Description of Historic Place

Morley's Soda Water Factory is a two-storey nineteenth century industrial building located in Waddington Alley in Victoria's Old Town District. It is distinguished by a raised central pediment, detailed brickwork, and a large arched carriage entryway on its front façade.

Heritage Value

Morley's Soda Water Factory is important to Victoria because it is one of the few industrial buildings in the Old Town District to survive from the boom period of the 1880s.

Constructed in 1884 for Christopher Morley, this building's original function - manufacturing soda water, lemonade, essences of peppermint and ginger, and a variety of syrups - illustrates how Victoria was evolving from a Hudson's Bay Company fort to a well established city in the late nineteenth century. The only building facing onto Waddington Alley, it is significant that Morley's Soda Water Factory has retained the key physical elements which identify it as a unique early industrial building in this area, including a carriageway leading through the building to a Klondike-era courtyard at its rear.

Source: City of Victoria Planning and Development Dept.

Character-Defining Elements

The character-defining elements of Morley's Soda Water Factory include:
- Its location facing onto Waddington Alley.
- The contribution it makes to defining the Klondike-era courtyard at its rear.
- Its vernacular industrial architectural style.
- The integrity of the 1884 building envelope, reinforced by the evidence of construction methods and intact building materials used to carry out its original design.
- Its two storey form.
- Detailed brickwork on the front façade, including corbelling over windows and on cornice, dentil course above first storey, and arches on the first storey.
- Surviving wooden-sash windows, doorways, and wooden doors on its front façade relevant to its original construction, including the large carriage doorway.
- Surviving interior elements relevant to its original design which support its general heritage character as a late nineteenth-century industrial building.