Description of Historic Place

The historic place is the one-and-one-half-storey wood-frame T.E. Handlen House, built around 1930, and located at 780 DeHart Avenue in Kelowna's South Central neighbourhood.

Heritage Value

The heritage value of the T.E. Handlen House is seen in its being a good example of an architectural type built in Kelowna during the inter-war period, as well as in its association with the Handlen family as long-standing occupants.

The house was likely built around 1930, although its exact date of construction is not known. The earliest known owners were Thomas E. and Margaret H. Handlen, who moved to this address in 1940 and lived here until at least 1968. Thomas Handlen worked during the 1920s as a warehouseman for the Johnson Coal Company and the Campbell Coal Company. After active service during WWII, at the time he lived in the historic place, he was employed in Kelowna's significant fruit industry, as packing foreman and then superintendent at Kelowna Growers Exchange.

The house is representative of the simple, one-and-one-half-storey, stucco-clad residences built between the two world wars. The entry into the full-height ground floor is marked by a gabled porch, while a upper storey is tucked within the gabled roof.

Source: City of Kelowna Planning Department

Character-Defining Elements

The character-defining elements of the T.E. Handlen House include its:
- location on DeHart Avenue in Kelowna's South Central neighbourhood
- residential form, scale and massing, as expressed by one-and-one-half-storey height and rectangular plan
- medium-pitched gabled roof
- projecting medium-pitched gabled dormer facing street
- projecting, partially-enclosed porch, with a medium-pitched gable, with three arched openings
- asymmetrical fenestration on the second floor, with four single-pane wood windows with medium-width wood trim
- symmetrical wood fenestration on the ground floor, whose form is two-over-one and four-over-one, double-hung, wood sash, and fixed center window, with four-over-one fixed panes and curved-arch mullion
- mature trees throughout the property, particularly in the side yards