Join Us For Our 5th Heritage Lounge Saturday, August 12th from 12 – 6

The Heritage Lounge will again be located in front of Rath Art Supplies at 2412 Main Street, just up from the intersection of Main, Kingsway and 7th Avenue and a part of the Vancouver Mural Festival’s street party. The street party is sponsored by the Mount Pleasant Business Improvement Area (MPBIA) and Create Vancouver Society.

Along with displays and maps about Mount Pleasant’s history, including its long and rich tradition of being home to a vibrant arts community, we will have colouring pages celebrating the neighbourhood’s built, cultural, natural and industrial heritage created by local artists.

Jennifer Chernecki created the page of the 1889 James Black Residence at 144 E 6th representing the time when it housed the Gropp’s Gallery Collective (from 2008 until 2014). James Lloyd’s illustration of the 1889 Depencier House at 151 E 8th depicts the Victorian building when it was home to the legendary Bain’s Candies and Fine Chocolates.

This year we will have several new colouring pages as well as a colouring station sponsored by Rath Art Supplies. The pages are free for the taking and if you don’t have time to sit down and do a little colouring we encourage you to take one home.

We will also have some neighbourhood walking tour pamphlets and our Heritage Heart Look and Find to take away.

We look forward to you dropping by and sharing your stories of the neighbourhood. Mount Pleasant’s Heritage Lives!

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Mount Pleasant’s Historical Themes

Each year since the Mount Pleasant Heritage Group’s inception we have had a Heritage Lounge (at the Autumn Shift Festival 2013-2015 and at the Vancouver Mural Festival 2016). We have created display boards on different topics including this one on Mount Pleasant’s historical themes. To access the City of Vancouver’s Mount Pleasant Community Plan document, on which this display board is based, click here.

Thanks for Joining Us at the Heritage Lounge!

Thank you to everyone who dropped by the Heritage Lounge. It was lovely to meet so many heritage enthusiasts interested in Mount Pleasant’s history and be part of the Vancouver Mural Festival/ MPBIA street fest.

A feature display this year was ‘My Mount Pleasant: Vancouver’s First Suburb’, put together by the neighbourhood’s grade five heritage ambassador Lauren Lee for BC Heritage Fairs. Everyone was most impressed with her engaging storytelling about our historic neighbourhood and her own heritage home. Click here to see her companion video for Young Citizens.

We had the beginnings of our next project available, which is a colouring book with pages by local artists celebrating Mount Pleasant’s built, cultural, natural and industrial heritage.

Jen Chernecki is colouring James Lloyd‘s illustration of the 1889 Depencier House at 151 E 8th, which depicts the building when it was home to Bain’s Candies and Fine Chocolates. Bain’s was in Mount Pleasant for over sixty years. The Depencier House is currently home to eight 1/2 Restaurant. Jen’s illustration is of the 1889 James Black Residence when it housed the Gropp’s Gallery Collective between 2008 to 2014. The residence is currently home to the James Black Gallery.

Sean MacPherson was on hand to tell about his ‘Remembering Brewery Creek’ project. We are happy to report that he has received a grant from the Chapman & Innovations Fund at UBC to create a website and walking app about the historical creek. We look forward to this new documentation of a key aspect of Mount Pleasant’s history.

Great to have Josh and Finn pouring lemonade for thirsty visitors on a hot day.

Many thanks to Lauren Lee and her family, local artists James Lloyd and Jennifer Chernecki and to Sean MacPherson.

Big thanks as well to Bruce Macdonald for the loan of his maps and photos, Stan of Rath Art Supplies for the easels, the Quebec Manor Co-op for the Lounge furniture and the MPBIA for the canopy.

The Heritage Lounge crew this year was Alyssa, Danielle, Jen and James & Sally.