E. P. Connors House - Classic Prairie Style in the heart of Westboro

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If you read this blog regularly, you'll know that I love to find examples of architectural styles in the Westboro neighbourhood of Ottawa, particularly Modern and Prairie style architecture.

Once in a while I find a real gem in the 'hood that deserves its own post. In this case, it's E. P. Connors house at 166 Huron Ave.

This house, designed in 1915 by Francis Conroy Sullivan, is a classic example of the modernist Prairie school of architecture in Canada. Sullivan was strongly influenced by the Prairie school and worked for several years with Frank Lloyd Wright, the best known architect of the prairie school movement.

Sullivan, who once worked for the federal Department of Public Works, was a prominent architect in Ottawa from about 1907 to 1917. In addition to frequently designing schools for the Ottawa Catholic School Board, he designed several buildings of national historical significance, including the Banff National Park Pavillion and the the Horticulture building at Landsdown Park in Ottawa.

Although strongly influenced by Frank Lloyd Wright, Sullivan's style was different in several important ways: For example, whereas horizontals predominate in Wright's creations, Sullivan used strong verticals to create tension in his designs.

It's interesting to see how architects working in Ottawa today are influenced by Sullivan's and Wright's work. Barry Hobin, for example, at least to my eye, seems to be a disciple of the prairie school and often seems to incorporate strong vertical elements reminiscent of Sullivan's work into his designs. Just take a look at some of Hobin's designs in the pictures below.

(If your interested, you can see more pictures of the interior of these homes at the Modern Ottawa blog and on Helen McCallum's website.)

Barry Hobin also designed the houses at the the old Olgivie estate in Westboro, which were built by Uniform Urban Developments. Again, notice the influence of the Prairie school.

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Is Ottawa seeing a resurgance of the Prairie school movement. I think so. Arts & Crafts is still very popular, but there is no doubt that there is a shift happening.

Traditional style wins out

After much back-and-forth, we decided to go with the more traditional looking house. The contemporary design was nice, and we loved the porch that Linda designed, but in the end I think I'm a sucker for the strong horizontal lines produced by the prairie style. I also didn't care too much for the windows in the contemporary design. I felt they were too plain, even though they were very characteristic of the Modern style. In addition, the hipped roof of our house does not really lend itself to the modern look.

In terms of deciding factors, cost was not one of them, as both styles cost about the same. Similarly, fitting in with the neighbourhood was not really an issue, because all around we can find examples of Arts and Crafts, Modern, Mid-century Modern and Victory houses.

Another consideration that was raised, which we had not thought about, was that our house might end up looking too squat in the modern style. If you look at all the examples of modern houses in my previous post, they are all tall; they have a lot of presence on the street. Our house would lack that height (at least in the front) making it potentially look squat from the street.

So, with that sorted out, its onto the next step, designing the kitchen and starting to find a builder.


Examples of Craftsman and Modern style homes in the neighbourhood

Modern vs Traditional style house

Because we really like to make things difficult for ourselves, we asked our architect to do a concept drawing of the house in a more modern style so we could compare it to the more traditional, Arts and Crafts/Prairie style.

The only problem is that we like the new concept as much as the first.

Tell us what you think.

Below is the more traditional look, with the first picture the front of the house and the second of the rear of the house. (the picture of the front of the house was provided in black and white, so I had to colour it myself, which is why the colours don't exactly match)

and below is the more modern look. First, the front of the house. We both really like the asymetrical porch that she has designed. It's a bit difficult to tell on this picture, but the porch would be covered by a flat roof with wood sticking out the front so it looks sort of like a pergola. There is a wall at the front of the porch, about 3 feet wide or so, that screens the front door from the road. This provides a place to put things like strollers, snow shoves, etc. so that they are in front of the house, but not in sight from the road. The porch would be open at the side behind the wall. The cladding is a combination of stucco and wood siding. The siding would be by a company called Maibec, and they have a 25 year warranty of their siding (which means I don't have to paint it every five years).

and here is the rear of the house. The same basic design, but different windows from the more traditional look. This more modern look would allow us to have large corner windows in the bedroom and the living room.