Newsletter Article -- January 2002

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Ottawa's Former Bowles Lunch

By Barbara McMullen

The former Bowles Lunch (c.1916) is Ottawa's only example of the use of brightly coloured glazed architectural terra cotta, seldom seen and appreciated for its unusual use in Ottawa and elsewhere in Ontario. The 24-hour restaurant served as a popular gathering place for local luminaries and was associated with the federal government's growth and increasing demandfor local services. The facade of the Bowles Lunch, located at 134 Sparks St., will be retained and rehabilitated along with three adjacent heritage buildings in the Sparks/Queen/O'Connor mixed use development.

Bowles Lunch, Sparks Street May 1917 (National Archives) Click photo to enlarge

The use of terra as a building material, and its role in the growth of central Canada's towns and cities from the late 19th to early 20th century has gone almost unrecognized due to a lack of understanding of its characteristics and forms. Red unglazed terra cotta was used as a decorative material with brick in Ontario from 1880 until the late 1890s. White or cream-coloured glazed terra cotta (often mistakenly identified as stone) came into use around 1900, first as a decorative, and then as a cladding material on many of central Canada's first tall buildings.Brightly coloured glazed terra cotta, often called polychrome terra cotta, only rarely appeared in Ontario after about 1910, although used more often in Winnipeg. Polychrome terra cotta was much more common in the U.S., such as in New York City and Chicago. Virtually all of Ontario's red unglazed terra cotta was made in Ontario. All the glazed terra cotta used in central Canada was made in, and imported from the U.S. or England.

The two storeys of the Bowles Lunch facade were originally clad in cream-coloured semi-glazed terra cotta, decorated with a deep terra cotta cornice and egg-and-dart frieze. Rich blue and cream-coloured glazed terra cotta can be seen both on the underside of the cornice and beneath the lintels of the second storey windows. Reportedly, blue terra cotta tiles also decorated the underside of the original ground floor arch. The one-sided red tile roof reflects the Spanish Colonial Revival style, seldom used for commercial buildings in Ottawa. The ground floor was later refaced with parging material. The existing glazed terra cotta is to be carefully conserved and repaired, along with the redesign of the ground floor to reinstate the building's segmental arch and storefront entrance.

Coloured glazed terra cotta under cornice and lintels of windows Click photo to enlarge

The Sparks St. Bowles Lunch was likely designed by architects Hand, Harris & Merritt, a firm that designed three Toronto Bowles Lunch buildings. Each had distinctive design features and details; all were decorated or clad with glazed terra cotta. Ottawa's second Bowles Lunch, built circa 1920-21, on Rideau St., was demolished, as were the three Toronto buildings,one of which, built circa 1913, was also decorated with coloured glazed terra cotta. The Bowles Lunch chain of restaurants was reportedly headed by H.L. Bowles of Springfield, Massachusetts.

Ottawa's former Bowles Lunch is also reminiscent of the first building in the U.S. to make extensive use of polychrome glazed terra cotta, built in New Jersey in 1898. A model of the latter was displayed at an architectural exhibition in New York as an example of the future possible use of polychrome terra cotta, an idea discussed again in journals during 1911.

Interior, Bowles Lunch, May 1917 (National Archives) Click photo to enlarge

The Sparks St. Bowles Lunch, situated between the Hardy Arcade and the former Citizen Building (demolished), was known for its quick, inexpensive food, which attracted a wide range of clientele. An early photo of its interior suggests its material furnishings were likely marble wainscoting, enamelled white and coloured wall and ceiling tiles, and a tile floor. Like its Toronto counterparts, it also had a billiard hall, along with a large cigar counter on the ground floor.

The Bowles Lunch on Sparks St. was often frequented by journalists, sports figures and businessmen. Some who later became parliamentarians also came here, such as Norman Rogers, secretary to Prime Minister Mackenzie King, and George McIlraith, who became a minister and later a senator. Reportedly some Ottawa residents who watched the first Parliament Building burn on a cold night in early 1916 went there for warmth and the sharing of experiences. Ottawa's longest-serving mayor, J.E. Stanley Lewis often lunched there. Lewis was one of the founding members of the Ottawa Knockers' Club, a charitable organisation made of prominent Ottawa businessmen who used to "knock" the government. The Club was founded in the Sparks St. Bowles Lunch in 1942 and commemorated by a brass plaque in a lunchroom table. Ottawa's Bowles Lunch was taken over during the 1950s by Scott's Restaurants, which also purchased the Toronto Bowles Lunchrooms about the same time.

Bowles Today

(This article is based on Barbara McMullen's recently completed M.A. thesis"Architectural Terra Cotta in Central Canada and its Links with England and the United States," Dept. of Canadian Studies, Heritage Conservation Program, Carleton University. Information has also been drawn from the City of Ottawa's Central Area West Heritage Survey, the Toronto Region Architectural Conservancy's Terra Cotta Artful Deceivers, articles in Construction, The Brickbuilder, and The Ottawa Sunday Herald, as well as the J.E. Stanley Lewis Collection at the City of Ottawa Archives.)

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