Nation Building: Gothic Revival Houses in Upper Canada and Canada West, c. 1830-1867

The Gothic Revival is, without question, the most influential architectural movement to have ever come out of England. Its effects on houses, and colonial houses, in particular, however, have been little studied. Nation building: Gothic Revival houses in Upper Canada and Canada West, c.1830–67 examines the Gothic Revival houses built in the English colony of Upper Canada and Canada West prior to Confederation in 1867 in order to contextualize them and to give this category of housing the academic attention it merits. Using the buildings themselves as well as architectural drawings, plans, and archival photographs, this dissertation reveals and contextualizes the houses of pre–Confederation Canada within the broader scope of Western architectural history. The houses are divided into temporal and theoretical categories, examining the chronological spread of the style as well the means by which it was employed; namely, through architects and publications. Beyond formal analysis of the objects themselves, then, the influence of British and American precedents is examined from the mid–eighteenth century through to the late 1860s, as well as the dissemination of these ideas to the colony through a variety of conduits such as architects, publications and popular aesthetic theories. This study also explores the rise of the architectural practice in the colony and the resulting eventual spread of the architectural vocabulary of the Gothic style into vernacular housing. Likewise examined are the multiple identities and associations produced by the Gothic style as applied to designs for houses, both on paper and as actually built. This study is the first of its kind, providing not only a comprehensive examination of the houses themselves, but the diverse theories, influences and cultural meanings behind them as well. In short, this dissertation establishes the framework for the academic discussion of these houses by rigorously contextualizing them within existing architectural histories. Overall, it exposes these houses as valid cultural objects and as an important part in the formation of Canada’s built heritage.