Heritage apartment building continues to thrive with ‘neighborliness’

By Louise Rachlis

“People don’t usually think of rental buildings as a home for the rest of their lives,” said Bill Brown, who has lived at the Windsor Arms Apartments at 150 Argyle Avenue for 34 years. “Many people here do.”

The Windsor Arms is an historic five-storey, 42-unit apartment building that once offered lobby and parking attendants and maid service when it opened in 1930. It was billed as “Ottawa’s first fireproof building.” The original owner of the building had his own apartment in it, which continues to be the largest apartment.

No such amenities now, but the building is a paragon of “neighborliness not nosiness,” said Brown, a retired teacher, as is his husband, John McKinven.

Brown credits the urban garden, which he and McKinven maintain meticulously, as one of the catalysts for camaraderie. “The garden changed how people interact with each other,” he said. “People began to stop and talk.”

In 2001, McKinven and Brown created a second garden, laid out in gravel, rocks and berms of the Ottawa Valley, meant to be seen from apartment windows. “It was the first time we presented a detailed plan to the owner, who paid for the plants….Right from the beginning, the owner, Sandy Smallwood of Andrex Holdings, has been restoring the historic details of the building. He doesn’t want to compromise the look of it. He even put storm windows on the inside of a few units to maintain the heritage status. He liked what we were doing with the garden and let us jump the sidewalk. The key element of our garden is the sidewalk. In the summer, 75 per cent of the people who go through it say something. People feel it’s an oasis on a summer day.”

In June 1984, the then landlord informed tenants that the building would be sold for conversion into a form of condominium but the tenants successfully fought off the conversion scheme. The previous owner converted the ground floor units into offices but the present owner, Andrex Holdings, returned all units to residential occupancy. The building is a designated Category 1 heritage building within the Centretown Heritage Conservation District.

“I’ve been involved in restoring old buildings since 1973,” said Sandy Smallwood of Andrex Holdings. “When I first started, there were no rent controls and landlords competed for tenants. Once the rent controls came on, I saw the relationship changing into one of landlords doing the basic minimum they had to do; they weren’t taking good care of their buildings…What happened is that the market got distorted and an adversarial relationship developed between tenants and landlord. The landlords felt ill done by. We always had that goal to restore the historic features, and it was a challenging time.”

However, thanks to “vacancy decontrol/recontrol”, when apartments starting turning over, they could then restore the apartments and increase the rents, said Smallwood.

“The historic buildings are a fertile environment for a caring community,” he said. “If you have ownership that is prepared to water the garden, it will flourish. Part of it is that you’re in a special place that has a history…What we’ve tried to do is celebrate that environment and to allow tenants to be in a place they’re glad to be in. We’re glad to have that working relationship; if we help them, they help us.”

His company has done the same thing at Strathcona Apartments on Laurier East in Sandy Hill, which they purchased in 1992. “One of the first things we did was put in accessible features in the building. What we thought would help seniors, also ended up helping mothers with strollers, all age groups. What a great investment doing that can be! We want to make all our buildings user friendly so people can stay throughout all their life stages.”

Strathcona has an active garden club and the oldest rooftop garden in the city. “There is such a community where people care about each other,” he said.

The garden at Windsor Arms spawned a composting program that six tenants take part in. “We hope they feel involved in the garden because their kitchen scraps end up there,” said McKinven.

For at least 20 years, the building has had a “sharing table” in the laundry room, where they leave furniture, books and knick knacks to share with others.

The two men are thrilled that the Windsor Arms now has a mix of young and old, young professionals, seniors, and five young families, who among other things have incorporated a children’s garden.

Most of the tenants don’t have cars “and don’t seem to care,” said Brown. There are just 12 spots in the building’s indoor garage.

“We find the current mix of families makes the place more welcoming,” said Brown. “We’ve always had families but often they would move out to the suburbs. These plan to raise their kids here.”

A year ago, Bill and tenant Susan Johnston began organizing house concerts in the building. About 30 attend, bringing their own chairs. “Most of us toss in $20, and all the money goes to the performers.”

The February concert was a musical afternoon and sing-a-long, with tenants providing food. It was a fundraiser for their second Little Library, this one for children’s books. March was Duo Brazil, Donna Brown and Andrew Mah.

A lecture series is an offshoot of the music concerts. The first speaker was Sandy Smallwood, speaking about the history of apartment buildings.

Three years ago the tenants of Windsor Arms reached out to their neighbors in Beaver Barracks to organize a “Please Walk Your Bikes” campaign on the Argyle sidewalk. “That opened new channels with our neighbors, running counter to the notion of renters not being involved in their building or community.”

They call their area and beyond “Museum Precinct”, and are working to rid the residential area of trucks and buses. “We’re not unique in Centretown. There are great things going on as part of the community at Options Bytown, CCOC Beaver Barracks, and Blair House as well.”