Not an ordinary funeral home

Not an ordinary funeral home

Front of the new building

Westminster Funeral and Reception Centre

Westminster Cemetery, owned by Park Lawn Limited Partnership, recently launched its new service, the Westminster Funeral and Reception Centre. The Centre serves as an on-site service where people can “now have all (their) wishes met at one location.”

In its opening event held Wednesday, Nov. 23, 2022, officers of the Centre welcomed guests and media at its brand new modern building in North York. Guests were treated to a reception that included a tour of its facilities and lunch.

The Centre features a huge reception facility which can accommodate up to 140 guests, two modern lounges, a chapel and four visitation rooms.

What makes the Centre exceptional is its home-like atmosphere and environment, where the building’s spacious interiors are all elegantly but comfortably furnished to make people feel they are at one’s residential home, and not in a funeral home.

Funeral services room

“Our new Westminster Home and Visitation Centre is an airy and light filled space with floor-to-ceiling windows” says its promotional brochure. The building, which sits in beautifully grounds, was architecturally designed such that people can view the outside environment while inside the modern structure. Paintings, original works of artists, adorn all the rooms, and huge comfortable couches and chairs further help create the ambience of or home.

Another feature the Centre takes pride in as an exceptional feature is that it is “a non-denominational facility’ that is open to all cultures and religions. You cannot find any statue and symbol of any religion whether in the exterior or interior of the building.

During the tour officiated by one of the funeral directors, Danielle de Caros, it was explained that the rooms had special facilities for recording memorial services and even streaming the entire event so relatives and friends in other countries can be part of it.

Another special feature of the Centre is that its spacious design allows the hosting of a celebration as unique as the person being honoured. Staff at the centre explained that they can assist in customizing service according to one’s wishes so as to reflect the background and interests of the person.

Guests from the Filipino Canadian community touring the facilities of the Westminster Funeral Reception Centre on Bathurst St.

Mark Vandermeersch, family counselor of Park Lawn, emphasized in a phone interview that his company and Westminster are Canadian-owned. The company has other cemeteries located in the Greater Toronto area, but the North York location is the first to have built a funeral and reception centre of its kind, where one feels not to be inside a traditional funeral home.

Asked if the same or similar centres would be built in other locations, Vandermeersch said in the next 15 years, people can see this kind of centres built to offer the same kind of service in its unique home-like setting.

Among the guests at the opening were Filipino-Canadians who had some of their loved ones buried at the Westminster Cemetery before the new Centre was built.

They were pleased to know that with the new services, they could use the facilities of the modern building with its open and welcoming ambienace, for special memorial services they may want to hold to honour their loved ones, who are now buried at the Westminster Cemetery before the brand new funeral and reception centre was built.