What were they thinking??

I'm not a snob.

To be called "a purist"can sting.

But maybe, when I am tempted onto the topic of older homes and renovations, I can be a bit picky.

On the scale of problems facing us and our world, this is a small issue. I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings.

Buuutt...

It makes me sad and frustrated when I see unsympathetic renovations made to older homes. Oh, sure, we all understand eclectic, that clever juxtaposition of elements that can make for an interesting interior. But I would argue that harmony and fidelity to style on the public faces of our older homes create more beauty.

I have been watching the house on the left for some time. A lovely man has been pouring time, skill and soul into a porch for the home, using found elements. But, well, it doesn't work with his Victorian era house. I would suggest that both the house and the addition lose personality in this awkward marriage.

At the right is a rubble stone house I've loved for years. It was built in 1863. It has barn-red shutters, a hip roof and that upright and dour Georgian facade. Recently it was treated to a showy bevelled glass confection in place of its former plain panelled door. A beautiful door, but it works like love beads and a miniskirt on an octogenarian.

Sorry folks. Just had to say it.

the case for Heritage Conservation Districts

It's not in my nature to criticize, but I'm just sayin'...

I've been watching this house.

The last owner maintained a medical office in his/her home - lots of attractive improvements were made to porch, paint, and planting.

Then it was for sale - checked all my pockets but no luck....

Soon it became apparent that there was a new owner.

The first sign of change was the disappearance of a single-storey wing to the east side.

Good work, I thought. It was never in keeping with the house. Then I noticed that the east brick wall, exposed by the demolition of the addition, had been covered - cedar shakes in the gable end! beige vinyl siding! Ugly quick fixes covering the interesting blind window openings and former doorways telling the building's story. The house is not designated; it is unprotected from unlovely changes.

Then I learned that the owner was attempting to sell the lot created by this extra space, for infill housing. The request for severance was initially refused, but subsequently approved by Ontario Municipal Board. There was insufficient protection for the heritage home (not listed or designated) or the character of the neighbourhood (not a Heritage Conservation District).

So now the property is for sale, and construction fencing has appeared.

The lovely big trees are looking apprehensive.

Let's hope whoever buys this choice lot has good taste...

Watch this space.

...'a very very very fine house'

"And you think you know someone..." I can still hear my mother saying this, in an incredulous response to learning something previously secret about a public figure (or a relative), usually something unsavoury.

This is the family home near Bongard's Corners, on Lot 50, Concession Bayside, Prince Edward County. I grew up in this house. And I thought I knew it.

Incidentally I don't call the place "the county" anymore. Prince Edward County was referred to in that way in the days when people's horizons were very narrow, many folk living and dying never having left their home township. It was "the county", because there was no other. Nowadays when I hear the words "the County" I figure somebody (usually someone with big city marketing savvy) is trying to sell me something. Sound curmudgeonly? Maybe, but I've lived long enough to wear the label proudly.

But the house I thought I knew? It's a white frame, 'double' house, built to accommodate two families. When I was very young, we lived in the one and a half storey east side of the house. I vaguely remember a cot occupying a tiny under-stairs room off the main floor bedroom - was it mine or my baby brother's? A large room on both levels, common to east and west sides of the house, connected the two structures. As I study it today, it's so obvious that this room was actually the space to the left of the centre hall in the original house - the windows tell the story. When the structures became conjoined, the door was put through. Elegant and practical.

The east side of the house possessed some fine architectural detail, both inside and out. I remember the centre hall, the stairs with their unique shallow rise, deep baseboards, tall narrow windows with heavy moulded trim and a fine doorcase, Gothic gable window with quatrefoil trim. Cruikshank mentions the wide Marysburgh gable. The front-gabled west side was taller and plainer. I recall its lovely front staircase, a large window with transom (replaced later), pressed tin ceilings, the summer kitchen with the wood stove for canning, and the precipitous back stairs, which were removed by subsequent owners of the 5 generation farm.

As I research heritage buildings, and the generations who lived in them, I am standing back and looking with different eyes, at places I knew intimately. As we step back, our perspective widens. Our resources grow. The lovely Krista at PEC Archives showed me the family name at Lot 50 on an original 1863 Tremaine's map, but no building. In Belden's 1878 atlas (which I'd browsed dozens of times before, but not with a hungry researcher's eye), we saw a structure on the lot. We looked through the land registry and assessment records. We saw the land value increase significantly in 1860. So a safe hypothesis was that the 'east' side of the house dates from 1863-1878, but most likely 1860/63.

Just recently, skimming through a family memoir written by our mother and published by my brother years ago, I spotted something I'd overlooked all my life. Our grandparents Viola and Clarence were married on December 23, 1916 and moved into "the west side of the house built several years earlier." Next time I'm at the archives, I'll take another look at those assessment books; we can likely confirm that date.

So, that explains it. To anyone with a knowledge of architectural history, the double house is clearly of two different styles, of two different dates. But it's my house. I only lived there for 18 years, cradle to college. I didn't notice, until this week.

Bottom: home

Left: cousin Terry and me, and my trim little mom, in front of the "east side". We lost the wonderful Terry, 5 short years ago this week.

Right: me celebrating the arrival of 'the television set', oblivious to the fine windows and deep baseboards behind me.

show 'em the bright lights

Our stay-at-home dad ruefully acknowledged the need to treat our more extrovert and adventuresome mother to the occasional junket off the home turf thus: "gotta show 'em the bright lights sometimes".

