Building Styles

London

With the exception of the windows, doors and some half timber work, this house is made entirely of stone, from the rubble stone walls and chimney to the beautiful cut stone shingles on the steep gabled roof. It resembles a medieval postcard perfect country cottage.

The dormers are modest and made in an almost authentic half-timber method. The oriel window is multi-paned and sports a copper hood. The larger windows on the first floor are multi-paned as well.

London

Like many Tudor Revival homes, it is best seen in the winter because it is completely surrounded by mature trees and bushes.

The windows are all casement windows. Sash windows replaced casements in England starting around 1670, with the influx of the Neo-classical style. Sash windows became the required window of the Georgian period. Casement windows were revived in the first half of the 18th century when the medieval period became, once again, popular.

London

The facade of the house is composed of half timbering - large wooden members filled in with white stucco. Traditionally, the white stucco would cover a mixture of horse hair, horse and cow manure, and soil. This was medieval insulation.

The details on this house are where the real magic lies. Under the sill, acting as a bracket, is a medieval antic figure: commingled animal, human and floral parts used to terminate moldings and decorate brackets and corbels.

Erindale

Lislehurst was built by the Schreiber family in the 1880s. It was bought by the University of Toronto in 1964, and is now the residence of the president of Erindale College. It is a very early example of Tudor Revival.

The gable has a loop hole opening, used in medieval times for shooting at approaching enemies, but now, probably, used only for admitting light. The multiple chimneys show the age of the building plus the wealth of the original owners who would have heated the house with wood. The door is a Tudor arch, and the door surround has a drip mold and label stops. The windows have strong sills and the leaded glass has been maintained.

Hamilton

This house is largely stone on the front with half timbering on the sides. The front gable has a walk out onto a castellated balcony. The doors on the upper level have a hood mold.

The bay has two sets of casement leaded windows. The casings for the windows are splayed in the medieval manner.

The lower set of windows has a fixed upper window which contains a heraldic crest.

Hamilton

The upper windows on this bay are fixed. They have leaded glass. Within the glass is a heraldic crest.

The lower windows are casement windows. They are also leaded. The casing for the windows is stone.

Hamilton

Along the sides of the house are half timbered jetties. A jettie is something that hangs out over or is cantileveredover the lower story. In this case the jetty is held in place by a breast summer. This is a massive beam that acts like a lintel, but, as seen here, supports the whole superstructure of the building.

The upper floor is half-timbered, a typical Tudor treatment. Large wooden members are filled with insulation then finished in orough cast stucco.

Hamilton

The breast summer extends the full length of the upper story. Vertical wooden members are attached to it, then the sill for the window and the window ledge are built. Vertical members are often braced by diagonals.

Simcoe

The stone on this building is slightly more rustic than in the examples above.

The front gable is a "shaped gable", a gable composed of convex and concave gables, with steps between them and a semi-circular top. The voussoirs are pronounced, and there is a large keystone in each flat arch. The windows without flat arches have heavy stone lintels. All the windows have heavy stone sills.

The building is constructed almost exclusively of stone with stone bands along the sills of the first and second floors. There is a pronounced cantilevered overhang over the front door.

Ottawa

This house represents the most popular of the Period Revivals, the Tudor Revival. The attention to detail in this charming house provides an authentic recapturing of medieval methods using modern materials.

This house has half-timbered elements, a gabled roof, a jerkin-head roof on the dormer, plain vergeboarding, and leaded multi-paned glass. The doorway is a Tudor arch with a hoodmold, a carved reveal, and decorative molding. Twisted chimney pots complete the picturesque quality of this charming house.

Ottawa

A completely different and much later Period Revival, this house is like a small castle with corner towers, machicolation, scalloping, and simple window surrounds. This fanciful house is reminiscent of the early medieval age when thick walls and fortification were necessary. The towers would have been advantageous for repelling advancing enemies.

The fortress-like floorplan is offset by a fairly Classical portico that has clustered Ionic columns, dentils, and an architrave. The portico provides the base for a second storey balcony with a wrought iron railing. The mixture of Gothic and Classical elements first started during the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras, thus, this type of mixture is sometimes called Jacobethan.

