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Four golden Victoria makeovers capitalize on cultural past

When it comes to character, Greater Victoria is as easily defined by its coastal culture and socially conscious residents as its colonial heritage and architecture.

When it comes to character, Greater Victoria is as easily defined by its coastal culture and socially conscious residents as its colonial heritage and architecture. How local businesses capitalize on this can depend as much on space as marketing, especially when a compact downtown is considered.

‘There’s still a wide range of spaces here, particularly for those fond of heritage buildings,” says Geoff Archer, president-elect for the Canadian Council for Small Business and Entrepreneurship and a professor at Royal Roads University. ‘‘Taking advantage of the characteristics of the space makes sense as an entrepreneur. It’s resourceful.”

Archer foresees the city following suit with others in the propensity to renew outdated neighbourhoods and industrial spaces, the creative blossoming of micro lofts into business spaces, parkades into developments with underground parking and unusual business spaces. ‘‘Put a business on a barge downtown? Why not?”

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There are already many businesses in the city, and outlying areas, making creative use of the space they’re in, some with a particularly Victoria flavour.

1. Green, clean and local

After three years of teaching cooking classes and catering in several spaces around town, London Chef Dan Hayes and his wife, Micayla Hayes, knew they needed to put their business under one roof. ‘‘We wanted to form a tangible identity and be in a space that was modern and clean,” says Dan Hayes.

Being in an environmentally friendly building wasn’t at the top of their list, but it was definitely a draw when they had the opportunity to move into one of the city’s first LEED gold-certified developments at 947 Fort St. three years ago. ‘‘The recycling room here is unbelievable. There are bins for absolutely everything,‘‘ says Hayes. The building also has a green roof, energy-efficient plumbing, water-reduction features, a gym, showers and is close to bus and walking routes.

Hayes says his customers come foremost for good food and to learn how to cook, but he does see a stronger value placed on sustainability. ‘‘In London, you’d get chefs shouting from the rooftops if they got the season’s first lemons from the Amalfi coast or artichokes from Normandy,” he says. ‘‘Here in Victoria, people want their food to be grown 10 steps from their door. But they also want it to be good.”

2. Converted heritage house is more than a fish shop

Just a stroll across the park from Fisherman’s Wharf in James Bay is a green-and-white-trimmed character house converted into an understated fresh fish shop — or at least that’s how it appears. The headquarters for Finest At Sea ocean products, at 27 Erie St., also includes an entire fish-processing plant, business office, open-air fish market, and deli and food cart, all expertly enclosed in a residential neighbourbood. “Part of the plan to grow was always to keep expansion in style with the house and the neighbourhood,” says Paul Chaddock, vice-president and partner in Finest At Sea.

“We’re fully immersed in the community and they’re our best customers, so it’s important to fit in well.”

Filtration systems run under buildings with facades to match the main house, quaint wood steeples mask the sound of fans, and a special forklift runs on an engine that barely whispers.

The idea to house the operation in a heritage home came from company owner and president Bob Fraumeni. He started fishing at age 11 in Gonzales Bay and has fostered a passion for the associated culture and community ever since. “It’s a sweet thing for a fisherman to be able to reach out and sell fish to his own people,” says Fraumeni.

With its proximity to Fisherman’s Wharf and James Bay residents, he saw great potential in the 1903 home that’s now Finest At Sea.

“It was built by the captain of a schooner so his wife could watch him come into the harbour,” he says. “It was just a drab old house when I bought it, so a lot had to be done.”

In 1999, Fraumeni gutted the home and refinished the inside with office space, rooms for overnighting fishermen and eventually a fish shop in the back. It still holds several heritage features, including hardwood floors, a clawfoot tub and nautical memorabilia.

While Finest At Sea works with more than a dozen fishing boats, several still come into Victoria’s harbour to deliver fresh spot prawns, salmon, halibut, crab and tuna.

3. Cooking a concrete block, sunny side up

It took a photographer’s eye to see a diamond in the rough in an unfinished concrete-block space for rent in Vic West. Actually, it took two. ‘‘We were blown away by the potential,‘‘ says Dean Azim, in the bright, cavernous Cinderbloc Studio at 602 Esquimalt Rd.

Azim and business partner Antonio La Fauci liked the space so much they named their business after it.

The photography studio is in an non-descript building next to a used-car lot and dog-grooming shop, literally on the other side of the train tracks.

When La Fauci first checked out the place more than three years ago, it was a cluttered shell of a room with one invaluable feature. “Eighteen-foot ceilings and southwest-facing windows,” says La Fauci.

He shows how the floor-to-ceiling windows helped create the studio’s crown jewel by pulling massive white parachute-material curtains across the bright light streaming in to create a soft glow.

“It’s kind of like putting a softbox over the sun,” La Fauci says.

It terms of a work space, Azim and La Fauci went all out on the local connections. They used reclaimed wood from an old house in Oak Bay to build a loft, made a kitchenette from a dismantled bridge in Jordan River, a desk from the old Mayfair Lanes bowling alley and flooring from 120-year-old salvaged fir.

Other professional photographers in town already rent the space for shoots, but Azim and La Fauci plan to form a non-profit organization so they can host photography-based talks and events. “It’s an ideal space because you can just take it over and everything is here,” says Azim.

4. Toasting a historical gem in the heart of Victoria

Matt MacNeil has a history of building pubs around things that are, well, historical. His first venture, The Penny Farthing in Oak Bay, was inspired by watching resident Jack Leonard ride his homemade version of the 18th-century bicycle in the Oak Bay Tea Party Parade.

When he was putting together the Irish Times downtown, he researched the history of the building — designed by our most-famous architect, Francis Rattenbury, in the late 1800s as a Bank of Montreal — and restored the original entrance.

But his latest venture, The Bard and Banker Public House at 1022 Government St., is perhaps the most historically inspired.

“Banks are excellent buildings because they’re usually on a corner, near the best foot traffic, and big,” says MacNeil.

The corner building was erected in 1862 for what would later become the Bank of British Columbia.

“In researching the building, one of the most interesting notes was not just that it had been a bank, but that the great poet Robert Service worked here.”

In 1903, Service came through Victoria looking for work and landed a job as the night watchman. The young bachelor slept with a pistol on the second-floor vault, inspiring the name for the pub’s loft bar room. He would later transfer to banks in the Yukon and Prairies, writing poems and becoming one of the country’s most profitable “bards.”

“He was both a bard and a banker,” says MacNeil, who envisioned his pub as if it opened in the 1800s in a high Victorian style. Using photos and catalogues from the era, he worked with designers to create the ornate vaulted ceilings, a bevelled glass entrance and an extraordinary display of locally made light fixtures.

One of the most interesting features of the pub is the logo, an emblem made up of a Scottish thistle, wild English rose and Irish clover. It comes from a cast-iron fixture that was on top of the building in 1885 and later went to a homeowner in Oak Bay. When MacNeil discovered the emblem, he had it recast into gating on the loft seating above the pub’s bar.

spetrescu@timescolonist.com