ROEDDE HOUSE MUSEUM 
The West End’s Window On The Past

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The West End’s Roedde House Museum is the neighbourhood’s only surviving example of late-Victorian housing architecture to remain intact. The building is painted, decorated, and furnished in the original style, faithfully restored to reflect the day-to-day life of a middle class, immigrant family at the end of the 19th century. Today, the museum is both a window on the past and a thriving hub of events, exhibitions, and activities.

Roedde House Preservation Society president Cindy Kravchenko (left) and interim manager Rachel Lige.

A WINDOW ON THE PAST … Gustav Roedde was born in 1860 in Grossbodungen, Germany and trained as a bookbinder in Leipzig. He immigrated to the United States in 1881 and settled in Cleveland, Ohio, where he met and married Matilda Marie Cassebohm, who was from the island of Heligoland, Germany. The couple moved to San Francisco, then Victoria, and finally to Vancouver. It was here where Gustav opened the city’s first bookbindery in 1888. Mr. Roedde’s business flourished in the following decades; as the newly-founded city did as well. By 1893, the Roeddes could afford to have a new house built in the new West End neighbourhood at 1415 Barclay Street. Theirs is one of three treasured houses at what is now known as Barclay Heritage Square.

The family grew to include six children and three St. Bernard dogs, a houseful indeed. Some of the great-grandchildren of this pioneer family still live and work in Vancouver and maintain a proud and active interest in the house.

In the early 1980s the City, with the assistance of the Heritage Canada Foundation and the B.C. Heritage Trust, began a restoration of the exterior of the house which was completed in 1984. The Roedde House Preservation Society was formed to implement the interior restoration of the house.

Its design is generally attributed to the famed B.C. architect, Francis Rattenbury, notable for the Legislative Buildings and Empress Hotel in Victoria. The architectural style is Queen Anne Revival, incorporating a cupola, bay windows, upstairs porch, and downstairs verandas.

Roedde House is now a City of Vancouver-designated Class A Heritage House. The house is owned by the City of Vancouver and, at the urging of the Community Arts Council of Vancouver, was designated a “heritage building” by the City in 1976. This served as a catalyst for the restoration and development of the entire Barclay Heritage Square, which includes Barclay Manor, home of the West End Seniors’ Network, and Diamond Centre For Living, headquarters of the Friends for Life Society.

Since 1990, the Roedde House Preservation Society has taken painstaking care to restore and furnish the house to reflect the ambience of late Victorian family life. This monumental undertaking involved many dedicated groups and individuals, including many citizens of the West End neighbourhood.

Roedde House Museum was restored to its original splendour with paint from the Benjamin Moore “True Colours” collection of original colours from the Victorian era. Work on the interior was painstaking, with faithful attention to detail gleaned from historical records, from consultation with surviving members of the Roedde family, and from the process of stripping paint and wallpaper from century-old walls to discover the original colours and finishings. The downstairs of the house was then authentically furnished with all the accoutrements of middle-class life in the 1890s.

In March 2000, the restoration of the second floor of the Museum, comprising boys’ and girls’ bedrooms, and Matilda’s sewing room, further enhanced the portrayal of turn-of-the-century family life.

The Museum offers a unique experience for visitors: unlike many heritage houses, the rooms are not roped off or behind glass. Visitors can walk into every room and will even be invited to touch some artifacts. Each of the eleven rooms has been furnished with period items which were collected over the years, some returned by the Roedde family. Experienced docents will be happy to share their knowledge and stories with you.

If you wish to go at your own pace, you may use the multilingual information cards you will find in each room of the house. They are available in English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Japanese, Korean and Chinese. These are also accessible using the self guided tour.

Group tours are by appointment only. For information and bookings, call 604.684.7040 or email info@roeddehouse.org.

MORE THAN A MUSEUM … As well as being a unique look-in on Victorian life in the West End, Roedde House Museum offers the community a busy lineup of events. The popular Jazz In The Parlour monthly series has seen artists like Patty V, Miles Black, Jody Proznick, and Eli Davidovici entertain in the Victorian parlour. Come spring and summer the series moves to the porch, with seating on the extensive lawn of Heritage Square Park, and other music events have included an outdoor performance by Vancouver City Opera. Other concerts throughout the year include the Vancouver Inter-cultural Orchestra’s “Music of the World” series, reflecting different cultures with Vancouver musicians.

The house keep step with the seasons, with movie screenings, Victorian ghost stories and other Victorian-themed Christmas events, including a Christmas Market, connecting visitors to the museum’s Victorian era roots.

Exhibitions are always a big draw at Roedde House, such as the current “Legacy Voyage: The African American Migration to British Columbia, 1858,” which commemorates Black History Month by spotlighting the significant wave of migration that occurred around 1858, when Sir James Douglas extended an invitation to African Americans to immigrate to British Columbia. Promising eventual citizenship and fair treatment in exchange for support of British rule in the new colony, Douglas played a pivotal role. The exhibition also shines a spotlight on some of the individuals who left a lasting impact on B.C.’s political and cultural fabric. The show will remain up until the end of March.

Running concurrently with “Legacy Voyage” are two other deeply meaningful exhibitions. “E. Pauline Johnson – Tekahionwake: A Retrospective” is the story of the life and legacy of the Canadian poet, who transcended cultural boundaries, became known by her Kanyen’kehà:ka (Mohawk) stage name, Tekahionwak. She authored the famed “The Song My Paddle Sings,” and gave Lost Lagoon its name. This exhibition runs to the end of May.

The Roedde House Parlour, scene of many cultural gatherings.

The Roedde family hired at least one Chinese immigrant man to serve in their home as a house servant, and the exhibition “Essential Servants: Hung” at the Roedde House and Chinese Domestics in Victorian and Edwardian British Columbia” uses testimony from Gwen Varcoe, the Roeddes’ eldest granddaughter, and archival and academic sources to explore the experiences of Chinese Canadian domestic servants in late 18th- and early 19th-century B.C. This exhibition serves as another way that the Museum is working on decolonizing its space and telling more diverse stories. Indeed, the Roedde family, too, was implicated in this history, as were many middle-and-upper-class families in the young province. This exhibition is currently on hiaitus but will return in June.

Education of the next generation is another important role played by the museum. The Roedde House Museum’s School Program offers hands-on activities for students and supports and enriches the Grade 4 and 5 Social Studies and Language Arts Curricula. The program includes a tour of the house with experienced docents at a cost of $4/student, along with access to the downloadable “Roedde House Museum : Windows to the Past” curriculum, and an artifact kit to explore in the classroom.

And did we mention weddings? You can rent the facilities at Roedde House for your special events, including weddings, anniversaries, and other special occasions. How about a Victorian-themed party?

And that’s not all … not by a long shot! For more information about Roedde House Museum’s past, current, and upcoming offerings spend some time browsing their comprehensive website here. For more about Roedde House, its rental facilities, tours, special events, and education program visit their website here.

Learn more about Roedde House Museum and its events and activities on their website here. Also, consider volunteering and/or making a donation!