A century-plus old house of worship in Victoria could be getting a new lease on life, as the church that owns it looks to transform the property.
The United Church congregation that called the First Metropolitan church home held its last service at the end of 2023, before merging with another Victoria congregation at a new home.
Several other faith groups still hold services in the 1913 building on Sundays, but the rest of the week it mostly sits empty.
Now, the United Church has approached developer Aryze with the goal of transforming the property with the conduction of 130 units of rental housing, plus a new arts centre and a renovation of the 400-seat church itself — which would still also hold Sunday services.
“We thought, wow, we could do housing, we could have an arts centre, and we could still have worship services in there,” said Don Evans, director of property development for the United Church of Canada Pacific Mountain Region.
“There’s models out there showing that it works, and it’s a great use of that building because then it will be used all week long.”‘
Chris Quigley, Aryze’s director of development, said the idea is to integrate the new facility into what is already a blossoming arts district in the city.
First Metropolitan sits at the intersection of Quadra Street and Balmoral Road.
The Pacific Opera’s Baumann Centre lies just across the street, while Victoria’s Conservatory of Music — another arts facility operating in a converted United Church — is two blocks away.
“The goal is to reimagine how the church plays a new role in the community, so really leaning into the cultural quarter that Quadra currently is and could be even more so in the future,” he said.
“That means new arts programs, new cultural programs as well as creating new housing and commercial opportunities.”
On top of that, the proposal is to reserve some of the rental units to serve as affordable housing specifically for people working in the arts and culture sector.
The proposal will still need to go through Victoria’s zoning process, which Quigley estimated would take more than a year at minimum.
The Anglican Church of Canada submitted a proposal to rezone its Christ Church Cathedral property for housing two years ago — a project that has yet to move forward.
Quigley said Aryze will be holding a community event later this month to give locals a better look at the proposal.