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The Merchants' Bank, Nanaimo, B. C. (1909-1911), designed by English immigrant architect Francis Mawson Rattenbury. Located at the juncture of Wallace and Albert Streets, the "Free Renaissance" brick-faced bank building has two façades, despite the fact that it has a Wallace Street address (no. 499). It is relatively fire-proof owing to Rattenbury's use of concrete and steel. For its plans the architect was paid the not inconsiderable sum of $15,000 (Barrett and Liscombe 304):
Elements of the eclectic Free Renaissance style include the building's "form and massing, prominent cornices, elaborate round arched windows and corner entry ("Canada's Historic Places"). According to the same source, this building is Nanaimo's only example of it, but the style was popular in North America at this time: "the exterior was faced with a combination of a banded brick base and quoining that framed the edges and structural openings. A later coat of stucco obscured these features but some of the facade details, including the prominent cornices typical of this style, are still discernible. The elaborately detailed, round-arched windows, featuring radiating mullions and brick keystones, angled corner entry and ornate cast plaster ceiling are also substantially intact." The style was inspired by Italian churches and palaces from the fifteenth and centuries — a style which Rattenbury rarely used for commercial and government buildings.
Interior of the restaurant, showing what would have been the lobby.
The building is now "The Vault Restaurant," and despite its added light pink stucco, not only its prominent cornices, but also its "elaborately detailed, round-arched windows, featuring radiating mullions and brick keystones, angled corner entry and ornate cast plaster ceiling," are striking enough (Heritage Register). The 321-square-metre building has two storeys, but only the main floor at present is in use, as a restaurant.
Bibliography
Barrett, Anthony A., and Rhodri Windsor Liscombe. Francis Rattenbury and British Columbia: Architecture and Challenge in the Imperial Age. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1983.
Canada's Historic Places. "Merchant's Bank of Canada." Web. 5 May 2023.
Elliot, David R. "Rattenbury, Francis Mawson." Canadian Encyclopedia. Edmonton: Hurtig, 1988. Vol. 3: 1828-1829.
Liscombe, Rhodri Windsor. "Rattenbury, Francis Mawson." The Canadian Encyclopedia. Posted 20 May 2008. Web. 25 April 2023.
Nanaimo Cultural Heritage. ""(Re)Focus on Nanaimo's Heritage: From Bank to Beans." Posted 19 February 2006. Web. 5 May 2023.
Created 8 May 2017