A
scanned copy. Done on a non-word processor, called a typewriter, I believe.
Some of the spelling is original, even if it appears wrong. The name Elliott
has one t, even though it is often seen in this text with two tt's. The
figures are left out at his time but as this is a City document a copy
is in the Central library, in the Canadiana Reading Room 615-3524 - code
971.3535.PHI
A HISTORY
OF THE CAWTHRA-ELLIOTT ESTATE
By Ken Phipps, LACAC student, September
1989
THE ARCHITECT
William Lyon Somerville was born
in 1887. He died seventy-eight years later, on April 14, 1965, having been,
among other things, a Royal Canadian Academy of Art 'Academician', a Fellow
of the Royal Institute of British Architecture, a Fellow and President
of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, a President of the Ontario
Association of Architects, a husband, a father, a grandfather, a great-grandfather,
and a prolific writer for Canadian Homes and Gardens magazine.
He was born in Hamilton and educated
there and in New York, where he practised architecture before World War
1. He started practising in Ontario in 1919.
Among his projects were the Mills
Memorial Library, the student residences and other buildings of McMaster
University, Hamilton, which he designed "with the intention of reproducing
the quiet dignity of the famous English universities of Oxford and Cambridge
... in what is commonly called Tudor or Collegiate Gothic" [64]. For this
work McMaster eventually (thirty years after the fact) awarded him an honourary
doctor of laws degree [65].
During his career he was a consultant
for the Rainbow Bridge and designed the Peace Tower and the bridge's Canadian
Plaza at Niagara Falls. He assisted with the restoration of Fort Henry
in Kingston, Fort George at Niagara-On-The-Lake and Fort Erie. He also
designed hospitals such as the Ontario Hospital at St Thomas, St Joseph's
Hospital in Brantford and Pembroke General Hospital. He was the consulting
architect on University Hospital in Edmonton, the architect for additions
to St Michael's Hospital in Toronto, the Calgary Geneva Hospital and St
Joseph's Hospital in Hamilton. He also designed the Lion Monument which
was sculpted by Francis Loring and Florence Wyle and originally located
at the east entrance of the QEW (opened in 1939 by Queen Elizabeth) until
in 1974 the Ontario Ministry of Transportation and Communications announced
it would be demolished because the highway had been widened and a stream
of protesting letters prompted Premier William Davis to have the lion moved
to the lakefront instead [66].
By 1926 he had designed the Cawthra-Elliott
estate. He had also won a medal from the American Society of Beaux Arts.
As well, he had won the National Americanization Housing competition in
New York in 1914 and the Model City Housing Competition in Montreal in
1920. His was among seven nominated designs for the Canadian National War
Memorial at Ottawa in association with the sculptor Francis Loring; and
in 1924 he had won the National Shakespearean Memorial Theatre Competition
in London, England [67].
In the mid-1920's he was among a
group of Toronto architects which met every day at lunch in the Diet Kitchen
restaurant on Bloor Street. Out of these meetings came a movement entitled
"The Diet Kitchen School of Architecture". A committee of which William
Somerville was a member approached the Art Gallery of Toronto (now the
Art Gallery of Ontario) to suggest the mounting of a pan-Canadian exhibition
of architecture and the allied arts; the committee convinced the Board
of Directors and in February 1927 Architecture and the Allied Arts attracted
over 29000 visitors over its two-week showing period. The Diet Kitchen
School's intention was to "stimulate awareness of the high standards of
Canadian design and craftsmanship and encourage cooperation in the various
branches of the arts. In essence, a distinctive style for Canadian artistic
designs was being fostered" [68].
WL Somerville was also, as mentioned
earlier, a prolific writer for Canadian Homes and Gardens, and around the
time he designed Cawthra-Lotten he was writing about the Canadian architectural
identity. In August 1926 he pointed out that climatic conditions, which
vary widely in the United States and so constitute an important factor
in determining what architectural style is most suitable for that country,
vary little in Canada and so are unimportant when considering what sort
of house is most appropriate for this country; much more important in arriving
at such a determination here are our living conditions, sources of material
and cultural backgrounds, which vary widely. At this point Somerville felt
that since homes seemed to be getting smaller a Canadian style needed to
be pinpointed to keep this gradual change under control. He noticed that
the parlour had disappeared, occasional help, had nearly replaced servants,
the upstairs sitting room was nearly gone, and even the validity of the
dining room's existence was being questioned. He believed Canadians had
reached the 'cottage stage'. He put aside the French Farmhouses of Quebec
(distinctive of Lower Canada), the Colonial or early British Canadian house,
the early Victorian brick houses of Ontario (distinctive of Upper Canada),
and even the plaster and pine lath gabled cottages distinguished by doorways
and latticework which made the best use of limited means. He put aside
all of these, deciding to deal with rather than ignore the unfortunate
lack of skilled mechanics then available in the Canadian building trade
(and so avoid the embarrassment of having an elegantly-designed Georgian
horribly maimed in its production by Canadian ignorance or incompetence),
to cater to the culturally simple Canadian " ... with his informal ways
and his wife's confessed weakness for the pictures of the 'Group of Seven"'
and to finally conclude that the perfect Canadian house must descend directly
from the cottages of England--with their neutral rather than architectural
style, the opportunity they offer for craftsmanship, the great variety
of design among them, and , most importantly, their "utter lack of pretence"
[69].
