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Description of Historic Place

The Church of Our Lord National Historic Site of Canada is an important architectural landmark located in the heart of Victoria, British Colombia. The building’s exterior incorporates design elements from traditional Gothic style buildings of brick and stone, all skillfully adapted to wood construction. A roof-top spire, corner pinnacles, and board and batten siding, all crafted from California redwood, convey a sense of verticality to the design. Inside, a Gothic hammer beam truss system spans the nave, offering an unbroken view of the apse and pulpit. In 1930 an annex was added to the south side of the church. Official recognition refers to the church and its annex on their legal lot.

Heritage Value

Church of Our Lord was designated a national historic site of Canada in 1990 because: it is one of the finest examples of Carpenter’s Gothic on the West Coast of Canada.

Following a dramatic schism within the city’s Anglican diocese, the Reverend Edward Cridge had the Church of Our Lord designed by noted pioneer West Coast architect John Teague, and constructed in 1875 by builders Haywood and Jenkinson for the Reformed Episcopal Church in Victoria . The building’s Gothic Revival character was enhanced by exploiting the advantages of board and batten siding, which reinforced the vertical thrust of its gabled roof, pinnacles and roof-top spire. The church interior includes a fine example of hammer beam vaulting. Famed regional architect Samuel Maclure designed a complementary 1930 church annex known as the Cridge Memorial Hall.

Source: Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada, Minutes, June 1990.

Character-Defining Elements

The key elements relating to the heritage value of this site include: the form and massing of the church with its rectangular, single-storey body under a gable roof, truncated transept arms, and polygonal apse; the Gothic Revival style elements translated in wood including the rose window over the entry porch, the large traceried pointed arch windows of the side elevations, the elaborate pointed arch windows on the transept ends, the corner buttresses capped with pinnacles, the wall buttresses, the Gothic arched entrance and vestibule, and the spire-topped belfry; the High Victorian taste for surface variety and texture evident in the decorated frieze and gables, board and batten siding; the Gothic Revival style interior features including the hammer beam truss system; the use of California redwood as a primary building material; the complementary design and materials of the Cridge Memorial Hall.