Waterloo

Elaborate gables are usually found in Northern European buildings -Flemish or German. The gables have loops or loopholes found in medieval architecture as a place for launching arrows. Under the gables are paired windows with triangular arches, dripmolds, and roundels. The lower floor has rectangular windows with large window cornices. On the roof is a dormer with a roundel containing a trefoil.

The front entrance has a two-centered pointed arch with dripmolds and label stops. The door itself is new; sadly no attempt has been made to make it contextual.

Waterloo

This is one of thousands of reproductions of an English vernacular cottage. There are many variations on the steeply pitched cross-gabled roof, either in single, or in double version as in this example.

Apart from the gables, the most notable feature is the solid wood round-headed door and heavy stone door surround. The voussoirs are carefully placed giving the impression of hand-crafted work.

The building is of dark brick with heavy concrete window sills. The garden on this home looks as much like an English post card as the house does.

Simcoe

Like the image above, this, somewhat larger, house has a sweeping bell-cast roof with offset roof overhangs. A jetty - a projecting timber-framed room overhanging a wall - held in place by beams gives it a medieval touch. The cedar shingle roof has a dormer with a half-hip roof.

Under the lower roof overhang is a round-headed window with a keystone and stones at the spring.

Port Credit

In 1943, Anthony Adamson, one of Canada's most noteworthy architectural historians and restoration architects, took possession of this house built in 1920. The Flemish influence is immediately obvious in the ornamented, shaped gables and the U-shaped floor plan. The window treatment is minimal; on the upper floor are slightly recessed semi-circular arches. On the lower floor there is only a minimal sill.

The estate has a splendid location on Lake Ontario. It is open to the public as a park and is used by the Royal Conservatory of Music.

Sault Ste. Marie

Here is a somewhat newer version of the Tudor Revival with stone base and pseudo half-timbering. The gables have vergeboarding; the central ornament is called a pendulum.

There are ornate gold crests along the front façade by the entrance and under one window. The entrance is recessed and protected, better suited for the northern climates where this style originated. The windows are new, but they maintain the size that would be appropriate for this style.

Aldershot

This revival has the most spectacular river stone chimney in the province. The shingle roof and leaded glass window add to the old world appeal, but it is really the setting that makes this house so special.

This is such a good revival that it is difficult to say what year it was built. It could be 1890s or 1930s. The garage fits in so well that the house could have been built in 1975.

Oakville

This is an early example of a public building constructed in the Tudor Revival period with brick and stone. This may be called Jacobethan because of the mixture of styles.

There is a very small gable with a decorative loophole on the central portion of the building. Under this is a small band. The large frontispiece is supported by buttresses; there is a buttress supporting the back entrance.

The doors and windows have Classical surrounds, in the Georgian manner, but the arch on the door is a Tudor arch.

Ancaster

Here is a beautiful example of a Jacobean Revival house that, when built, was perfect in every detail. This has real, not pseudo, half-timbering, with an outward-curving ceiling entrance and hand- carved brackets. The interior of the house was equally authentic with solid oak wall panels and hand carved newel posts. The room layout and the construction processes, while allowing for central heating and plumbing, were done according to medieval building methods.

Hamilton

This is an example of a very splendid 'revival' that is clearly different than those above. The spaces between the half timbers are bricked. There is carved detailing around the windows. There is more detail on the vergeboard. The lower floor has many more windows than those above. This is an example of Elizabethan Revival. The effect is more opulent and a little more ornate that the Tudor Revival.

Simcoe

Here is a beautifully designed Tudor Revival house that has been well maintained and cared for. The half-timbering is authentic looking, and the owners have been careful to keep the original window glass with small muntin bars. The frontispiece has a winged gable and the entrance is framed by a Tudor arch.

The house was occupied by the original owner, Mr. Pond, until he was well into his 90s, then it was taken over by a family that has a similar respect for good architecture.

Kitchener

This Period Revival reflects traditional rural traditions, like those above, but this reflects a more French flair. From the bell-cast roof and dormers to the long, front, covered porch this is reminiscent of the French Regime period of the Eastern Provinces, and the rural architecture of Normandy and Brittany.

The dormers show pseudo half timbered detail. The front door and windows are pointed three point arches from the late Gothic period. The windows in the door are multi-paned.

The manor house has a series of chimneys for fireplaces in many rooms. This is a beautifully maintained old building.