Description of Historic Place

The impressive St. Joachim Roman Catholic Church, with its towering spire, is a notable feature on La Broquerie's tree-lined main street. Located in the community's quiet centre, the brick-veneer church, built in 1898, is prominently situated near the front of a large treed lot, neighboured by a mix of residential and commercial properties. The municipal designation applies to the church, an adjoining grotto and cemetery and the large site they occupy.

Heritage Value

St. Joachim Roman Catholic Church is a splendid example of French Catholic church architecture applied to a rural Manitoba parish church at the turn of the twentieth century. Derived from French-Canadian ecclesiastical examples of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and recreated in the French community of La Broquerie, the classically inspired building recalls long-established architectural traditions through its form and fine exterior and interior detailing. Constructed entirely with local materials by parish volunteers supervised by their priest, Father Alexandre Giroux, the church also is a symbol of local dedication. Little changed over the years, this impressively large facility is a local landmark and dominant element of the streetscape.

Source: Rural Municipality of La Broquerie By-law No. 1-2000, February 23, 2000

Character-Defining Elements

Key elements that define the heritage character of the St. Joachim Roman Catholic Church site include:
- the placement of the church on the east side of rue Principale in La Broquerie, on an east-west axis with its front facing west
- the extent and layout of the landscaped grounds, with a large cemetery at the rear

Key exterior elements that define the church's French-Canadian ecclesiastical style include:
- the high one-storey rectangular volume of the nave with a steeply pitched gable roof, an attached apse with a polygonal roof and a sacristy with steep gable roof, all clothed by smooth brick walls on a stone foundation and cedar shingles
- the neatly ordered symmetry of the front (short gable end) and side elevations
- the dominant square bell tower with its tin-sheathed, classically detailed spire and Latin cross centred over the front apex of the roof
- the front corner pilasters capped by miniature tin-sheathed belfries and Latin crosses
- the round-arched front doors with elaborately detailed fanlights, including the main double door at the base of the tower
- the well-ordered fenestration featuring the tower's large arched window with geometrical tracery and Palladian-style opening with a central niche containing a sculpture of St. Joachim; also, the tall round-arched fixed windows set elsewhere on the front facing and at regular intervals between brick pilasters on the side elevations
- the exceptional masonry detailing, including the thin pointing of the bricks with a charcoal-coloured line, the heavily articulated corbelled and arcaded brickwork on the front and sides, and brick voussoirs over doors and windows

Key internal elements that define the heritage character of the building include:
- the unaltered spaces of the front vestibule and high nave with a barrel vault ceiling
- the symmetrical main-floor plan with a wide centre aisle, lower side aisles demarcated by the columns and a raised sanctuary and altar with side alcoves
- the substantial U-shaped choir loft and balcony, accessed by side staircases and extended along the sides of the nave with the support of clustered wood columns that arch outward at the top
- the classical detailing of the columns and richly moulded cornice between the columns and ceiling
- other fine materials, finishes and features such as the wooden pews, wood-panelled and plastered walls, balcony woodwork with solid wood panelling and balustrades, coloured glass in windows, etc.
- the iconographic features, including the hand-painted religious scenes in the ceiling of the apse, the painting of patron St. Joachim at the altar, the painted wording on the ceiling at the front of the nave reading 'Le Dieu Vivant Est Au Milieu De Nous', and over the balcony, 'Louons-Le-Seigneur', the Stations of the Cross placed around the nave, and the statuary in niches and on pedestals