Peterborough City Council Supports Removing Former Montreal House From Heritage Register

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Peterborough City Council supported removing the former Montreal House from the Heritage Register and not designating the property under the Ontario Heritage Act, at Monday night’s council meeting.

Photo by Jordan Cooper.

The property owner plans to build a mixed-use building that would include 75 "affordable" (80 per cent market rent) residential units through an agreement with CMHC along space that would be used to support the adjacent urban park.

Ashburnham Realty (AR), was the successful proponent through an Expression of Interest process the City undertook to select a developer for the property that the City had purchased at 220 King St. next to the future location of the urban park.

The City asked for developers to come forward that were interested in building on the 220 King St. site with components that would include affordable housing and sustainable features with a high level of urban design that would fit well with the adjacent urban park.

Ashburnham Realty purchased the corner property at Aylmer Street and King Street to consolidate with the property at 220 King St., which would allow for a larger mixed-use development.

Since February 2022, City staff have worked with Ashburnham Realty and its design team on a number of conceptual design iterations in an effort to preserve the heritage value of the former Montreal House and fulfill the original intent of the Expression of Interest, including a high level of urban design and alignment with the Official Plan.

After numerous design iterations, it became evident that there were multiple competing priorities including:

  • the relationship of the building to the urban park,

  • the preservation of the Montreal House,

  • maintaining the agreement with CMHC to provide affordable housing,

  • achieving the accessibility and sustainability requirements of the new build, and

  • ensuring the development is not negatively impacted by the regulatory floodplain.

The Montreal House is significant for being one of the only local hotels that accommodated shantymen (lumberjacks) and under ownership of a French Canadian, Joseph Brault, it became a local gathering place for French and French-Canadian visitors and workers. Over time the establishment became a men’s only drinking establishment. By the late 20th century, the Montreal House emerged as a venue for emerging bands.

Now catering to both men and women, the tavern hosted numerous acts that have found local and national renown. Currently the building is used for a smokehouse restaurant.

Peterborough Architectural Conservation Advisory Committee received a presentation from Ashburnham Realty at its meeting on June 23, 2022. The Committee recognized the challenge of balancing the competing priorities to move this project forward. Several Committee members spoke to the merits of moving forward with the proposal which would require the demolition of the Montreal House; however, they were reminded that their mandate is to consider only the heritage aspects of the Montreal House and the Committee adopted a motion to recommend that Council designate the property under the Ontario Heritage Act.

A heritage designation for the property would end the public-private partnership for the construction of 75 affordable housing units on the property.

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Survivorman's Les Stroud Is Playing At The Montreal House Friday Night

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Survivorman himself, Les Stroud, is visiting Peterborough to play at the Montreal House this Friday night (March 22nd) to perform. Stroud recently won Best Writing in a Lifestyle or Reality/Competition Program at the Canadian Screen Awards, and is currently on tour. He is hoping to start filming new episodes of Survivorman soon. If you're new to his music, have a peek at his concert in Bancroft and listen to his music on the Les Stroud App for iOS.

[Contributed by PtboCanada's Evan Holt]

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Our Space Raise The Roof Fundraiser At MoHo November 25th

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Band to Watch: Peterborough's Elvyn Playing The MoHo January 28th

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Peterborough's Elvyn (pictured above) have a mini-tour upcoming later this month, including a gig at The Montreal House January 28th with Toronto's The Ethers and Ottawa's Still Winter Hills. Elvyn's latest record, The Decline, has been getting praise from college radio stations and music publications for their "rootsy power-pop and heartfelt imagery," and they were also recently featured on The Wolf's "5 Minutes of New Rock".

Take a listen to their stuff in the music player on the homepage of their website Elvyn.com. The band will be touring throughout this year, and are also in studio working on their follow-up to The Decline.

You can also follow Elvyn on Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and on their blog.

[Elvyn]

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PtboPic: Sign at The Moho Says...

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[photo submitted by Julie Morris, @cupcakeJu]

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Peterborough's Adam Kemp is a rock star of poster design

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Twenty-five-year-old Adam Kemp first got involved with graphic design in 2002 when he began making movie posters for fun. What started as a hobby has now become one of his jobs at his business World on Mute Designs, where he develops websites (for The Spades, for example), provides web maintenance, and does graphic design (from logos to invitations to his awesome posters). "I love the arts, from the clean to the wacky style," he says.

World on Mute is a curious name for a company—and here's where Kemp says it came from: "The name 'World on Mute' originated from a group of friends that was gathering to make a movie about me and my hearing impaired disability. I loved the name and it just stuck with me for quite a long time. When I was at Sir Sandford Fleming [he's a graduate of the Web Developer program there], I was asked by one of my teachers, 'What are you going to name your business?'  And I knew right away. I remembered 'World on Mute' and wanted to use that."

Chances are you've seen some of his eye-popping posters at The Historic Red Dog and elsewhere in downtown Peterborough. "I'm glad that Ryan Kemp [his brother] of The Red Dog gave me a chance to express my creativity through these posters that I've designed for the Red Dog," says Kemp, who was born and raised in the Patch. "I've received so many compliments from the bands that just loved their posters that I did."  

Kemp recently moved to Port Credit, Mississauga's Village on the Lake—"it reminds me of East City in Peterborough but without the good old Quaker Oats smell," he says—but gets back to Peterborough as much as he can.

Below are some of his favourite posters he's designed.

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Platinum Blonde Playing The Montreal House

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Since Platinum Blonde is playing the MOHO this Friday, we got a little nostalgic:





 
[Platinum Blonde, The Montreal House]

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