Yesterday, the staff of Glanmore National Historic Site really showed their volunteers the bright lights (many of them lit by gas to this day!) The occasion was the annual (for me, the first annual) volunteer-training field trip. Carefree as kids on a trip to the zoo, we were shepherded by comfy bus to Toronto and dropped at the imposing front door (this one outfitted with a porte-cochere yet) of Spadina Museum, the home of three generations of the socially and financially well-positioned Austin family from 1866 to 1982. Ironically, the home and gardens are one of the many historic museum properties under threat of closure during Toronto's current budget deliberations/war on culture.

The place was stunning, the degree of curatorial research, creativity and resourcefulness for a recent re-restoration of the interior to the 1920's era, awe-inspiring. It will take many more blogposts to process yesterday's experience, and many more visits to fully appreciate this treasure. Best act fast.

With a nod to my father, a few notes about the lights at Spadina.

James Austin was president of Consumers Gas Company so it was not surprising that the house was outfitted with sumptuous gasoliers, many still in operation, at the front doors, in the drawing room. Our guide pointed out that as soon as James died, madam had the gaslight replaced by electricity in the dining room.

The process of researching and re-restoration was mind-boggling. Our guide explained the steps in rehabilitating a delicate painted silk lamp shade, the unique balloon shade near the nineteenth century Steinway (which one of our group actually played!), the story of the broken globes on the Tiffany lamp in the Palm Room. Such small details in a site of overwhelming complexity, the work destined to be overlooked by all but the most attentive and informed.

Suggest you add this to your to-do list: Join Friends of Glanmore.

Fancy meeting you here!

During our three weeks of August camping along the north shore of that most Superior of lakes, we had one day of drenching rain. Too wet to hike. Too wet to go to the beach. Too wet to kayak (really?). So we went to town. Thunder Bay was thundery and very rainy. For the morning, we settled into the most civilized Seattle Coffee House, fired up the computer, had lots of coffee and a great panini lunch, and sat out the worst of the rain. While LOML did business email, I browsed a number of great architectural walking tour guides. Sure the weather wasn't ideal, the misty foggy air not the least bit conducive to memorable photos, but as the waterstained, crinkly parchment feeling house tour brochures have just been reminding me, it was a grand adventure.

The first spot we visited was Vickers Park....such a large area of deep green conifers and bright Victorian flower beds catches the eye, when the neighbourhood itself is a bit down at the heels. I risked my life to run across a street of aggressive drivers, only to come upon a plaque that explains that the park which caught my attention had Belleville roots!

Vickers Park at the corner of Selkirk and Arthur Streets was created on property donated to the city in 1902 by Catherine Mary Vickers. Catherine was the daughter of author Susanna Moodie, who had escaped from a settler's life in "the bush" near Peterborough to the relative ease and sophistication of Belleville and lived to tell about it in Life in the Clearings, 1853. Daughter Catherine and husband John Joseph Vickers were some of the first settlers in the Fort William area in the late c.19, and became prominent citizens of their town, too.

(I just checked my photo files for an image of Susanna and Dunbar's house in Belleville, but I am remiss. Not a one.)

Home and Garden

A photograph just flashed up on my screen-saver slide show...a lovely board and batten driveshed I snapped with my friend and neighbour Elaine, when we were prowling the back roads of Tamworth. Encouraged by a lovely email from a blog visitor, I share this photo and one or two others.

These images have in common the friendly marriage of soft old brick, sunbleached wood or warm stone with tangled kitchen gardens and abundant beds of homespun natives like coneflowers and black-eyed susans. These spots stop me in my tracks every time. Thanks gardeners, I know it hasn't been easy.

top: 2 lovely places near Tamworth

bottom: McFarland House, Niagara Parkway

Time for Tea?

Doors Open Belleville today. What a great celebration of local heritage, and such a great opportunity to visit places seldom seen. On what other afternoon could I stand in the original attic of Belleville's 1872 Gothic Revival red brick City Hall, lean on the rough wood railing and float out into the building's massive wooden skeleton, revealed by an inspired renovation in 1988, then upward through the open space, through the sky-light to the top of the original clock tower? We should be proud of our city - somehow somebody discovered the idea of reworking the building's interior space, added another 10,000 square feet of working space - INSTEAD of tearing down a heritage structure to build a roomy box for city business!

And that was just my 'break' from my Heritage Belleville duties in the building, engaging and networking with many visitors sharing my experience!

Later that afternoon, we got to wander the lawns of the exquisite Montrose Inn, a 1918 Colonial Revival mansion associated with one of the city's leading citizens in its day. It's now a luxury bed and breakfast, tea room, and the site of many memorable weddings. Innkeepers Wayne and Dianne Campbell opened their house for hundreds of visitors - us among them. Dianne was gracious as a queen as she toured us, and tempted us with a return. I look forward to high tea in the quarter-sawn oak panelled dining room - soon.

We ended a busy day in a peaceful spot, the Belleville Cemetery. Took some photos of evocative old monuments, and was pleased to find the resting place of many of the folk associated with our city's stately homes (including the builder of Montrose), and with our area's history, such as Susanna Moodie and her sheriff husband Dunbar (Susanna Moodie wrote Life in the Clearings here, after she exorcized the trauma of her years as a Peterborough area homesteader by writing Roughing it in the Bush). A former Prime Minister, Sir Mackenzie Bowell, much ignored in this his home town, rests under the shagbark hickories of the lovely site by the bay. Developed in 1872, one of the picturesque garden cemeteries which began with Paris' Pere Lachaise in early c19, the Belleville Cemetery is a wonder, and a place of repose for living and dead alike. Jennifer McKendry has a wonderful book on Cataraqui Cemetary, one of the best of the Victorian rural memorial parks - Weep Not For Me, 2000). A lovely place to spend an afternoon, or eternity.