The Walper Hotel wins Heritage Award
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The Walper Hotel, a historic Kitchener hotel, has received the Ontario Lieutenant Governor’s Ontario Heritage Award for Excellence in Conservation.
BNKC Architects accepted the award from Lieutenant Governor Elizabeth Dowdeswell in a ceremony at Queen’s Park.
The Lieutenant Governor’s Ontario Heritage Awards celebrate individuals, groups and communities for their exceptional contributions to heritage conservation – cultural and natural, tangible and intangible.
The Walper Hotel was originally built in 1893 and was designated as a historic landmark under the Ontario Heritage Act in 1983. The hotel hosted many notable guests in its heyday, from Eleanor Roosevelt to Louis Armstrong to Lennox Lewis, who boxed in the Walper’s Crystal Ballroom. But the hotel fell out of fashion and declined into a state of disrepair until Perimeter Development saw the opportunity to restore the hotel to its former glory.
BNKC Architects was hired as the base building and restoration architect to give the property a much-needed face-lift. Dubbeldam Architecture + Design, Jill Greaves Design and Dialogue 38 combined efforts for the hotel’s interiors. The Walper now greets guests with 92 unique rooms that exude a hip, boutique vibe rivaling similar restored establishments in Toronto, and abroad.
The Walper has been described as “the epicentre of one of Kitchener, Ontario’s oldest neighbourhoods, now a hub of vibrant growth, partly due to the buzzing tech scene of the Waterloo-Toronto Tech Corridor.”
The King & Queen Streets neighbourhood is now home to dozens of independent, locally-owned shops, including coffee bistros, restaurants & pubs, art galleries and museums.