Originally his grandmother’s house, he had been living there since she passed away and left it to him. With the revenue from the sale of the home, David and his father plan to build an off-grid home, and ideally a whole intentional community, on land they’ll purchase west of Calgary. But David, a stills photographer on television and movie sets, will still need a home base in Calgary for when he is in town working. So, in the summer of 2006, he began the search for a downtown condo within his price range. A building with character would be a bonus.

David found what he was looking for and more in Anderson Estates, the distinctive, 95-year-old, brick-and-sandstone landmark located at 804 18 Avenue S.W., just across from the Bank of Montreal on 17 Avenue. The building, formerly called Anderson Apartments and made up of rental suites, was registered as a heritage site in 1988 and fully restored by owner Victor Mah between 1999 and 2001.

“I was hoping for somewhere central, and just … cool,” says David. “And this way overdid it, in terms of the coolness factor. I was just stunned. I had no idea that we had anything like this in Calgary. As soon as I saw this place, I just pounced.”

Anderson Estates is rich in history, a fact that is readily apparent as soon you enter the elegant wrought-iron front gates into the centre courtyard. Mah personally feels that the building is “the most important residential building in the city of Calgary,” because of its size, age and architectural uniqueness. At one time the tallest building in Calgary, the six-storey building was considered the first residential highrise of its time, and was the first building in the city in which reinforced concrete was used. The distinctive brass cage elevator is the oldest automatic elevator (i.e. running without an attendant) in Calgary, installed in 1928.

David’s 500-square-foot condo cost him less than he had budgeted, and prices in the building remain relatively low considering the area, a fact that he attributes to the size of the suites (partially remedied by the ten-foot ceilings) and the lack of balconies and designated parking. The Anderson’s designation as a heritage site dictated that no walls could be knocked down during the renovation, so the layout of the suites has remained virtually the same as originally planned.

David admits his condo is quite small, but it works perfectly for him. His unit is laid out in a T-shape, with the entrance hall (with coat closet) forming the bottom leg of the T and a narrow hallway at the end leading to the kitchen and dining/living room on the left and the bathroom and bedroom on the right.

“It helped me break up with my last girlfriend, in a way. She saw this place and said, ‘You’re really not interested in having kids, are you?’ ”

David argues that in some countries, a family of ten would call an apartment that size home. Nevertheless, David remains a bachelor, a fact that doesn’t seem to bother him much at all, and is fitting for life at Anderson Estates, originally intended as a bachelors’ hotel.

Anderson Estates was built for $150,000 in 1912 by businessman Alexander Victor Anderson. Anderson had moved to Calgary from Quebec in the 1890s and gotten married, but when his wife of 15 years passed away in 1908, he decided to build a luxury bachelors’ hotel in lower Mount Royal that could house Canadian Pacific executives while they awaited the completion of their Mount Royal mansions.

The building was designed in the Baroque style, by architect Roscoe Whitten. The U-shape with central courtyard allowing for sunlight to reach all suites, and details such as the brass cage elevator, brass railings along the main staircase, Italian marble flooring in the foyer, and grand dining room downstairs made it an expensive rental property indeed, at upwards of $60-per-month for a room. Anderson Estates stayed in the Anderson family until the Mah family purchased the building in 1977.

The 1999 to 2001 renovations cost Mah somewhere in the neighbourhood of $4 million, refurbishing the vital systems of the building (plumbing, electrical and windows); bringing the elevator up to date; adding the front gate; and developing a few one-off units on the bottom floor, bringing the number of units in the Anderson up to 66. It was, however, the carpenters who had the heaviest workload, as the building is rich in woodwork. They stripped all the walls down to the lath and plaster and rebuilt them, also refinishing the imposing wood beams that characterize the suites.

“I felt that it was a very important building that had to be saved,” says Mah. “I look back and feel very content about (the refurbishment).”

Today, the old and the new co-mingle happily within Anderson Estates, with original maple floors complemented by maple or oak kitchen cabinets; a pass-through servant’s window atop shining granite countertops allowing a view from the kitchen into the dining room; and an authentic re-porcelained clawfoot tub in the gleaming tiled bathroom.
The common areas of the building are equally stunning, with elements such as the old elevator and marble floors transporting residents and visitors back to a time when the grandest buildings in Calgary were constructed of Sandstone. In fact, walking the halls of Anderson Estates, a person may be reminded of the Fairmont Palliser Hotel, which was built during the same time period.

It all suits David, who is accustomed to challenging the status quo, just fine. Though it’s not as low-impact as his planned intentional community in the foothills, his condo isn’t contributing to urban sprawl, and he even uses Greenmax energy to power and heat his home. He does admit he still needs access to a garage in which to service his Land Cruiser, which he converted himself to run on vegetable oil, but that’s a small detail to iron out. CL