Description of Historic Place

The Charlottetown City Hall is a three-storey, Romanesque Revival-style, red brick building erected in 1888. It is located in Charlottetown’s historic downtown district. The formal recognition consists of the building and the legal property on which it sat at the time of designation.

Heritage Value

The Charlottetown City Hall was designated a national historic site in 1984 because its grand scale and elegant design in the Romanesque Revival style symbolize the pride and confidence felt by the city during the late 19th century.

The commanding presence and elegant design of the Charlottetown City Hall reflect the city’s late-19th century period of growth and prosperity and its status as the provincial capital. Designed by architects Phillips and Chappell, it is typical of civic buildings built during the second half of the 19th century in its use of an ornate, Victorian version of the Romanesque Revival style. Its multi-functional plan, typical of town and city halls of the period, included a police station, fire hall and stable on the ground floor, and council chambers, a court room, and offices on the upper storeys. It was constructed in 1888 by builder W.H Fraser.

Source: Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada, Minute, November 1984.

Character-Defining Elements

Key elements which express the heritage value of the Charlottetown City Hall include:

-its self-contained rectangular massing with corner tower;
-its Romanesque Revival style, evident in its massive scale and proportions, the high square, corner tower, deeply set windows, repeated use of rounded arches over windows and entrances, large gables breaking the steeply pitched roofline, and medieval-inspired detailing;
-its brick detailing, including corbel tables under the eaves, detailing around arches and at the corners of the tower;
-its stone detailing, including a string course delineating storeys;
-its Victorian influences, evident in the use of contrasting materials, textures and colours, including rustication and polychromatic brick in contrasting bands
-its surviving, original interior detailing, including the council chambers’ ceiling;
-remnants of its original plan which reflect its original multi-functional use;
-its prominent location in historic downtown Charlottetown at the corner of Kent and Queen Streets.