Somerville wrote about Canadians
as though he wasn't one, and this attitude as well as the opinions he freely
expressed would have appealed to Grace Cawthra-Elliott. In January 1927
he pushed house consumers to build their own houses, trusting entirely
in their hand-picked reliable architects, rather than to simply buy houses
'off the rack'. He suggested it is true that "a home expresses the personality,
culture and social standing of its makers in spite of everything they can
do to prevent it" [70] and intimated that the owners of the home quite
naturally and unavoidably express those same things--the unavoidable conclusion
being, of course, that if you want to know for sure you look good, you
have to dress yourself. He seems to have been interested at this point
in promoting individual architectural plans for the needs of individuals.
He demonstrated what a perfect pick of an architect he would be for any
concerned home-builder by showing off his knowledge of design and materials.
By May he was writing again about
the blanket architectural style and specifically its application to the
city house. He wrote that the city house must be in harmony with its neighbours
in order to look its best. He said assumed heavy constant traffic makes
it desirable to have as few rooms as possible near the front of the house
and the street, and that to provide for garden space at the rear the house
must be kept as close as possible to the street. He proposed that the new
formal city home be not original, different or primitive, but rather a
free interpretation of English traditions to meet modern requirements [71].
By June 1927 WL Somerville, recently
elected President of the Ontario Association of Architects, was writing
that the city house, unlike the suburban, is not forced to show its 'welcoming
smile' to the street, and that therefore a more restrained, reserved appearance
is suitable, the natural choice being the formal 18th century Georgian.
He wrote about its simple elegance and the necessity of a garden which
coordinated with the design; he said the effect of the garden he would
consider perfect would be that of an outdoor living room [72].
In July he warned house consumers
to beware of fads, and in August he wrote that they were in the midst of
the walnut and gumwood era; "the Spanish influence of Hollywood and Florida
is happily dying out without doing too much damage .... Why should we copy
the freakish styles of the moving picture scenario artists, or be carried
away by the bizarre extremes of our more temperamental cousins?" [73] Obviously
he was a traditionalist of the permanent opinion that the best in architectural
design had been expressed as well as it ever would be a hundred years before
he began his practice. He encouraged experimentation with colour and texture
but not quite quietly insisted that any changes in the permanent architectural
aesthetic be no more than cosmetic.
W.L Somerville believed in himself
and in the value of the English architectural heritage. He was proud and
wanted the architectural heritage he'd adopted to occupy the most important
position it could in the landscape of the future. He also believed that
in architectural design consumers get what they pay for [74]. He himself
probably did not undercharge. He had definite ideas about how to apply
traditional English designs to modern projects, and these ideas, along
with the attitudes and opinions his articles show he possessed, made him
the perfect architect for Grace Cawthra-Elliott.
ENDNOTES
[64]
Contract Record and Engineering
Review, 31 Dec., 1930, 232.
[65]
Globe and Mail, 19 April 1965.
[66]
Globe and Mail, 5 Aug. 1975.
[67]
Canadian Homes and Gardens, Aug.
1926, 13.
[68]
Canadian Society of Decorative Arts
Bulletin, Autumn 1982.
[69]
Canadian Homes and Gardens, Aug.
1926, 18.
[70]
Canadian Homes and Gardens, Jan.
1927, 54.
[71]
Canadian Homes and Gardens, May
1927.
[72]
Canadian Homes and Gardens, June
1927.
[73]
Canadian Homes and Gardens, Aug.
1927, 19.
[74]
Canadian Homes and Gardens,
Aug. 1930, 18.
THE ARCHITECT - List of Figures;
1. W.L. Somerville, as shown in the
March 1936 Journal of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, president
at the time - p. 88
2. Somerville posing with others
of the Diet Kitchen School in 1927, as reprinted in the autumn 1982 Canadian
Society of Decorative Arts Bulletin - p. 89
3. Somerville's August 1930 conceptions
of how houses facing in different directions should be differently constructed.
Here, his plan for a house facing north - p. 90
4. His plan for a house facing south
- p. 91
5. His plan for a house facing east
or west - p. 92
6. Somerville's own home, truly his
as he designed it--July 1928 - p. 93
7. Some of his work on St. Michael's
Hospital. Here, the entrance - p. 94
8. St. Michael's Chapel as well as
Somerville's plans for hospital rooms, the chapel itself and the entrance
lobby - p. 95
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