Description of Historic Place

The Arthur & Charlotte Green Residence is a two-storey, wood-frame Edwardian-era Foursquare house located on a prominent corner lot on Pine Street at Fourth Avenue in the Queen’s Park neighbourhood in New Westminster. The house is distinguished by its second-storey square corner bays, scroll-cut brackets and bands of different siding.

Heritage Value

Built in 1910-11, the Arthur & Charlotte Green Residence is significant as a fine representation of the booming economy in New Westminster during the Edwardian era, and for its prominent location in the affluent Queen’s Park neighbourhood. The historic character of Queen’s Park is based on its consistent streetscapes of fine restored homes, augmented by mature landscaping. The first owners of this fine home were Arthur Robert Green and his wife, Charlotte Amelia (née Holmes, 1854-1943), who were married in New Westminster in 1887. Arthur Green was a civil engineer.

The house is further valued as an example of the widespread use of plan books to facilitate residential construction during the Edwardian era. This house is derived from Design Number 91 in the Western Home Builder, published in 1907 by prolific Seattle-based architect Victor W. Voorhees. Design Number 91 was a particular favourite with developers, and a number of houses were built to this plan in Seattle. Two additional houses in New Westminster also utilized this plan; 236 Fourth Street and 328 Third Street. Plan books provided a reliable and cost-effective alternative to engaging an architect, and many houses were either built directly from these prepared plans or inspired by them. They were also a source of practical advice on all aspects of interior layout and decorating, site planning and gardening, and other matters of appropriate taste and appearance.

Source: City of New Westminster Planning Department

Character-Defining Elements

Key elements that define the heritage character of the Arthur & Charlotte Green Residence include its:
- corner location on Pine Street at Fourth Avenue, in the historic Queen’s Park neighbourhood
- residential form, scale and massing, as expressed by its two-storey height, full basement, cubic massing, hipped roof with wide overhangs and closed soffits, inset corner porch, and square corner bays at the front of the second storey
- wood-frame construction, as expressed by its lapped wooden siding with cornerboards on the main level and second storey, and cedar shingle siding at the foundation, dormer and in a band between the first and second floors
- exterior Edwardian-era details, such as its Foursquare massing, asymmetrical inset front entry porch, scroll-cut brackets, and lathe-turned columns
- windows, such as its double-hung one-over-one wooden-sash windows with horns, some with diamond-patterned upper panes, stained glass piano window at side of house, and original front door assembly with sidelights
- internal red-brick chimney