Heritage Register
Burnside

1910 Store Street

Built 1892
Heritage-Registered

For: Charles Spratt

ARCHITECTURE:

This small, 1-storey, shed-roofed brick commercial building has a central arched entrance and sheet metal cornice. The slightly projecting entrance bay is enhanced by parging to imitate dressed stone with a moulded cap and a tall keystone tied to the moulding above. The arched windows on each side are tall and have rusticated stone voussoirs. Because of the steeply sloped site, the back has two levels. Some original interior features have survived including a small vault with a brick barrel-vault ceiling and an office with original reeded glass partitions.

ORIGINAL OCCUPANTS:

This elegant little structure is one of the city’s earliest surviving office buildings. It was built in 1892 for Charles Joseph Vancouver Spratt, son of Joseph Spratt who founded the Albion Iron Works. Construction cost $600 but the architect and builder are unknown.

Charles Spratt began Spratt and Gray’s Foundry, and later the Victoria Machinery Depot. He was president of the Victoria Liberal Association for many years. Spratt lived on Gorge Rd in the early 1900s but later moved to Carberry Gardens, Rockland, then to Stonyhurst on Rockland Ave, then Lotbiniere Ave, also in Rockland. He retired in 1926 and died in 1941.

OTHER OCCUPANTS:

A later owner of the Spratt Building was the Canadian Puget Sound Lumber Co and later still it was owned by Store Street Holdings.

There was some restoration in 1958. From 1978-93 Capital Iron used the building as an office. More recently it has been occupied by a tattoo business.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION & IMAGES:

• Map of Victoria Heritage Register Properties

• Burnside History

• Burnside Heritage Register


• This Old House, Victoria's Heritage Neighbourhoods,
Volume Three: Rockland, Burnside, Harris Green,
Hillside-Quadra, North Park & Oaklands