Concordia’s revamp of Grey Nuns’ Mother House is a ‘tour de force’
BY MARIAN SCOTT, THE GAZETTE AUGUST 13, 2014
MONTREAL — How do you turn a sacred historic site into an up-to-date venue for students from diverse backgrounds?
That was the challenge facing Concordia University, which bought the former Grey Nuns’ Mother House for $18 million in 2007. Now, a year after the last elderly nun moved out, the newly refurbished convent on René-Lévesque Blvd. between Guy and St-Mathieu Sts. is reopening as a 600-bed student residence with study areas available to the entire Concordia community.
On Wednesday, the university gave journalists a sneak peek of the dorms and common rooms in the renovated H-shaped complex, which dates back to 1869.
The $15-million overhaul was a “tour de force” in adapting the historic convent to the needs of a modern, non-denominational university while protecting the integrity of the 145-year-old structure, said Clarence Epstein, Concordia’s senior director of urban and cultural affairs and an authority on religious architecture in Quebec.
The soaring windows and 16-foot ceilings are original, while splashes of lime-green and orange paint and black vinyl sofas inject a contemporary note. In an airy, white study hall overlooking the leafy grounds, original features like slender wrought-iron columns have been preserved, while modern LED fixtures provide discreet illumination.
The pièce de résistance is the exquisite Chapelle de l’Invention-de-la-Sainte-Croix, now transformed into a silent study hall inspired by the venerable libraries at the University of Oxford. Long tables lit by white-shaded desk lamps now replace the pews where members of the religious order founded by Saint Marguerite d’Youville in 1737 worshipped for 125 years.
Richly decorated by religious paintings and sculptures, the chapel, designed by Quebec’s leading church architect, Victor Bourgeau, was built between 1874 and 1878. At the foot of the white marble altar, a semicircle of sleek, cardinal-red armchairs form an arresting focal point.
Epstein said that when devising the plans to adapt the chapel, the university took inspiration from a value it holds in common with the Grey Nuns: a reverence for books, be they sacred texts or vessels of learning.
“They were, as sisters, followers of a book and in the university, of course, we cherish the book,” he said.
Using the chapel as a silent space for reading and reflection seemed the most appropriate way to repurpose it, he said.
“So the decision was to invite students and researchers to come and utilize this space, to contemplate, to read, to study in this sacred space,” he said.
“For me, the fact that the university, a multi-denominational institution, is able to take a Catholic place and convert it into a multi-denominational space I think is really a tour de force for us,” Epstein added.
When it bought the building, Concordia announced it would turn the Mother House into its faculty of fine arts when the Grey Nuns moved out in 2022. But when the nuns vacated the building nine years ahead of schedule, “the university had to take a pragmatic decision” to use the building as a residence, Epstein said.
The fine-arts plan is still on the table, but funding to transform the former convent for academic use — a project that could cost hundreds of millions of dollars — has not been confirmed.
“In the next 10 years, the university will study other options for the site. We’re going to keep all our options open,” he said.
The Grey Nuns retain ownership of the basement crypt where the remains of about 300 nuns are buried. In 2010, the remains of Mother Marguerite d’Youville were moved to Varennes, the South Shore community where she was born in 1701.
Rents at the residence range from $620 per person for a small double room to $850 for a private room with its own bathroom.
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(heritagehamilton.ca)
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