Description of Historic Place

The historic place is the one-and-one-half-storey wood-frame McDonald Farm House, built in 1913 with Arts and Crafts detailing, and located at 520 Rutland Road in Kelowna's Rutland neighbourhood.

Heritage Value

The heritage value of the McDonald Farm House is found in part in its being a rare, surviving farm house from the period before World War I in the Rutland neighbourhood. The attractive and well-maintained Arts and Crafts house in a mature landscaped setting provides a good reminder of the community's rural character in the early days of development.

The house is also valued for its association with the McDonald family, which was active in the early days of the Rutland community. Dan E. McDonald arrived from Ontario, after a period in Calgary, in early 1908. He cleared a plot of land at the corner of the Black Mountain and Rutland Roads and built a store and residence, the first store in the Rutland village. When Rutland post office was established in 1908, it was located in McDonald's store, and he served as postmaster from 1908 to 1911. In 1911, he sold the store to Clever and Whiteway, and built this house in 1913. He farmed and kept bees on a commercial basis near the school, and trapped on his preemption in the hills. In 1913, Dan McDonald was a machinist for the Okanagan Lumber Company. Mrs. D.E. McDonald was a charter member of the Rutland Women's Institute when it was formed in 1915.

Source: City of Kelowna Planning Department

Character-Defining Elements

The character-defining elements of the McDonald Farm House include its:
- mature plantings throughout the lot, with a continuous lawn to the street
- residential form, scale and massing, as expressed by its one-and-one-half-storey height and rectangular plan
- medium-pitched gabled roof, with the ridge parallel to the street and a gabled dormer on the entrance slope
- bay window on the left side
- brick chimney
- horizontal bevelled wood siding, with wood shingles on the dormers
- fixed-pane and one-over-one double-hung wood-sash windows, all with plain narrow wood trim
- wood casement windows with wood trim in the dormers
- decorative wood brackets supporting the eaves on the main gables and dormer gables