were a little less green this year, inconveniently being downgraded to yellow cards in advance of St. Paddy's Day (oh, and by the way, how's the hangover?).

Here's this week's dunce crew on DineSafe.

Jerk Jerks (1356 Weston Rd)
Inspected on: March 10, 2014
Inspection finding:Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 1 (Significant: 1)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

Not Just Noodles (570 Yonge St)
Inspected on: March 11, 2014
Inspection finding:Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 6 (Minor: 3, Significant: 2, Crucial:1)
Crucial infractions include: Operator fail to maintain hazardous food(s) at 4C (40F) or colder.

Fox & Crown (646 Danforth Rd)
Inspected on: March 11, 2014
Inspection finding:Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 3 (Significant: 3)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

Whelan's Irish Pub (1663 Bloor St W)
Inspected on: March 12, 2014
Inspection finding:Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 5 (Minor: 3 Significant: 2)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

Duke of Gloucester (649A Yonge St)
Inspected on: March 13, 2014
Inspection finding:Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 5 (Minor: 1, Significant: 2, Crucial:2)
Crucial infractions include: Operator fail to ensure food is not contaminated/adulterated.Operator fail to maintain hazardous food(s) at 4C (40F) or colder.

La Prep (207 Queens Quay W)
Inspected on: March 13, 2014
Inspection finding:Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 4 (Minor: 1, Significant: 3)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

Of all the gimmicks used to promote public transit in Toronto, this one is definitely the weirdest - and the most sexist. In 1969, at the suggestion of a conference on urban transportation, a bunny girl was dispatched (by who it's not entirely clear) onto a Toronto Transit Commission bus to drum up ridership.

"Bubbles" - a waitress at the Town and Country Palace on Mutual Street - was dressed in a skimpy gold lamé costume and black net stockings, despite the February weather. She had "the sure footedness of a trapeze artist and the charm of a Bell Telephone operator," the Toronto Star gushed.

Two teenage students on the Eglinton Avenue bus clearly liked the idea: Sal Sapienza, 17, said girls like Bubbles could become, like, totally cool. "Man, it would be groovy to chat up the hostess. I mean, you can't chat up the driver, can you?"

"I ride this bus every day and, oh boy, wouldn't I like some company like this bird," said 19-year-old Henry la Fiura.

The Star reported that a man missed his stop and another asked to hold hands because he felt unwell. The intention appears to have been to find out whether public transit would benefit from airline-style hostesses - someone to guide passengers to their seats, provide information, and generally boost spirits - but how the outfit came to be that of a Playboy model is decidedly murky.

The 1,000 delegates at the First Canadian Urban Transportation Conference at the Royal York Hotel also suggested relaxing music and free rides as gimmicks to entice people out of their cars. The "bunny girl" idea seems to have been the only one tested.

The wife of an elderly passenger, 87-year-old Jim McCormack, certainly didn't approve of the look. "It'd do beside a swimming pool, but not in a bus," she said. "If we're going to have hostesses, why don't they dress like the girls on the airlines?"

The Twitter account of the Toronto Star photo archives sent out a photo from the risqué stunt earlier this week.

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

16 Bracondale Hill Road has a lot going for it: original wood floors and finishes, a modern kitchen with seemingly endless storage, big bedrooms, and a huge property. Coupled with the killer location -- a quiet, winding Wychwood street near Christie and Davenport -- this house will definitely attract a lot of attention. Did we mention that the backyard is so large it can do double duty as a summer oasis and a winter skating rink? This place isn't just good on paper -- it basically sells itself.

The house has retained all the trademarks of its early 20th century heritage, from fireplaces flanked by built-in bookcases to rich wood wainscoting and trim. The bedrooms on the second floor are all large and bright, and the third floor master retreat is a real jewel. The room is private and airy, and comes complete with an en-suite bathroom featuring glass tile and a copper soaker tub. The materials used in the renovations all complement the feel of the original house, and that's a rare achievement of late.

The kitchen and extension, designed by Doron Meinhard of Hariri Pontarini Architects, proves the adage that the kitchen is the heart of the home. It's clean and simple thanks to a wall of maple cupboards, Brazilian slate countertops, and built-in appliances including a classic 2-oven AGA gas range, and also packs an aesthetic punch with a sliding glass wall that opens onto a large stone patio. I would pay rent just to camp on the patio. The rest of the house is in fantastic shape, but it's this seamless indoor/outdoor space that really gives the house life. Radiant heat flooring can't hurt, either.

