Reno, Restoration...or Rationalization
BY NICK RUSSELL: A REPLY TO 'RESTORATION VERSUS REHABILITATION':
I confess: when we bought our little house in James Bay in 1998, it was covered in asbestos shingles, and we took them off. And several graceful sash-windows had been modernized with aluminum picture windows, so we replaced them. Did we hesitate? Not for a nanosecond! Our neighbours were delighted, and we were proud to receive two heritage awards. But perhaps we were wrong: unquestionably, the asbestos shingles – added in the 1940s for insulation and easy maintenance – reflected the values of the time, and were part of the building’s history. And those aluminum windows, too, demonstrated the tastes of the 1970s. Although the paint shadows on the original 1891 siding gave us the details of the dining-room window (see photo), and the measurements exactly matched the double-hung sashes on the existing front bay – nonetheless, the new window is a replica.
Yet clearly every older building should not be frozen ‘as found’ to preserve the integrity of its history. Would anybody want to keep plywood patches over broken windows? Rehabilitation might call for repairing them with modern glass, to prove they’ve been replaced, while Restoration suggests using 19th Century glass, to maintain the ambience of the original. Or is that ‘restoration lite’?
In a sense, we are at a disadvantage in Victoria: we don’t have the European luxury of 1,000-year-old buildings to demonstrate the continuum of human history and culture. We only have 100 year old (or at best 150 year old) buildings, and precious few of them. Most days, I do not believe we should strip the siding off the St Ann’s Schoolhouse or Helmcken House, to show the original log construction, but should changes on every other building be left intact? We can admire and respect the evolution of an ancient castle, but a Victorian cottage cannot always transcend the indignities of later ‘modernization’. If one of a row of Arts & Crafts bungalows was converted to suites in the 1940s with three plywood front doors, should those be preserved for their historical story, at the cost of the streetscape? I don’t think so: this history can be carefully recorded for posterity, but the citizens deserve the integrity of the streetscape. Neighbours have rights too!
If we give our blessing to the concept of preserving changes in older buildings for their historical record, then perhaps we will keep asbestos and stucco, leaky vinyl windows and modern carports, and we will forever forfeit the look of missing gingerbread or turned columns or iron widow’s walks. And very soon, everything will blend, and we won’t even recognize heritage style.
However, even the national Standards & Guidelines for Conservation… accept restoration of a historic place, “as it appeared at a particular period in its history.”
“Restoration includes the removal of features from other periods in its history and the reconstruction of missing features from the restoration period. Restoration must be based on clear evidence and detailed knowledge of the earlier forms and materials being recovered.”
Rehabilitation is to be preferred – say the S&G – but Restoration, with minimal intervention, has its place.
In the past, much modification of old buildings was done in the name of expedience: A tower needs paint and probably leaks, so, off with its head! Another gets HardiePlank® over its original shingles; but now the surface is bland and all the decorative elements are gone. Or a lazy roofer hacks off the rafter-tails, to simplify his job. But all these compromises diminish not just that house but the entire street, and preserving the full richness of their history is not sufficient grounds to condemn them to perpetual mediocrity.
Viollet-le-Duc is an odd duck to cite in this context, because of course he ‘restored’ the gargoyles and grotesques of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, re-making many that were so corroded as to be unrecognizable and downright dangerous. Should he have left the rotting stumps? Certainly they would tell us about centuries of Parisian pollution. But something had to be done, not just for aesthetics but to preserve the structure and protect pedestrians.
Locally, several paint companies are striving to produce palettes that reflect original colours. And some communities are encouraging replacing missing house elements, such as Vancouver’s “Porch Project.” Why not? If they are authentic and they please the eye, then surely we are all the richer?
Values-based management shouldn’t focus exclusively on individual structures but should also recognize the values of style, street and community. I apologize for being white and middle-class…but so were William and Margaret Garnham, who built our house in 1891. And I doubt they would want me to restore my asbestos.
