An affectionate preservation of the old Waterloo Post Office

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“There’s all the salvaged stone,” says architect Jason Martin. “Anything that was taken down, like the front entrance, when you come into the elevator [lobby], we had to drop it down, probably six feet.”

It’s not a very big pile. A standard wooden skid containing a tidy stack of red brick at waist-height, and, beside it, about six or seven small cuts of chiselled sandstone. All stored in the basement of the old Waterloo Post Office (1910-11 by architect David Ewart, who designed dozens of post offices for the government between 1898 and 1914) at 35 King St. N., they’re a testament to the kid gloves Mr. Martin and engineer Nick Lawler donned when conducting a restoration and addition a few years ago.

“The argument is, if you ever remove the new building, you could put it back to what it was.”

However, Martin Simmons Sweers Architect’s glassy building to the north – made possible after a tragic fire in 2012 necessitated the demolition of the old two-storey building – will likely be considered handsome enough that future generations will want to keep the conversation between the Romanesque Revival landmark and its Neo-modernist appendage alive.

Especially because that neighbour is clad in copper panels that are a very close match to the heritage building’s roof: “We were just super fortunate to find a pre-patinaed copper that almost matched exactly. … If you do red brick it would always be competing,” says Mr. Martin.

It’s best to view this pairing from the empty, still-unleased third floor, where one can stand on a portion of floor that ‘hovers’ over the gap between the two buildings. New, square building to the left; a ‘bridge’ of skylights looking down into the leased second floor; and, at right, the angled heritage roof punctuated by dormer windows surrounded by pink sandstone. It’s here, too, that one can see the affectionate, architectural kiss-on-the-cheek that Mr. Lawler has engineered rather than, say, the greedy and sloppy groping that takes place at the Royal Ontario Museum.

“You said that, I didn’t,” Mr. Martin says with a laugh.

“The glass skylight here keeps the integrity of the existing roof line from the street,” Mr. Lawler says of Tacoma Engineers. “As you go down through the building, that façade of the building is exposed – there’s no covering up of anything – so you can always see the building wherever you are.” He’s right: later, when we visit Old Firehall Confectionery on the ground floor, the retail counter’s backdrop is the proud face of the old post office, untouched by the structural posts in front.

“My experience in older buildings allows me to push the limits even further, because I know that there’s inherent strength in older materials,” Mr. Lawlor continues. “I know that there’s a lot more efficiency and redundancy in these older buildings, and so I can really push things out, whereas some other engineers are not as comfortable doing that.”

Of course, as with all things heritage, it still wasn’t a walk in the park. The main entrance, at the corner of King street and Dupont street west, had always been up two short flights of stone stairs. Since altering that would severely change the look of the building, the team decided on changing the north entrance for full accessibility. Except something four brick layers thick was in the way.

“There was an existing vault that was three storeys high,” says Mr. Lawlor, who explains that the post office was also the customs house, so each floor had to have a secure area for goods. “So, we had to demolish the whole thing … and then put the elevator in, going down, like, 10 feet in the basement, doing pits and stuff. And then this wall, which was three storeys high, was unsupported during all that work, so we had all of this crazy shoring; so, for me, that was the biggest challenge.”

Yet, from the street, the only visible change is a longer door.

On the third floor, as we walk from the sloped ceilings and smaller windows of the heritage portion – the sheltering aspect of this space makes this writer think sun-starved advertising copywriters would feel good in here – to the higher ceilings and massive glazed wall of the new portion is, literally, like walking from 1924 to 2024 in just a few steps.

“You get a commanding view up and down the street,” offers Mr. Lawlor as he stands at the big window. “I always figured that whoever would rent this floor … would call themselves the King of Waterloo. Some people would say that the old post office is kind of the heart of the city.”

It likely took a king’s ransom to restore the building and, for that, owner Lexington Park is to be commended.

It no doubt took extra time as well, and extra hassle, since finding tenants that think a heritage building’s peculiarities are enjoyable rather than annoying can be a challenge.

“It’s a goodwill gesture for the community [for Lexington Park] to do this,” confirms Mr. Martin. “You can see the materials, the complexity, it maybe makes sense financially, maybe not.”

It made sense to the Canadian Association of Heritage Professionals (CAHP) to announce that the project had been given an “Award of Excellence in the Conservation: Engineering” category in October. “It’s a national group, and all of us heritage wonks know about it,” Mr. Lawlor says with a smile. “I’m a professional member, but it’s hard to become a member, it’s peer-reviewed … so to be recognized by that group is very telling that is was a good project.”

Good? More like exemplary.