Description of Historic Place

The James B. Whitburn Residence is a one-and-one-half storey, wood-frame British Arts and Crafts house located on the north side of Fourth Avenue in the Queen's Park neighbourhood in New Westminster. It features stucco cladding, two projecting front gables, decorative half-timbering and the consistent use of leaded casement windows.

Heritage Value

This residence is valued for its association with its architect and first owner, James Boulton Whitburn. Whitburn’s first known commission in B.C. was the design for a welcome arch erected in Burnaby for the 1912 vice-regal visit of the Duke and Duchess of Connaught. In June 1913, he opened an office in New Westminster, but given the downturn in the economy, his practice consisted mainly of residential projects. In the late 1920s, he received some substantial commissions, notably Trapp Technical School (later John Robson School), 1928, and Richard McBride School, 1929, both in New Westminster.

Whitburn’s own house, built in 1927, demonstrates his affinity and his training in the British Arts and Crafts tradition. The modest scale and historical elements impart a storybook cottage character to the Whitburn Residence. In North America, the 1920s were a time of entrenched traditionalism in residential architecture, harkening back to the domestic values and ideals of an earlier age. It was considered the height of good taste at the time for houses to conform to a recognizable historical appearance.

Additional significance is derived from the second owners of the house, Reverend Canon Frank Plaskett and his wife Mary Plaskett (née Draper, 1885-1976). The Plasketts’ son, Joseph Plaskett, an internationally-recognized artist, lived with his parents for a short time before moving to Paris, France in 1949, where he currently resides.

The James B. Whitburn Residence is also valued for its association to the long development of the Queen’s Park neighbourhood, an established suburb for New Westminster’s prominent families.

Source: City of New Westminster Planning Department

Character-Defining Elements

Key elements that define the heritage character of the James B. Whitburn Residence include its:
- residential form, scale and massing, as expressed by its one-and-one-half storey height; side-gabled roofline, dual-pitch at front with a side-hipped skirting; and asymmetrical front gable projections
- wood-frame construction, with stucco cladding and cedar shingle roofing
- British Arts and details, such as the tapered buttress wall at entry, decorative half-timbering, combination of clipped eaves and open soffits, central corbelled red-brick chimney, red-brick front stairs, bargeboards, pointed and with tapered mouldings on the front gable, plank front door with iron strap hinges and glazed lozenge inset, the consistent use of wooden sash casement windows in single and multiple assembly, with straight-leaded glass and decorative rustic bulls-eye glass inserts, and period fittings such as the entry light and front doorbell
- interior features, such as beamed and panelled ceilings and a fireplace inglenook