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Bellcrest Apartments

72 Lenore Street, Winnipeg, Manitoba, R3G, Canada

Formally Recognized: 1994/03/01

Primary elevation, from the southeast, of the Bellcrest Apartments, Winnipeg, 2006; Historic Resources Branch, Manitoba Culture, Heritage, Tourism and Sport, 2006
Primary Elevation
Etrance detail of the Bellcrest Apartments, Winnipeg, 2006; Historic Resources Branch, Manitoba Culture, Heritage, Tourism and Sport, 2006
Entrance Detail
Wall detail of the Bellcrest Apartments, Winnipeg, 2006; Historic Resources Branch, Manitoba Culture, Heritage, Tourism and Sport, 2006
Wall Detail

Other Name(s)

n/a

Links and documents

Construction Date(s)

1928/01/01 to 1928/12/31

Listed on the Canadian Register: 2008/03/10

Statement of Significance

Description of Historic Place

The 1928 Bellcrest Apartments, a three-storey brick building faced on two sides in stone, stands on a busy street corner opposite an elementary school in a mature west Winnipeg residential neighbourhood. The City of Winnipeg designation applies to the building on its footprint and the following interior elements: layout of the lobby, staircase and skylight.

Heritage Value

The Bellcrest Apartments is a sleek, minimally ornamented box whose otherwise typical mid-twentieth-century walk-up apartment block design conveys a timeless quality through limestone-clad facades. The structure's monochromatic finish, executed through the careful interplay of rusticated and ashlar stone, is an exemplary display of the mason's craft and of a local construction material whose use was heavily promoted in the 1920s. Designed and built by Bently Taylor, a Winnipeg contractor, the Bellcrest also has a spacious, well-lit interior, including central hallways, high basement suites and amenities such as eat-in kitchens, dining rooms, large living rooms and some private service entrances. The structure retains considerable physical integrity and fits well within its setting of stylish single-family houses and apartment blocks built mainly in the early 1900s.

Source: City of Winnipeg Committee on Planning and Community Services, March 1, 1994

Character-Defining Elements

Key elements that define the site character of the Bellcrest Apartments include:
- the building's location at northwest Lenore Street and Wolseley Avenue, set back on a grassed double lot opposite Laura Secord School in the Wolseley district

Key elements that define the building's sleek design, fine stone finish and residential function include:
- the sharply defined rectangular form extended three storeys over a high basement, of brick and concrete construction with a flat roofline and flat primary (front or east and south) facings
- the monochromatic Manitoba limestone cladding on the primary walls, carefully laid in broken-course rusticated blocks with fine ashlar trim in window and door surrounds, corner quoins, parapet coping, etc.
- the abundant fenestration provided by tall rectangular sash openings (with simple Art Nouveau-like uppers), symmetrically aligned on all elevations in singles, pairs and triplets
- the centred front entrance with double wood and glass doors and a pair of windows in a two-storey surround of smooth stone, and the similar but smaller south entrance with a single wood and glass door
- the large off-centre well containing wooden stairs and platforms on the west side and a second smaller wooden staircase at a jog in the north wall; the north and west sides plainly finished in sand-lime brick
- ornamentation limited mainly to the stonework, including raised parapet sections, continuous lintels and sills doubling as belt courses and quoin-like window detailing, and a few front wrought-iron balconets
- the large stucco-clad penthouse with rectangular-shaped windows

Key internal elements that define the building's heritage character include:
- the front lobby with a central staircase, spacious suites organized around central hallways, and common-area finishes and details such as egg-and-dart staircase moulding, the staircase skylight, etc.

Recognition

Jurisdiction

Manitoba

Recognition Authority

City of Winnipeg

Recognition Statute

City of Winnipeg Act

Recognition Type

Winnipeg Landmark Heritage Structure

Recognition Date

1994/03/01

Historical Information

Significant Date(s)

n/a

Theme - Category and Type

Expressing Intellectual and Cultural Life
Architecture and Design

Function - Category and Type

Current

Residence
Multiple Dwelling

Historic

Architect / Designer

Bently Taylor

Builder

Bently Taylor

Additional Information

Location of Supporting Documentation

15-30 Fort Street Winnipeg MB

Cross-Reference to Collection

Fed/Prov/Terr Identifier

W0157

Status

Published

Related Places

n/a

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