Description of Historic Place

Victory Square Park is an urban public open space in Vancouver’s Hastings Street area. This 0.36-hectare trapezoidal site is lined on three sides of its perimeter by mature specimen maples that surround a sloped lawn and a landmark cenotaph at the north end of the site. The park has the combined elements of the Beaux-Arts formality of the circular cenotaph setting and an informal layout to the south.

Heritage Value

The heritage value of Victory Square Park is associated with the Cenotaph, dedicated in 1924 as a memorial to the First World War, and which, along with the renaming of the site as Victory Square, marked a renewal of civic commitment to the park. The 9.14 metre tall Cenotaph is a highly visible landmark and significant place of civic remembrance. Erected by public subscription, the Cenotaph is an obelisk of Nelson Island granite engraved with inscriptions. Designed with three sides, to conform to the triangular shape of the site, and situated in such a way that when approached from the east, it appears centrally located at the bend of Hastings Street. The Cenotaph was designed by architect, town planner and park commissioner Major G. L. Thornton Sharp (1880-1974) of the prominent architectural firm Sharp and Thompson. Sharp's design for the Cenotaph and its base established the classical formality of the north end of the park. Since 1924, this has been the location of the city's annual Remembrance Day ceremonies.

Victory Square Park is additionally valued as the original centre of the city’s institutional life with subsequent layers of civic association and historical development. Originally known as Government Square, this was the location of Vancouver’s first courthouse. The site was adjacent to the first City Hospital, Central School and many significant commercial buildings, one of which - the Dominion Building - was hailed briefly as the tallest skyscraper in the British Empire.

Furthermore, Victory Square Park is significant for the configuration and features of the park itself - its siting, views, topography, layout, pathways, stone walls and other landscape elements. The specimen maples that line three sides of the site were planted in 1892, and are likely the oldest street trees in Vancouver, reflecting the priority placed on the beautification of the new city. These plantings also help to define the site and mediate between the open space contained within and the continuous street wall of significant buildings that surround the site. The unusual shape of the park is formed by the context of the surrounding street pattern. The park marks the western boundary where the Old Granville Townsite survey of 1870 met the subsequent CPR surveys, resulting in a space that serves as a ‘hinge pin’ for downtown circulation. The unique street pattern radiates out from the harbour, allowing open vistas to the park, while a series of framed vistas from inside the park are terminated by an ensemble of late Victorian and Edwardian era buildings.

One of the earliest and most symbolic public spaces in the city, Victory Square Park continues to be a significant location for commemoration, remembrance and protest for all citizens of Vancouver, as well as an important neighbourhood park for local residents.

Source: City of Vancouver Heritage Conservation Program

Character-Defining Elements

Key elements that define the heritage character of Victory Square Park include its:

- setting in the context of an ensemble of Late Victorian/Edwardian era heritage structures that surround the Park
- topography, on a rise from north to south
- geometric layout, with Beaux-Arts formality at the north end and an informal network of paths and plantings towards the south end
- framed views to and from the site
- urban street wall of heritage buildings that surrounds the park, including a unique archway over the alley to the east
- 1892 specimen maples (Sugar, Big Leaf and Norway) on the site's perimeter, dating from the time when the courthouse was located here
- granite walls and steps that lead into the cenotaph area
- concrete curbs and old fence posts
- granite paving and curbs on the west side of the 400 block Hamilton Street
- granite paved lanes to the east and west of the square

Cenotaph
- three-sided vertical tapered granite shaft with stepped circular base with grass insets surrounded by a circular path
- engraved inscriptions: Hastings Street facade: "Their name liveth for evermore" and within a stone wreath, "1914-1918"; Hamilton Street facade: "Is it nothing to you"; Pender Street facade: "All ye that pass by"
- ornamentation, such as one embossed sword and two wreaths, one of laurel and one of poppies, entwined with maple leaves - the larger laurel wreath surround the numerals "1914-1918"
- stone replicas of a helmet adorning three corner buttresses