{"id":7796,"date":"2014-08-20T10:59:29","date_gmt":"2014-08-20T14:59:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=7796"},"modified":"2014-09-04T23:52:19","modified_gmt":"2014-09-05T03:52:19","slug":"homeowners-businesses-put-best-feet-forward-for-doors-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/homeowners-businesses-put-best-feet-forward-for-doors-open\/","title":{"rendered":"Homeowners, businesses show creativity at Doors Open"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Whether they were showing off their personal showplaces or watching a year\u2019s worth of ideas come into fruition, Aurora\u2019s creativity came into full bloom on Saturday with the annual Doors Open Aurora event. <\/p>\n

Comprised of walking tours around town, rare glimpses into private homes, and new and creative things to do at some of Aurora\u2019s more venerable institutions, people from across Southern Ontario descended on Town to see just what we have to offer historically, architecturally and artistically. <\/p>\n

On Saturday morning before the skies opened up to an afternoon of rain, among the busiest locations was the colourful home of Roxana Farrell on Larmont Street. <\/p>\n

Painted a vivid blue, the aptly named \u201cBlueprint House\u201d is the culmination of a long-standing vision of Ms. Farrell, who is an artist and architect by trade. The distinctive house stands out from the rest not only in colour, but with the white text that wraps around the building, mimicking an architectural blueprint, but one that has come to life.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had this idea five years ago when I moved here from New York and I just saw this house,\u201d she said. \u201cSomehow it gave me the inspiration that even though it was in rough condition, to take my profession and showcase it in an artistic way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Outside, white text outlines the dimensions of the building, the elevations, and even the mailbox, along with a garden that makes practical use out of old packing crates left over from the defunct Thompson\u2019s Furniture Store, which coupled with discarded hockey masks, combine to create a very unique kind of fencing. Inside, the creativity continued with layers of time peeled back, and salvaged material finding a new lease on life \u2013 including a chandelier made out of light bulbs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI like finding things,\u201d said Roxana. \u201cI have more or less tried to strip off all of the old paint that was on the doors and doorframes. What I am trying to experiment with is what is it to have something old against something crisp and new and just keep that collision happening? I love what happens and I like to have things and objects give me direction and tell me what they want to be and where they fit into the space.\u201d<\/p>\n

Valerie Otton subscribes to a similar philosophy at the Absalom Blaker House on Wellington Street, just west of Larmont. This was the second year running in which she and her husband welcomed guests as part of the Doors Open tour, but she bristled at the idea that she was welcoming guests into a \u201cshowplace.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not a showplace, we live here,\u201d she said. \u201cLast year it looked like a museum, but this year it looks like a home. We just want to show the heritage and history of a home. These homes are just as beautiful as modern homes. This is quality and we love doing what we do.\u201d<\/p>\n

This beauty, however, was not always apparent, she said. When they bought the house it was subdivided into apartments. They quickly set about to rectify that, restoring it to its former glory, peeling back the paint, restoring the wood, and even finding mementos of old Aurora \u2013 ranging from old newspapers to a Sisman\u2019s shoe box, all proudly displayed on the dining room table \u2013 in the process.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe love showing off our house and we are really proud with what we have accomplished in trying to get it back to what it used to be, and we love it,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was a disaster before\u2026but it is a solid house.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the people coming through the doors to see just what the Ottons have accomplished was MJ from Newmarket, who is drawn to Doors Open each year for the architecture. For her, there is so much people can learn from their own local history. <\/p>\n

She started the day with a walking tour around Aurora lead by local historian David Heard who, when leading his packed group through the Aurora Farmers\u2019 Market, emphasised the importance of historical salvage. <\/p>\n

\u201cMy favourite tidbit [I learned from the tour] is there were horse-drawn train cars that brought product from the factories over the train line and, from the train, the product got shipped all over,\u201d she said. \u201cIt made me really appreciate our local history and the impact Aurora had on the rest of Canada, and even the world, with the Fleury ploughs and the shoes that were supplied to the military in the First World War.”<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Whether they were showing off their personal showplaces or watching a year\u2019s worth of ideas come into fruition, Aurora\u2019s creativity came into full bloom on Saturday…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7778,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/2014-08-21-01.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-21K","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-06 22:43:09","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7796"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7796\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}