SPECS

• Address: 16 Bracondale Hill Road
• Price: $1,675,000
• Sq-Ft: approx. 3000
• Lot Size: 40 x 185.83' (lot widens at rear, on a diagonal, to 83.6')
• Bedrooms: 4 + 1
• Bathrooms: 2 + 1
• Parking: Driveway and carport
• Storeys: 3
• Taxes: $10,287.83 (2013)
• Walk Score: 92

NOTABLE FEATURES

• Mudroom and powder room incorporated into kitchen renovation
• Kitchen and patio features built-in interior and exterior speakers
• Patio stonework made of Owen Sound Ledgerock Eramosa Limestone
• Outdoor patio includes bench seating and a custom fireplace
• New double-pane thermal windows installed in 2012
• Roof shingles added and electrical and plumbing systems upgraded in 2004
• 2 fireplaces including a working fireplace in the 2nd floor sitting room/study

GOOD FOR

A growing family will love the warm feel, renovated touches, and special features in this house. The main floor, front porch and backyard are ideal for entertaining, while the bedrooms and third storey master are all cozy and comfortable retreats. There's even a sunroom/yoga studio on the second floor off of the study. The current owners say it best, noting that this house had ample space for their family "to grow up together and apart, as needed." Happy house, happy life, right?

MOVE ON IF

Move on if you don't want to find a squatter inside (me) when you get the keys. I can't find any any faults with this place -- even the basement is stylish. Do you need more bedrooms? Do you wish there was an in-ground pool? Would you prefer a covered garage to a carport? Maybe move on, then. If not, seal the deal.

MORE PHOTOS

Read other posts in this series via our House of the Week Pinterest board.

You'd think that Rob Ford segments on Jimmy Kimmel would have gotten old by now -- but, then again, you'd also think that at some point the Mayor would cease to provide so much fodder for the late night host. Neither has happened. The latest episode, of course, was Rob Ford's pre-St. Patrick's Day antics, which involved him reportedly stumbling and swearing outside city hall on Saturday night.

Arguably the best part, and the one that Kimmel capitalizes on, is the brief interview conducted by CTV's Natalie Johnson during the parade the next day. A somewhat horse-sounding Ford evades her question as to whether he was drinking the night before, which leads the host to make a plea on the Mayor's behalf. "Can't you see he's hungover? Leave the man alone!"

And then something involving a leprechaun and crack cocaine happens. Watch the vid to see how Ford is somehow the third figure in this bizarre trifecta.

One hears Toronto referred to as an urban jungle on occasion, but what would the city look like if this was a literal description? We've had a few imaginative illustrations that take to this task, most notably by Matthew Borrett and Jonas DeRo, though the scope of these scenes is necessarily limited by their medium. Enter Google Street View. A new hack by Swedish developer Einar Öberg allows one to explore the cities of the world overrun with the type of vegetation that's become the hallmark of post- apocalyptic films.

While the graphics are relatively limited, the exercise is a fun time-waster if only for the degree to which it allows one to imagine Toronto in an unfamiliar light. While the overgrowth doesn't always look bizarre on residential streets, when you explore the Financial District, for instance, things get decidedly more creepy. Ditto for the Port Lands. If you've ever scouted locations for an end of times blockbuster set in Toronto, this program is for you.

Check out a few screencaps below or explore for yourself.

Rosedale Valley Road

Polson Street

Unwin Avenue

College Park

Yonge and Dundas

Toronto might get a sprawling 9,300 square-metre indoor/outdoor water park for the winter of 2016 if developer MarbleLIVE gets its way. Although very much in the preliminary stages, the company has announced its intentions to bring the venue to the GTA (Mississauga is also a possibility) for 2016 at an estimated cost of $60 million. It looks touristy as all hell, but the developer does have a point that Toronto isn't exactly flush with these kind of attractions. Sure we have indoor pools galore, but with Ontario Place in the process of redevelopment, there is a gap to be filled.

The idea here is to build an entire complex, one that would feature restaurants, retail, and live entertainment to go along with the water park itself. Before one gets too excited, however, it's worth pointing out that a location has yet to be secured for this recreational oasis. While there are apparently three spots in the running, I won't start worrying about what I look like in a swimsuit until shovels are in the ground. In the meantime, this little promo vid might get you dreaming of warmer days.

Macaron Day in Toronto is an annual celebration of those colourful melt in your mouth meringue confections that French bakeries do so well. Taking place this Thursday, March 20th, the one-day event coincides with international celebrations in Paris and New York.

In Toronto and across the GTA there are 22 participating patisseries and Parisian cafes serving up complimentary samples with just the mention of Macaron Day. A portion of all macaron sales from the day will be donated to charities like the Red Door Family Shelter and Sick Kids.

Here's my top picks for where to get in on the fun in Toronto.

Nadege, 780 Queen Street West and 1099 Yonge Street
The regular roster of flavours will be doubled, feature flavours du jour will be blueberry vanilla, cayenne pepper and passionfruit chocolate. Beating to their own drum, Nadege is donating 50% of all macaron sales from the day to SickKids.

La Bamboche, 1712 Avenue Road
Free flavour: Nori wasabi
Pick up extras for a good cause in unique flavours like yuzu sake, orange cardamom and green tea with mango.

Bobbette & Belle, 1121 Queen Street East
Free flavour: Your pick
Choose from 11 signature French macarons in flavours like chocolate mint, passion fruit, cassis and milk chocolate caramel.

