Description of Historic Place

The Merchant's Bank of Canada building is a two-story, Free Renaissance style building located on a prominent corner in downtown Nanaimo. The historic place is confined to the building footprint.

Heritage Value

Built in 1912, the Merchant's Bank is Nanaimo's sole example of the eclectic, elegant Free Renaissance style, inspired by Italian churches and palaces, and popular in North America from the late 19th to early 20th centuries. The exterior was faced with a combination of a banded brick base and quoining that framed the edges and structural openings. A later coat of stucco obscured these features but some of the facade details, including the prominent cornices typical of this style, are still discernible. The elaborately detailed, round-arched windows, featuring radiating mullions and brick keystones, angled corner entry and ornate cast plaster ceiling are also substantially intact.

The Merchant's Bank is significant for its association with Francis Mawson Rattenbury, British Columbia's premier architect of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Rattenbury also designed the Nanaimo and Nelson Court Houses, the provincial Parliament Buildings and numerous other residential and institutional buildings.

The building's prominent corner location and exceptional windows make it a highly visible landmark.

Source: City of Nanaimo, Development Services Department, file #6800-20-H01-02/499 Wallace Street

Character-Defining Elements

Character-defining elements of the Merchant's Bank Building include:

-all of the discernible elements of the Free Renaissance style including the form and massing, prominent cornices, elaborate round arched windows and corner entry.

-the location at a prominent downtown intersection.