The Vancouver Sun
"Old Houses Are Finding a New Lease
on Life...
Demand for heritage-style houses has been strong for a decade or more in areas such as Strathcona in Vancouver and New Westminster. But until the last couple of years, demand for such houses on the West Side of Vancouver lagged behind.

Over the last two to three years, houses with heritage character from the 1920s and before on the West Side have often sold for more money than new houses," says Keith Jakobsen, who trained as an architect and now specializes in renovations and custom home design.

Before, such houses were considered tear-downs, but now there is a definite shift to heritage awareness." As a result, there is often a scramble to buy examples of those houses, sometimes attracting multiple offers, Jakobsen says.

Alix Brown, a realtor with Dexter Associates, has sold a number of heritage-style homes over the last few years. "People just love the old mouldings, stained-glass windows, old doors with beautiful brass or cut glass crystal handles and the magnificent banisters," Brown says, "Anything in the six and seven hundred thousand dollar range in Kitsilano is snapped up immediately." Last year, she sold a Tudor-style house on the 3500 block of Cypress which featured a huge fireplace in the hall, exquisite oak panelling and

oak floors. "You don't get the craftsmanship today that went into houses built in the early part of the century," Brown says.

Jakobsen says one type of heritage home, the so-called Craftsman style, can trace its roots to California at the turn of the century.
"A lot of builders and developers started to hire architects to design single-family homes at that time," says Jakobsen, principal of Jakobsen Associates.

He says they were influenced by Japanese post-and-beam construction and by bungalows commonly used by the British in India.

"The bungalow in India typically had a porch wrapped around the whole structure because of the heat," Jakobsen says. "They were adapted in North America with a porch on either the south or west side for protection from the hot afternoon sun."

Knee braces that hold up the eaves were influenced by Japanese construction, he says. There is also a trend to undo renovations that, in many early 20th century houses, occurred in the 1960s and 1970s.

For example, Jakobsen worked on a house at First Avenue and Larch which had been renovated in the 1970s with shag carpeting and canary yellow melamine kitchen cabinets.

"A lot of the heritage character had been taken out of the inside of the house," he says. "The owner wanted to re-work the interior and put in a new kitchen, new stairwell and second-storey bathroom to reflect its heritage."

Before Jakobsen started his own company six years ago, he worked as a heritage development planner at City Hall. His company specializes in custom designs and renovations.
By Rod Nutt
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