The Gryphon on Lakeside Drive (Photo: Stewart Bailey)
Not every house on the Christmas in the County House Tour is a heritage landmark. But every one is loved. The Tour celebrates the love of houses, the idea of home, and the way these both endure, and change, over time.
The proud homeowners featured this year are also tireless: houses must look all ready for Christmas by the first weekend in December. And ready for visitors. Lots of them. Once again, the tour sold 400 tickets this year.
Last Sunday’s House Tour took visitors through a couple of houses in Picton, north to Demorestville’s Friendship United, through Ameliasburgh and its Heritage Village, and then west to Consecon.
Nine landmarks featured, including Picton Main Street’s 1880 Gillespie House, a midcentury modern masterpiece on Maitland, an 1850 farmhouse at Wild Lot Farm Distillery, the Friendship United Church in Demorestville, and The Marsh House, a picturesque early 1800s white house at the heart of Consecon.
At every stop, the cider was mulled, the trees were decorated, the shortbreads were ready, and the fires were lit. The only requirement for inclusion is that your home be loved.
This year’s ticketholders were entered in a draw for a copy of The Settler’s Dream – the deluxe boxed reprinting, a $150.00 value. Proudly displayed on bookshelves and coffee tables across the County, the 1984 publication documents 300 of thousands of historic properties. It is full of photographs and historical details about the built heritage of the County, much of which dates back to the 1780s.
Some of the homes on this year’s tour had been extensively renovated, like the former Chapman stone drive shed on Bowery Street in Picton, which retains a gorgeous original stone wall within an extensive back addition. Others were still in near-original condition, such as the log cabin and other buildings featured in the Ameliasburgh Heritage Village (circa 1868). Standouts on the tour were two “rescues,” The Gryphon, an 1830s Regency cottage originally built in Ancaster, Ontario, was salvaged and rebuilt on Lakeside Drive by the current owner. Its lovely carriage house was also relocated, from Closson Road, and rebuilt in period style with cob, or rammed earth, and limewash.
Proceeds go to the Built Heritage Fund, and are dispensed in the form of grants to structures needing support all through the County. It has, in the 11 active years of its operation — there was a hiatus from 2020-2022 — raised $65,000 for the preservation of the County’s rich architectural heritage.
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