The Restoration of 1908 Heritage Copper Cottage
We recently heard that a “labour of love” project that caught our attention early last year has come to a happy conclusion. The restoration of Copper Cottage is complete. Tony and Yvonne are living in their beautiful new home, landscaped with specimen plants that were moved with the cottage, and gearing up for the next stage of their project, re-commencing the renovation of their original home.
The offer was too good to pass up: a 1908 heritage cottage free of charge. The catch: find a new home for the cottage.
Tony Dean and Yvonne Perrault were well into plans to renovate their own heritage cottage in the Grand Boulevard area when they put that renovation on the back burner and acquired Copper Cottage, vintage 1908, only three blocks away.
Copper Cottage Restoration
Photo Credit Alex Jordan, North Shore News
In March 2020, they accomplished the monumental task of moving the cottage to its new location. The move was a challenge, even for Nickel Brothers house moving specialists: it took one hour to move the house those three blocks and three hours to place it correctly on the site. Copper Cottage’s new home is on the same lot as Tony and Yvonne’s original home. One could say the two-cottage project is a combination of lane house and infill.
Almost a full year later, the restoration of Copper Cottage is complete. Tony and Yvonne are living in their new home, landscaped with specimen plants that were moved with the cottage, and gearing up for the next stage of their project, the renovation of their original home.
Tony has produced a second video documenting the renovation. Here is the link, to the video and Brent Richter’s story in the North Shore News
The WVHS took an interest in this project from the outset and encouraged Tony and Yvonne to participate in the society’s Local Voices series on Heritage and Neighbourhood Character. For the Copper Cottage presentation, look for the video within the video, made to convince Yvonne’s nephew that yes, a building can be moved. In Copper Cottage’s day, moving houses was common practice. It was considered wasteful to demolish them. Check out the WVHS YouTube video here.