Bannerman Brewing, St. John's Farmers' Market win awards for heritage preservation
'We could see through the old lead paint and asbestos' of defunct fire hall, says owner
When Phil Maloney first walked into the defunct fire hall at 90 Duckworth St., he began to doubt his grand scheme to revamp the site.
"It was a mess," Maloney said. At that point, the building had been vacant for about two decades.
"The city had stored a bunch of documents and stuff in here. The basement was decrepit. I think they'd actually filmed a horror movie in here at one point."
Maloney co-owns Bannerman Brewing Company, which is among four locations recently awarded the Southcott Award for preserving a heritage space by the Historic Trust of Newfoundland, a non-profit organization that advocates the restoration of historic sites in the province.
The St. John's Farmers' Market, which moved into the former Metrobus Depot on Freshwater Road, also won a Southcott.
"They're really successful projects that took existing buildings in the community that had previously pretty unique uses and transformed them into new businesses or new community entities that continue to have really different and unique uses," said Emily Wolf, member of the board of directors of the Newfoundland and Labrador Historic Trust.
"We felt that those were two really successful projects that demonstrate how effective adaptive reuse can be."
The Bannerman Brewing Co. microbrewery — with its cavernous drinking hall and iconic garage door — opened last spring in a structure built in 1895 and overhauled in the 1940s.
The legacy of the fire hall was apparent when the bar's owners took over, but it wasn't just the high ceiling that reminded them of decades past.
Luckily, "we could see through the old lead paint and asbestos," Maloney said — looking past the grime at the bones of the building.
"It was this great big open bright space."
The restoration was not without its challenges. Maloney describes the slow realization that the entire foot-thick concrete floor, including the rebar, would need to be jackhammered out and replaced — a far cry from the simple polish they'd expected.
"But all things considered, the shell of the building … this concrete rectangle that we're in has mostly been left unchanged," Maloney said.
Construction took about two years.
"There were a few points where we looked at each other and said, yeah, it might have made more sense to tear the thing down," he said.
"I'm glad we didn't, because that would be a huge loss to the heritage and meaning of this place."
Wolf said the public can look to Bannerman as an example of why it's important to care about heritage buildings and develop existing resources in historic downtown St. John's.
"Preservation can take different forms, depending on the project," she said.
"Sometimes it means that every aspect of a historic of a historic building is carefully maintained; sometimes it means that, as appropriate, new elements are brought in to complement older elements."
The Harbour Grace Railway Station and Crocker House in Heart's Delight also received awards for historic restoration.
With files from The St. John's Morning Show and Malone Mullin