Royal Victoria Hospital Nurse's Home(5/1905-3/1912)
[687] Pine Avenue West, Montreal, QC, Canada
Health, Dormitory [basement, 4 floors, 114 bedrooms]; stone; steel frame

Client: Royal Victoria Hospital
Architect: E. & W.S. Maxwell

Description: In 1880, George Stephen was a well-known entrepreneur when he undertook the direction of the CPR project. He and his cousin, Lord Strathcona, contributed in the creation of a Montreal landmark, the Royal Victoria Hospital. Both entrepreneurs proposed to donate half a million dollars each for the building of a hospital, on condition the city allocate ten acres of land on Mount Royal for the site. When completed in 1893, the hospital emerged as an expansive structure, designed by architects Saxon & Snell from London, England. The Royal Victoria Hospital housed the most modern hospital facilities of its time. The exterior is a hybrid style of Scottish manor house and the sumptuous Val-de-Loire châteaux of the French Renaissance. Its U-shaped plan and the numerous turrets make it similar to the design of the Royal Edinburgh Hospital erected a few years before. A later addition, the Ross Pavilion was funded by another Montreal philanthropist, J.K.L. Ross (590) his residence was also designed by the Maxwells. The Pavilion continued the tradition of the main building with a graceful structure spread against the background of the Mountain. In offering the city a new hospital the founders had expressed their hope that it would be devoted to the care of the sick and poor of Montreal, to increase the facilities of acquiring a medical education, and to become a centre for the training of professional nurses. In 1905, considering the provision of adequate living quarters for nurses, the Maxwell brothers were commissioned to design the Nurses’ Home. The result was a four-storey building, with its distinctive crow- stepped gable roof, which contains 114 bedrooms organised along a double-loaded corridor. The building is flanked at both sides by two minor blocks, one containing the dining room and the other the assembly room. The exterior elevations show common elements used by the Maxwells like dormers on the roof, and quoins that articulate the façade. Today, the Nurses’ Home of the Royal Victoria hospital houses the hospital’s library and research laboratories of medical genetics.

Holdings: Dormitory (basement, 4 floors, 114 bedrooms); stone; steel frame
91 Drawings: 76 ink on linen; 2 ink on paper; 1 watercolour on paper; 12 blueprints
1 Presentation drawing: exterior perspective
28 Working drawings: floor plans, elevations, section, library, washrooms, structure, dormers, bay, stonework
50 Detail drawings: floor plan, elevations, section, wall section, hall, assembly hall, library, living room, dining room, kitchen, pantries, passage, washrooms, entries, mechanical, stairs, fire escape, fireplaces, chimney, windows, dormers, bay, gables, doors, archways, balustrade, fittings, finishes, ironwork, stonework, ornamentation, entry gates
12 Consultant drawings: structure
3 Photographs: 3 finished exteriors
Comment: 12 drawings by Dominion Bridge Company, dated 1906, are included.

Comments: 12 drawings by Dominion Bridge Company, dated 1906, are included.