Vacation in Canada, eh? 8: Lunenburg, Nova Scotia

In Lunenburg, the centuries seem to melt into one another.

A townscape on the edge of the water is full of brightly coloured wooden houses and ships in the harbour. — The waterfront of Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of Canada’s most historic towns.

We have good reasons to choose Canadian vacation destinations these days. And we have great destinations to visit – especially if you’re interested in architecture. This is one of a series of blogs meant to shine a light on some of our built treasures.

By Peter Coffman

Have you ever experienced a ‘time slip’? That’s when you step into a place – could be a streetscape, or a building interior, even your own home – and suddenly realize that you’re no longer in the year you thought you were in. The streets are filled with horses and carts, the women wear petticoats, rooms are lit by gaslight and candles. It’s a common trope of paranormal stories.

Visiting Lunenburg is the closest I’ve come to experiencing a time slip. I walk around its quiet streets at night – especially away from tourist season – and I have trouble remembering if I’m in the 18^th, 19^th, 20^th or 21^st century.

Blueprint of a the plan of Lunenburg in 1753, showing a perfect grid of streets. — The street plan of Lunenburg in 1753 – a pristine colonial grid that is perfectly preserved today.

It’s the seagull who gets the best view of the 18^th-century town. From above, you can still see the perfectly preserved colonial town plan, laid out when the town was founded in 1753. The British had a vision for what a colonial town should be: a perfect grid with a civic square in the middle. It’s a ruthlessly efficient instrument of control, completely oblivious to the specifics of the site. But that’s colonialism for you.

As we walk those perfectly aligned streets, we get a sense of what the Georgian town looked and felt like. As we reach the Lennox Tavern, we drift seamlessly between the late 18^th and the early 19^th centuries. For most of its more than 200 years, the Lennox has offered food, drink, and a place to lay your head. The building itself is simple, practical, and dignified. Like the Georgian town that built it.

A bright red/orange wooden house viewed obliquely along a narrow and empty street that recedes into fog. — The Lennox Tavern, built either a bit before or a bit after the end of the eighteenth century.

I walk north-west for less than five minutes, and I find I’ve traveled about a hundred years. Lunenburg Academy, designed by architect H.H. Mott and built 1894-95, proudly proclaims the value of public education. The building is bold, confident, optimistic, and exuberant. Like the Victorian town that built it.

A very large building with a varied, picturesque roofline. Made of wood pained in white, black, and red. — Lunenburg Academy.

That exuberance isn’t restricted to big public buildings. You can spend hours, even days, walking the Victorian streets and drinking in the details. We have architectural terms for all of those bits: ‘brackets’, ‘lintels’ ‘pediments’, yada yada yada. But all we really need to do is look, and marvel at what a person with vision and a jigsaw can bring to the world.

A bright yellow exterior widow frame is surrounded by red clapboard and adorned with ornate green gingerbread.

A large and elaborate wooden house with several bay windows and a triple-arched doorway.

A very elaborate series of painted wooden scrolls and roundels lines the upper edge of an exterior wall.

A detail of incredibly ornate woodwork decoration with pinnacles and arches, painted in black & white.

As we drift into the 20^th century, we drift toward the waterfront. The sea had long been the front door and the workplace of Lunenburg, and the bustle of the early 1900s has left its mark. Boats had to be built, and be outfitted. Fish had to be processed. And, for the unlucky ones, the ultimate price had to be paid.

A partially-built boat sits inside a huge work shed with an arched ceiling. — The restored Smith and Rhuland boat shed.

A series of bright red buildings on the waterfront, with the words "Adams & Knickle Lunenburg Outfitting Company". — Adams and Knickle, outfitters to Lunenburg mariners since 1897.

A series of red wooden buildings on the waterfront with several ships in the harbour. — A former fish processing plant, now the Fisheries Museum of the Atlantic.

A solemn set of polished black stone monuments, inscribed with the names of Lunenburg fishermen lost at sea. — The Fishermen’s Memorial, commemorating the many who went to work and never came home.

What if we awaken from the dream and find ourselves in the 21^st century? We find a town full of tourists (but little other industry), beautiful buildings, great seafood – and huge challenges. The whole of the Old Town is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Keeping that status is a priority. But there’s a housing shortage. Heritage buildings need maintenance. Maintenance needs money, lots of it. Lunenburg has to evolve to survive, but it also has to stay the same – whatever that means.

A slightly warm-toned black & white image of a series of small wooden house on a street that recedes into the fog.

When it all becomes a bit daunting, I start walking north again, away from the harbour, into the quiet streets where the tourists thin out and the air is thick with ghosts. And I blissfully forget what century I’m in.

Peter Coffman, History & Theory of Architecture program
peter.coffman@carleton.ca
@petercoffman.bsky.social

Other blogs in the Vacation in Canada series:

Fort Macleod, Alberta

Haines Junction, Yukon

St. John’s, Newfoundland

The Exchange District, Winnipeg, Manitoba

Getting to Know Us

The Promise of the Train

Dorothy, Alberta