Building Styles

Winchester

Along the beautiful country roads between Ottawa and Kingston you will find many farmhouses like this. The exterior finish is rusticated stone. The shuttered windows are either semi-circular or segmental arches. The roof is not intricate, but has gables decorated with vergeboarding (gingerbread). Along the front of the house is an extended veranda, a necessity before central air conditioning and computers when people would spend their evenings together on the front veranda watching the sun go down. While this building style is being copied rather frequently, for obvious reasons, you can tell it is the original model because of the chimney by the front parlour and another by the kitchen.

Barrie

Red or orange brick are certainly standard in Victorian buildings. This L-shaped house is very much in the style of the Ontario Farmhouse. Most farmhouses had a veranda of sorts, but this one shows no sign of one.

The dichromatic brickwork adds a Gothic flavor, as does the vergeboarding. The lozenge pattern in the high gable was a common decoration. The windows have eyebrow lintels with coloured keystones that seem more Italianate than Gothic.

Like many Victorian buildings, this is a very pleasant mixture of styles.

Paris

Here is another example of a Victorian Farm House. The paired cornice brackets, vergeboarding (or gingerbread) on the veranda and the front porch details make it look a little Gothic. Vergeboarding on Gothic Revival buildings has finials, pendulums, and other translations of Gothic stone detailing and tracery. On Victorian buildings, vergeboarding is ornate but doesn't always have the same historical precedent. The free flowing design on the veranda trim looks more like tasselled drapery than carved stone. This is a large house in the countryside, built before central air conditioning; the large veranda would have been used regularly to cope with the summer heat.

Port Dalhousie

Victorian homes come in various shapes and sizes. This house, built in the 1850s, is painted with Henely Blue with white trim, (after Henely England, the sight of a very famous boat race). The house is situated just yards from the Royal Canadian Henley Ragatta Course.

The front door is new, but the door surround has brackets, a cornice and a stained glass window. The bay window has an ornate cornice and small window cornices. The gable end is decorated with a geo-metric vergeboard patternwith alternating circles and diamonds terminating at all corners with a five-point star. Again, there is no historic precedent; the vergeboard is not representing crockets or finials as they might be in a Gothic Revival building.

Millgrove

The original windows of this residence have been replaced by picture windows in modern glass which destroy any period charm it might have had, but the decorative woodwork on the gables has been maintained in all its splendor.

On the right is a sunburst pattern and on the left is a starburst. The gable designs in many Victorian homes are really folk art. Each builder would have his own favorite designs, and these would be varied from project to project according to the client's requirements. The sunburst pattern is a popular pattern in the London area, particularly on the Queen Anne style cottages such as the following image, but it is rarely this large or this open. This treatment is found in smaller form in the Guelph, Hamilton area.

Markham

Markham is an extra-ordinary town just north of Toronto where several enlightened individuals have taken the time to preserve a large section of the downtown core. This fabulous example of Ontario decorative woodwork can be enjoyed from the well kept terrace where drinks are served daily. The interior has been preserved with similar care and is now a fine dining room. It is well worth the trip from the 401 into Markham to see this monument to Victorian painted wood.

Markham

London

Any modest house that had some detailing and could be called picturesque was considered a cottage in the 19th century. These two gable details illustrate how the triangular shape on cottages offered the most challenge and the most opportunity of expression to the Victorian fretworker or wood detailer. Because the gable finishes sometimes resemble medieval decoration, these are often referred to as Queen Anne Cottages.

The upper example has an elliptical lunette over paired windows with an elaborate cornice held in place with brackets. The gable is finished in fish scale shingles, and has a circle pattern trim with large side brackets.

The second image is a darker colour scheme, but many of the elements are the same. The actual fascia board design is the same on both gables suggesting that it was the same builder. This example has a sunburst pattern on the small door gable that is much different than the Millgrove example.

Cobourg

Individual housing took a variety of forms in the 19th century, but row housing or terraced housing was also popular.

In Cobourg is an example of red brick units with white trim. Each unit has a different porch design, but similar gable decoration and bay windows. The vergeboarding in the gable has a central king post and a floral pattern. The bay window has a large, but not ornate, cornice. The windows have flat arches and wooden sills.

Guelph

Guelph has a similar set of row houses with a more Gothic flavour. Each unit has a frontispiece with a large bay window. The corners of the frontispiece have dichromatic quoins. The frontispiece itself has a gable with vergeboarding, a small gable window and a finial. The front door and the two remaining front windows all have elaborate surrounds with agraffes. Above the front doors are large, single pane transoms. Each unit originally had at least one fireplace as can be seen by the chimney.

Westover

Westover is about 25 miles northwest of Hamilton, on top of the escarpment. The town was started as a resting place for those travelling between Kitchener - then called Berlin - and Hamilton; it was the half way point. The owners of the Westover General store have painstakingly returned the store to its original shape and colour scheme.

The building is a simple gable end plan with vergeboarding of the pierced solid variety: sturdy and practical but decorative. The large front veranda has two large, fixed windows on the street side with multiple panes of glass. The store front faces south, so it would have been heated by the sun on winter days.

Port Dalhousie

This doorway is from the Port Mansion of 1857, and it's what most people think of when they hear the term Victorian.

The glass is ornate with loads of stained glass and muntin bars. The doors are also ornate with multiple panels, molding, and large brass door knobs.