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Sir William Van Horne House (Coven Hoven)(10/1901)
Minister's Island, Saint-Andrews, NB, Canada
Residential, Country house [additions: 2 floors, including dining room and billiard room]; stone; wall bearing

Client: Sir William Cornelius Van Horne
Architect: E. Maxwell

Description: In January 1882, the CPR hired the American-born William Cornelius Van Horne as a general manager. He succeeded George Stephen as CPR president in 1888, and was knighted in 1894. Sir William purchased a five-hundred-acre property on the southern tip of Minister’s Island in Passamaquoddy Bay near the resort town of Saint-Andrews, New Brunswick. On this great expanse of land he developed a huge building complex named Coven Hoven in tribute to his father Cornelius Covenhoven Van Horne. In his retreat, Van Horne could devote himself to two favorite leisure activities, painting and stockbreeding. After having some problems with the local contractor, Mr. Van Horne called the young architect Edward Maxwell in order to assist him in the design of his summer home. Van Horne designed the first plans of the original house. These old plans show a modest one-and-one-half-storey building with a shingled roof extending to cover the verandah. The walls and verandah piers are of red sandstone with shingles used for the shed dormer and roof. Centered at the front were four windowed dormers which reflected the symmetry of the broad French windows flanking the ground floor entrance. On the ground floor the layout consisted of a central hall opening onto four bedrooms, with the kitchen and service rooms located in a block at the rear. The first addition to the house appears to have been designed in 1899. Van Horne asked Edward to project a compatible enlargement to the existing house, while retaining its original style. Maxwell’s inspiration was based on the works of American architects like John Calvin, J.C. Stevens and Gilbert Winslow Cobb of Portland, Maine. Maxwell designed a new wing extension (a 45 degree angle from the original house) at the north west corner accommodating a dinning room and a studio on the ground floor, with bedrooms above, and a small addition at the east by the kitchen. This work added a second gable to the western wing and included a porte-cochère that extended out from the verandah. In this way, Maxwell artfully managed to triple the house’s size and shift the central part to the west. Van Horne was not satisfied with the first plans designed by Edward and asked for a revision. The last plans designed by the architect featured and L-shaped addition to first wing previously designed. This new block contains perhaps the most striking room of the house, a magnificent dining room with exposed beams, decorated with paintings of old masters, Persian rugs and English furniture. A monumental fireplace of green marble and tile was surmounted by twisted gilded columns and carved with grape vines. One of the distinctive features of this house is a tower placed at the junction of the roof added several years later. This new addition housed the nursery and was decorated with a mural painted by Van Horne for his grandson’s third birthday. In the corner of the nursery stand a large fireplace decorated with Dutch scenes. They were inspired by the fireplaces at Tillietudlen, Nowentesa, Château-du-lac and other houses designed by Edward. The buildings in this farm retreat were outstanding in design and volume. The most interesting of the auxiliary buildings is the barn that housed the CPR president’s prize herd of Dutch-belted cattle. The building is a three-storey structure fifty meters long, built on stone foundations. Conical roofs crown two projecting tall silos on the front. A shingled roof with flared gable ends was fitted with five air vents, and a wrought iron weather vane with a Belted cow. In 1906 Van Horne added other buildings which included a greenhouse, a peach house, and a cottage for the head gardener and his helpers. There are other significant auxiliary buildings including stables, garages, service buildings, and a remarkable water tower and a beach house. The latter was built next to a natural pool and the two-storey stone tower beach house was built on bedrock. It had a number of changing rooms on the ground level and a lounge or studio overlooking the lawns of the estate on the upper level. After Van Horn’s death in 1915, Coven Hoven remained property of the family until 1961. It was bought and sold several times before the New Brunswick government purchased it, considering it a heritage site worthy of conservation.

Holdings: Country house (additions: 2 floors, including dining room and billiard room); stone; wall bearing
11 Drawings: 6 ink on linen; 2 ink on paper; 3 watercolour on linen
8 Working drawings: foundation plan, floor plans, elevations, sections
3 Development drawings: floor plans, elevations
1 Photograph: 1 finished exterior
Comment: The development drawings are signed by E. Maxwell. Architect unidentified on working drawings for existing house.

Comments: The development drawings are signed by E. Maxwell. Architect unidentified on working drawings for existing house.

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