Thursday, July 17, 2025

Wonderful Whimsy

You never know what you'll find in London & Southwestern Ontario, especially when you're not even looking for it. It's just a matter of keeping one's eyes open ...

 
Do NOT step onto this London balcony.

The middle of nowhere.

London's best architecture.

One of many stone monkeys climbs Oxford County Courthouse. Satire on local politicians?

Where else but St. Marys would you find Ye Olde Limestone Drinking Fountain?

Next time you have a rough day, remember Mr. Shea.

These guys, Hensall.


Decorative eyebrow window or Attic Alcatraz? London.

Memorial to a War of 1812 veteran, Elgin County.*

A bandshell porch in Old North London, a lovely place on a summer day.

In Seaforth, even the garbage bins have civic pride.



Abandoned railway lines are everywhere.

Stone pineapple, London. A sign of wealth, likely because of their rarity and the difficulty of obtaining them. Also a sign of hospitality and friendship throughout the Western world.

Duh!


Ring in curb on Prospect Avenue, London, once used for hitching horses.


A sorting hat, straight from Hogwarts.

Preserved wooden grave marker, Birr Cemetery.

Folding seat in choir, St. John's, Arva.

Photos of the old days on St. Marys shop front.


Staircase to the underground Vansittart family mausoleum, Old St. Paul's, Woodstock.

Ghost sign for Green Valley Motel, Elginfield. Motel torn down years ago.

Gatepost on a wealthy family's home, Mitchell. Clustered grapes symbolize abundance, wealth and good fortune. They also represent fertility, possibly in the sense of production and growth.

Mural commemorating local veterans, Melbourne Legion Hall.

When you're investigating a rural cemetery and the neighbours come to help.

Apparently this hamlet is dangerous.

Damaged grave photo, Elgin County.

Axe marks on an old timber, Arva Flour Mill.

Another visitor at the Arva Mill, not welcome inside, waddled in a huff to Medway Creek.

These old general stores, once found everywhere, are now a rarity. If you find one, don't pass by.
Drop in and BUY SOMETHING.

Old wooden windows are becoming rare too.

Souvenir hunters still chip pieces off the Donnelly monument in Lucan.

Carving on London's Old Central Library, Queens Avenue.

@#%&* metal thieves. Monument at Burwell's Corners, Elgin County.

Gravestone in German Gothic script. No, not Kitchener area. Churchville, Elgin County.


"Dogs" guard a home in London.


Magnificent entrance porch, Thornton Avenue, London.

And you thought false fronts were only in the Wild West. Nope. Alvinston.

Nature gradually takes over the former No. 4 Bomber and Gunnery School, Fingal.

Preserved mill stone, Napier.

When carriageways led to stables in the rear. London.




Clock on the empty store at Morpeth's main intersection. Still right twice a day. 

* Update: July 21: In response to a question, this is the grave of Daniel McAfee, d. July 20, 1878, aged 87 years. A sergeant in the Flank Company, 5th Regiment, Lincoln Militia, he was born in New York State and died in St. Thomas. His grave (below) is at Seminary Cemetery, 6150 Centennial Road (at Sparta Line), Yarmouth Township, Elgin County. See here for more details. Text: "He served in the War of 1812, Fought Under Gen. Sir Isaac Brock, Queenston Heights, and was at the taking of Detroit ... "



Wednesday, July 16, 2025

London Architecture: Queen Anne

Often, when you see a fabulous Victorian mansion, you're looking at a style called "Queen Anne." Why is it called Queen Anne when Victoria was on the throne? Well, because the style incorporated some motifs that were in style during the reign of England's Queen Anne (1712-14), which were in turn based on earlier Elizabethan and Jacobean forms. Created in Britain by architect Richard N. Shaw, the Queen Anne style spread to Canada via American architectural magazines. 

Possibly a reaction against the symmetrical Georgian style fashionable before it, the typical North American Queen Anne home has an irregular outline, turrets or towers, broad gables or pediments, projecting two-storey bays, multi-sloped roofs, and tall decorated chimneys. Often there were Palladian windows in the gables and eclectic wall surfaces. Rambling verandahs connected the home with surrounding gardens.  

