The Architecture

Interior features include a marble entrance hall and staircase, twenty-foot high barrel-vaulted ceiling, carved oak trim and doors, ceiling-high leaded glass windows and beveled bar mirrors, and Victorian milk-glass chandeliers.  The building also contains a two-story vault connected by a spiral steel staircase.

Exterior features include semicircular balconies, Doric pilasters, decorative ironwork, and a copper-sheathed door at the lane entrance.  The front doorway is splayed at the base in ancient Egyptian fashion, and rises through the pediment to enclose a clerestory window.  The whole exterior is solid granite, except for two beavers and lighthouse cast in concrete which crown the building.

The History

Century House was built in 1911 for the Canada Permanent Mortgage Corporation.  The building was designed by J.S.D. Taylor, a Scottish architect.  Canada Permanent operated at Century House until 1951.  Since then, it has been home to an insurance company, trade school, an antique store, a restaurant, a book store, and Lola's Restaurant.  Century House is a Class A heritage building.