TORONTO – Mall landlord Oxford Properties has won a fight to prevent an unwanted tenant from moving into the former Hudson’s Bay store at Toronto’s Yorkdale Shopping Centre.
In a ruling made Monday, judge Jessica Kimmel blocked the discount department store Les Ailes de la Mode from taking over the space.
She said the proposed plan lacked “commercial soundness,” so she agreed to quash it.
RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust, which leased the three-floor space through a joint venture it had with HBC, had been pushing since last year to sell its lease for the three-floor space to Fairweather Ltd., which owns Les Ailes de la Mode.
The real estate company saw it as a chance to lessen the blow caused when the department store filed for creditor protection last March as the chain’s debts became insurmountable. HBC and RioCan held 12 leases, including the one covering the department store’s former Yorkdale space, in a joint venture that was placed in receivership in June.
Yorkdale owner Oxford opposed the plan, saying Les Ailes de la Mode was not suitable for its luxury mall.
It maintained the company is “not a financially healthy retailer” and its stores “look and feel temporary and downmarket,” which is the antithesis of the posh vibe Yorkdale projects.
“I cannot overemphasize how inappropriate and detrimental it would be to have Fairweather occupy the most prominent premises at Yorkdale for even one year, much less the next 50 years as contemplated by the proposed Fairweather transaction,” Nadia Corrado, a vice-president with Oxford, argued in a November affidavit.
“This would have the effect of compromising decades of significant investment and planning by Oxford and create a cascading negative effect for Yorkdale’s existing tenants.”
Les Ailes de la Mode is a Canadian department store born in the 1990s that now exists as a small handful of shops selling deeply discounted clothing.
It is owned by business mogul Isaac Benitah through Fairweather. He and his family members have also run home goods chains Wyrth, Bombay and Bowring as well as apparel retailer International Clothiers. In recent months, they bought the rights to the Zellers trademarks from the defunct HBC and have revived the brand.
RioCan had argued that resumé meant Fairweather had the “necessary expertise and operational and commercial arrangements in place to operate the Ailes store” at Yorkdale and was “a creditworthy counterparty.”
While the Benitahs have said little about their Les Ailes de la Mode plans, RioCan recently revealed in court filings that the retailer will also open two department stores in former HBC locations in Québec City and Montréal in the first half of 2026.
RioCan said the version of Les Ailes de la Mode that Fairweather wanted to launch in Yorkdale would be a mid- to high-end department store, carrying a mix of branded and private-label merchandise, and offering a higher-quality of goods than the Fairweather Group’s more value-oriented banners.
Merchandise sold at the store would include men’s, women’s and children’s apparel, women’s apparel, footwear, housewares and home decor, accessories and confectionary, RioCan said.
Suppliers ranging from Reebok to Chaps, Billabong and Laura Ashley had all committed to supplying Les Ailes de la Mode with merchandise, it said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 9, 2026.
