Victorian Homes In Toronto - What Is Unique About Them?

Many people consider Victorian as a style, but this is not exactly right To best describe 'Victorian' Construction, we would be looking at the time period of 1835 and 1900 and the multitude of designs in that time frame. Many properties combine the features of several different styles and are not easily discernible as one particular style or another, but there are some common elements to look for. Motifs from Classical and Gothic appearance are used on buildings made of brick. stone and timber are the most common details to look for.

To see great examples of Victorian buildings in Ontario, then look no further than the homes; this is where the architecture is in abundance. Whether it was a vast farm in the country, a tiny worker's cottage or a town house in a growing urban centre like Toronto, the residences could flaunt good solid craftsmanship and decorative touches. When builders thought about the design of houses, they looked to patterns, frills and swirls to create that Victorian style. These accessories were not necessarily enjoyed by everyone, with some Europeans feeling that the designs were over the top and too complex. With such a mixture of designs and styles these properties could have looked out of place and garish, though surprisingly the end result actually worked.

The Cabbagetown Victorian Homes are born

Unlike in today’s subdivisions where many houses are built by the same builder in not-too-subtle variations on the same idea, the builders of what was Toronto’s first suburb were a very varied and imaginative bunch. These developers began looking north of Queen Street for building plots in the 1830’s, and found that the land north of Queen and west of Parliament had been logged and cleared for farming. Called park lots, these empty pieces of land became the homes of important York (now called Toronto) officials.

The first pieces of Toronto Victorian architecture were farm houses and a number of cottages. Sherbourne Street saw the initial building lots sold in 1845, a grid system of streets was developed by John Howard who was the city surveyor at that time. The narrow pieces of land of only 15 to 20 foot in width, made the most reasonable house the terraced (row or attached homes). But a more extravagant early Victorian specimen is Allandale, the property at 241 Sherbourne Street. The house flaunts a large rustic porch, with an ornate trim and two-toned decorative brick work; the owner being Enoch Turner, the brewer, who had it built in the late 1840's. Away from Sherbourne street there is another fine example of early Victorian design, this time at 424 Ontario Street - the property displaying an ornate gingerbread trim on the peaks and porches.