Manitoba Municipal Heritage Site No. 331

 

McDonald Drug Store and Bakery
237 Nelson Street W
Virden

McDonald Drug Store and Bakery

Designation Date:  March 4, 2008
Designation Authority:  Town of Virden
Present Owner:  Privately Owned

The McDonald Drug Store and Bakery, a medium-sized structure with expressive Romanesque Revival-style features popular in the late Victorian era, illustrates the type of pragmatic two-part storefront buildings widely found in developing prairie centres, such as Virden, around the turn of the twentieth century. Built in 1893, the facility is especially noted for its round-arched upper front windows, decorative brickwork, heavy masonry construction, including the use of local fieldstone, and favourable location near the centre of the business district. Attributes such as these suited various merchant-occupants over the years, including a long-time butcher shop and meat market, as well as the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, which used the upper level as a meeting room and dance hall. Recently rehabilitated in a manner compatible with its period character, this durable, solid building is a key element in a series of two-storey masonry contemporaries that recall Virden’s early commercial development.

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