As you walk down various current-day commercial districts throughout Vancouver, have you ever noticed houses that appear to pop out the top or the backside of store fronts? These store-house combinations can also be spotted throughout various photographs of streetscapes in the Archives’ holdings, and are often a product of residential streets evolving into commercial use areas. A fitting term for them is ‘buried houses’.[1] A buried house at 1120 Robson Street, 1974. Reference code: COV-S509-: CVA 778-341 It can be interesting to try to speculate what the layout of the original house was based on similar house designs of the period and try to figure out what was changed during the conversion to a commercial space. Some of the house-store combinations in the photos make it look as if little was altered other than the equivalent of a boxed in area sprouting out of the front of the house. However, others have clearly had extensive alterations, and of course generally have had even further alterations throughout the decades. A store front that appears more like a box addition to the exterior of a house on Davie Street between Thurlow and Bute Streets, 1928. Reference code: AM54-S4-: Str N266.1 Store fronts where it appears more extensive alterations were done to the houses to which they were attached. Denman Street, 1928. Reference code: AM54-S4-: Str N267.1 An instructive record on how exactly some of the original alterations were designed is an architectural plan for 1132 Robson Street. This plan is part of the City of Vancouver Series 393: Building Permit Application Architectural Drawings. Records in this series have been recently made more discoverable, thanks to ongoing efforts of Archives staff. The descriptions have been uploaded to our database, as previously the only way to search these records was via a card catalogue in our Reading Room. Additional metadata filled out previously scant descriptions, while errant metadata has been corrected. Stay tuned for a future blog post that details all the work that went into this. Architectural plan for alterations to 1132 Robson Street, 1927. Reference code: COV-S393-1-AP-0948 The details of the architectural plan for house alterations for 1132 Robson Street are quite interesting to examine. It is almost as if by looking closely at the notations one can visualize the alterations taking place in real-time. A bathtub is removed and the washroom is made smaller on the first floor, walls are repositioned, new window openings and stairs planned. Details of the architectural plan for alterations to 1132 Robson Street. Notations as to the removal of certain features, and the addition or changes of others can be seen. As part of chasing up more information on this particular building, I fortuitously (after conducting some database searches) came across a photograph of the house-store combination, taken by A.L. Yates in April 1957. The house that corresponds to the architectural plans is the one on the right, with Bonita’s dress shop. Bonita’s dress shop at the time, according to the city directories, was run by Becky Beckman. Living in the upstairs flat (listed as 1132 ½ Robson Street), was Roy Powell, a maintenance worker at the Alaska Pine building. Exterior of 1130 and 1132 Robson Street. 1130 Robson Street on the left was altered eleven years after 1132 Robson Street on the right. Note the different architectural facades in keeping with their respective alteration dates. Photo reference: AM54-S4-: Bu P508.63 The house itself was originally constructed in the 1890s. The exact date is somewhat unclear, as the building permit registers for the City do not go back that far. However, the year of the alterations is known from the 1927 building permit record. The permit lists the owner of the building as A.C. Akroyd, though this was likely a clerical error, as the water service applications for expanding water services to the address indicates the applicant as H.C. Akroyd of the real estate firm Richards, Akroyd & Gall. Building permit register entry for house alterations. Reference code: COV-S385– Water service application made by H.C. Akroyd for enlarged water connection. Reference code: COV-S293 The architect, listed both on the architectural drawing and the building permit, was William Frederick Gardiner. He was a local architect, better known for larger buildings, such as the Hutchinson Block at 429 West Pender Street. The value of the alterations to the house, according to the permit, was $4,000. The Hutchinson Block designed by architect W.F. Gardiner is the tall skinny building at the very right of the photo, as seen in 1932. Reference code: AM1535-: CVA 99-4179 From the time of the house alteration, there were a number of businesses that occupied the shop space, beginning with Florence and Lillian Lewis, dressmakers in 1928, followed by The Paris, another dressmaker business in 1929. Advertisement for the opening of The Paris from The Vancouver Sun, March 13, 1929 By 1930, the category of store shifted to that of tea and coffee emporium, owned and operated by Charles H. Knight. By the end of the 1930s, Knight’s business had moved from the premises, and was replaced once again by a women’s clothing shop under a rotating cast of names and proprietors. Bonita’s makes its first appearance as the shop’s name in 1946, with Mary Burgess as proprietor. Bert and Becky Beckman, according to the city directories, took over Bonita’s in 1948. Bert died in March 1950, but Becky continued to run the