Vancouver has a few triangle-shaped buildings but none are as prominent and photographed as the Hotel Europe across from Maple Tree Square in Gastown making it today’s Vancouver Icon photo feature. (Left) 1908 – Completed Hotel Europe. Archives #HotP17. (Right) 1910s – Archives #M-11-32. 1960s – Archives #CVA 1135-57. Our very own Flatiron Building was [...]

To celebrate BC’s first Family Day holiday, I turned up some old time family photos in the Vancouver Public Library‘s archives. Photographer Philip Timms, whose photos often grace the pages of this site, features his family in many of his photos making them a top hit in my archives searches. Having picnics, hanging out at [...]

Travel vloggers eat your hearts out! Back in 1936 James A. FitzPatrick presented a series of newsreels in fantastic new Technicolor called Traveltalks which included profiles of Victoria and Vancouver. Most of Fitzpatrick’s Traveltalks were produced by MGM and featured over a hundred destinations, from Motoring in Mexico (1943) and Chicago the Beautiful (1948) to [...]

The Monopoly board game is retiring its iron player piece in exchange for a new token. Hasbro, makers of the game, hosted an online vote and a cat was the winner (well played, Internet). In honor of this move today’s archive photo collection from the Vancouver Public Library and the City of Vancouver Archives features [...]

One of my prized possessions is an original 1876 Map of Westminster that depicts the Lower Mainland a decade before Vancouver even became a city. Unfortunately for me it’s on loan from my father but I enjoy inspecting it every now and then to follow the lines of rivers and creeks that have disappeared, boundaries [...]

The Vancouver Heritage Foundation presents Gritty City: Vancouver in the 60s at the historic Hollywood Theatre later this month. This is a mini three-night film festival that will feature Vancouver’s earlier days of neon, West Coast architecture, and the evolution of the West End. The films will include: 1958 – Granville neon. VPL Number: 65548 [...]

When the rest of Metro Vancouver is blanketed with centimeters of snow you’ll often find the streets bare or covered in slush downtown. Our snow build-up doesn’t usually compare to other parts of the region but that wasn’t always the case. I found a few frosty photos from the Vancouver Public Library archives that show [...]

It’s not as old as the Pattullo or as iconic as the Lions Gate but today the Knight Street Bridge turns 39. It was on January 15, 1974 that the Richmond and Vancouver bridge opened to traffic. Over the years it has served a purpose and its most noteworthy and newsworthy moments haven’t usually been [...]