Below is 536 Queens Avenue, one of the city's most imposing Queen Anne mansions. It was designed by architect George F. Durand in 1881 for Charles Murray, manager of the Federal Bank of Canada. Doesn't this home just cry out "banker?" It has two towers, one round, one square, the latter now missing its finial. Most interesting is the cross-bracing of the front gable.  The two-storey verandah and entrance porch were likely added later but don't look too out of place. 

Another fabulous mansion is at 496 Waterloo, now converted into offices. I took this photo before a 2023 fire in its attic, but the building has been repaired since. This 1893 home has updated windows but still has its arched windows, lovely corner verandah, cute balcony in the attic storey on the left, and, of course, the required tower. 


Some of the city's most spectacular mansions were built along Grand Avenue in what was then a southern suburb of London. Below is "Waverley" at 10 Grand Avenue, now a retirement home. Architect George Durand built this extravaganza from a plan by Captain Hamilton Tovey. Lawyer Charles Goodhue's dream home was built in 1882-3 on 5.5 acres on what was then called Queen Street. Durand's design called for a "light and festive look"* and I recall one London historian jokingly referring to it as Queen Anne On Steroids.** The home was further enlarged by Thomas Smallman who bought "Waverley" in 1893.

Here one sees the varied roof line, massive corbelled chimneys, gables, dormers, and towers that say "Queen Anne." The name "Waverley," taken from Goodhue's father's home on Bathurst Street, is carved above the porte cochere. Stained glass abounds and attractive woodwork decorates the eaves. Unusual for a mansion turned into an institution, the building is well preserved. 

Those of us who have been inside know that it's equally spectacular there, with carved woodwork, the Smallman family crest in a window on the stair landing, and at least one marble fireplace. The residents take their meals in the former ballroom added by Smallman.


Just to the east is "Idlewyld" at 36 Grand Ave., now a luxurious inn with fine dining. Built in 1879 by tanner Charles Smith Hyman, it's not quite as palatial as its near neighbour. But it was even simpler before Hyman hired the firm of Tracy and Durand to design an addition and alterations that cost more than the original house. The picturesque roof line and ornamented gables are part of the original Queen Anne design.


But not every Queen Anne is a mansion. 101 Cheapside Street, built about 1886, is a one-and-a-half-storey house that continues the Queen Anne theme with a broad one-storey tower on its northwest corner. The gable is shingled in a fish-scale design and the siding is of tongue-and-groove planks. High corbelled chimneys are typically Queen Anne. A former verandah at front has been enclosed. 


336 Piccadilly Street was built in 1907 for Charles Somerville. Note its substantial round central tower, large wraparound porch with Ionic columns (meaning the capital is decorated with spiral scrolls), half timbering in the gables, and Palladian window in the gable. In fact, Palladian windows became more common in the Edwardian era, even as homes became simpler.



Edwardian, or late Queen Anne, homes were usually built 1900-1915, almost always of red brick. These buildings are almost always plainer, with a simplified roofline, and sometimes symmetrical. But they usually have a prominent entrance, verandah, and classical details. Below are 410, 408 and 400 Queens, a nice Edwardian streetscape designed by local architect John Moore in early 20th century. No. 400, at the far left, was built in 1909 for Arthur McClary. Note the Palladian window in the gable and modillions, or small brackets, below the eaves of the roof and verandah. 


There's also such a thing as a Queen Anne cottage. Queen Anne cottages are similar to larger Queen Anne houses except that the style was adapted to a smaller one-storey home with an attic. This 1896 cutie on Tecumseh Avenue East has an asymmetrical design, irregular roofline, ornamented gable, decorative black string coursing, semicircular bricks over the front window, and bricks surrounding the keyhole window.


*Brackets & Bargeboards: Walks in London.  ACO London, 1989, p. 173.
** John Lutman, personal communication, probably on an ACO Geranium Heritage House Tour.