Butter Avenue, 3467 Yonge Street
Free flavour: Sea salt caramel
Macarons will be the only thing on the menu come Thursday, purchase extras from 25 flavours in support of a worthy cause.

Sweet Escape, 55 Mill Street, Building 47, Suite 102
Free flavour: Buttered popcorn
Mention Macaron Day for the free feature at this Distillery District bake shop.

Frangipane Patisserie, 215 Madison Avenue
Free flavour: Strawberries and cream
The corner patisserie at Dupont and Spadina stocks popular flavours like pistachio, salted caramel, raspberry and passionfruit.

MoRoCo Chocolat, 99 Yorkville Avenue
Free flavour: Marshmallow or cotton candy
Among the most popular macarons at this Yorkville confection shop are the sugar doughnut and salted caramel.

Yorkville Espresso Bar, 3 Yorkville Ave
Free flavours: Pick from hazelnut Nutella, vanilla bean or passion fruit
For purchase they'll also have mint chocolate, sea salt caramel and chocolate coconut.

J'adore Cakes Co., 3308 Danforth Avenue
Free flavours: Your pick
Choose from flavours like blood orange, black sesame, strawberry balsamic, peanut chocolate, yuzu, red velvet, hazelnut, green tea and chef's special.

Daniel et Daniel, 248 Carlton Street
Free flavour: Salted Earl Grey
About eight additional flavours will be available for purchase in seasonal flavours like raspberry, pistachio, lemon, chocolate, blood orange.

Patachou, 1120 Yonge Street and 835 St. Clair Avenue West
Free flavour: Your pick
Both locations are set to close in May but will be offering flavours like pistachio, salted caramel and mocha for their farewell Macaron Day.

Other bakeries and cafes of note

• Aren't We Sweet, St Lawrence Market - 95 Front St E. Lower Level
• Patisserie La Cigogne, 1626 Bayview Avenue and 1419 Danforth Avenue
• Patisserie 27, 401 Jane Street
• Ruelo Patisserie, 550 Highway 7 East and 463 McNicoll Avenue
• Petite Thuet, 1162 Yonge Street and 1 King Street West
• Ma Maison, 4243 Dundas Street West
• Rahier Patisserie, 1586 Bayview Ave.

Lead photo of Nadege

Kurtis Scott is watching you on the subway, and he mostly doesn't like what he sees. Since 2012, the cartoonist has been turning his internal monologue into short animations that skewer messy eaters, people who wear backpacks at rush hour, and inappropriate material on tablet computer screens.

"I'm on the TTC every day and it drives me nuts," he says. "I have no choice but to have these thoughts and it just occurred to me one day that I should be doing this."

When he's not fretting about bad etiquette, Scott works at Smiley Guy Studios, an animation house that produces cartoons for web and television such as Odd Job Jack and Cloud 8. His daily commute is usually from Eglinton to Bathurst stations during rush hour though sometimes if the subway is bad he takes the College streetcar instead.

There are currently 35 videos in the Subway Thoughts series, but not all of them dwell on the little horrors of the TTC. Scott applies his neuroses to mundane activities such as buying pants and people with really shiny heads.

I asked Scott whether he would prefer a perfect subway or more material for his series. "Oh, I think I wish people would smarten up and act better and be aware of things. The backpack needs to come off, that's a big thing all the time - just be aware of the people around you."

"It's like Tetris in a way. You should be playing the game, all the time."

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

Tomorrow afternoon, Outclass, a Toronto-based menswear brand launched in 2011, will make its debut at World MasterCard Fashion Week -- a huge milestone for a label that was born unexpectedly as a thesis project during founder and designer Matteo Sgaramella's final year at OCAD University.

For the first time ever, the Fall/Winter 2014 collection will parade under the penetrating eyes of potential buyers, intimidating editors, and a pit of hungry photographers ready to broadcast what's hot (and what's not) off the runway.

But, ironically enough, the local label is best known for its non-fashion approach to fashion - every garment is a timeless Canadian classic meant to surpass trends rather than follow them. Matteo calls his pieces "refined yet rugged," a completely appropriate way to describe a stock teeming with Japanese crosshatch denim and dead stock plaid.

Nevertheless, the decision to show at Fashion Week came organically after Robin Kay - the founder and former director of the 5-day spectacle - took him under her highly experienced and well-connected wing. "She's like the underground Jeanne Beker," Matteo raved as he explained to me how she put him in touch with all the right people to get Outclass on the lineup.

Though having an in is one hell of a lucky break, fashion shows hardly come without hurdles. Casting models, picking music, and coordinating lighting are just a few of the tricky battles Matteo had to learn and conquer. As for the garments, expect Outclass' reoccurring mélange of interesting textures and rich hues - and look out for their first foray into full leather and down-filled outerwear.

All in all, the hard work and plenty of firsts are sure to pay off; World MasterCard Fashion Week is bound to take this school project turned full-fledged clothing brand to the next level, as it often does.

Thanks to Yorkdale, celebrating 50 years of style, for sponsoring our coverage of Toronto Fashion Week.

Photo via the Outclass Facebook page