Mutchmor Public School - Ottawa, Ontario - Ontario Heritage Properties on Waymarking.com

Mutchmor Public School, completed in 1895, was one of seven elementary schools constructed in Ottawa in the 1890s. Of these schools, only two others, First Avenue Public School (1898) and Osgoode Street School (1897, now Ecole Franco-Jeunesse) remain standing. The Ottawa Public School Board built these schools when Ottawa's population was growing very rapidly and they remain as important visual reminders of an era of growth in the city when schools were a source of considerable civic pride.

Mutchmor Public School was designed by local architect E.L. Horwood, who also designed the city's other remaining 19th century public schools. In 1911, the Board of Education architect, W.B. Garvock designed an eight-room addition and in 1920, his successor W.C. Beattie added eight rooms.

Mutchmor Public School is a two-storey, red brick structure with a rock-faced stone foundation, stringcourses, window sills and lintels. A sloped parapet with bracketed eaves conceals a flat roof. The principal (south) facade, the original section of the school, is distinguished by a two-storey frontispiece with a centrally-placed, round-arched entrance and a recessed door. Elaborate terra cotta imposts from which brick voussoirs spring, a Palladian window, a date stone and a pair of handsome wrought iron gates further enhance the frontispiece. Brick is used with considerable accomplishment in this portion of the building to create decorative features such as channels, a dog-toothed course, rectangular boxes and elaborate corbelling below the cornice. Garvock and Beattie carefully designed the two additions to the north of the original portion of the school to match it, but each has more subdued classical details such as pedimented doorways and smooth-cut stone details. Large windows, designed to allow maximum light and air into the classrooms for the health of the students, further distinguish the building.

The original section of Mutchmor Public School is an example of the Romanesque Revival style that was popular in the 1880s and 1890s. Buildings of this style feature rusticated stone foundations and trim, few decorative motifs and the extensive use of the round arch, especially for elaborate entrances. The new portions of the· building are more utilitarian, but show the influence of Edwardian Classicism in their classically-inspired doorways, red brick and stone trim.

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Link to Property in The Ontario Properties Database: [Web Link] Building or Property Type: Educational Building County or Regional Municipality: Ottawa-Carleton

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