There is a building in Toronto that weaves a complicated tale. A lot of ins, a lot of outs, and a lot of what-have-yous.

The building has many stories, one about life-saving medicine, another about an unsolved murder and countless others, including one about a room full of eyeballs. It’s also a story about Toronto and its transformation over the past 138 years.

Now, the gothic revival building at 1 Spadina Cres. sits empty save for dirt, asbestos and gobs of stucco. The nearby area at Spadina Ave. and College St. is tired and run down.

But on Tuesday, the University of Toronto will unveil its designs on the historic site that began as a theological school in 1875.

“It’s finally time to give this part of the campus, and the city, the beauty it deserves,” said Richard Sommer, dean of the school’s John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design, which will move into the new building when it is completed in about three years.

The exact plans for the building are under lock-and-key until Tuesday.

But on Thursday, professor Lisa Steele unlocked an old door to give the Star a tour and a lesson in history. Inside, old arches have been covered up to make way for several additions that have been built over the years.

Steele is upbeat, proudly discussing the architecture and the past 15 years she spent there as a visual studies professor, rhyming off facts and the building’s current state of affairs.

“Did you see the gargoyles outside?” she asks. “We’re missing a few. I don’t know what happened to them.”

She points at rooms and down a hall, explaining that the original building didn’t have bathrooms.

“This hallway used to be a path to the latrines,” Steele says.

She opens a 10-cm wooden vaultlike door on the second floor.

“Yup, this is where they kept the eyeballs,” she says. “Because the eye bank of Canada was here.”

Every room has many stories. During the Second World War, the building became the Spadina Military Hospital for returning veterans. Amelia Earhart once treated wounded soldiers here.

Former Maple Leafs owner Conn Smythe once floated the idea of demolishing the building for a hockey arena.

In 1943, Connaught Laboratories bought the building where it produced insulin and penicillin, which revolutionized medicine and saved countless lives.

And in 1972, the university bought the building, which has been home to many medical science fields before the visual arts program moved in.

On the third floor, in a grand room under the 115-ft. tower, is a view straight down Spadina Ave. “This is the best view in the city,” Steele says with Lake Ontario in the distance.

Then talk turns to ghost stories. A 29-year-old woman died in 2009 while hunting for ghosts, jumping from one part of the building to another when she fell three storeys.

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“This place isn’t haunted,” she says, laughing at a question that many ask. “I’ve never heard voices.”

Then she goes quiet when asked about David Buller. He was an arts professor who was stabbed seven times in his office on the second floor on the afternoon of Jan. 18, 2001. His murder remains unsolved.

Steele was close friends with him. The room where he was killed was torn down and turned into a studio for students. Now the room is locked as workers remove asbestos in preparation for the upcoming renovation.

“We have a vigil for him every year on Jan. 18,” she says in a quiet voice. “I will never forget him, but there are also so many good stories from this building.”