The Macdonald Stewart Pavilion

The MacDonald Stewart Pavilion, Bisley

A residential club building constructed in 1897 following a competition held in 1896. It was designed by the Montreal architectural firm C J Saxe and R M Rodden to serve as headquarters for the Canadian team during the National Rifle Association championships at Bisley, held each July. The building was conceived as a showcase for Canadian materials and craftsmanship, with specifications requiring the use of Canadian woods for interior finish and decoration and the overall form of a Canadian house. The structure is built of cedar, maple and pine on a brick plinth, clad in red cedar shingles with a mansard roof now covered in 20th-century tiles.

The building is two storeys tall with four windows to the front, two to the sides, and a T-shaped service wing extending to the rear with irregular fenestration. The front elevation features four windows with the central first floor windows being sashes with eight panes to the upper parts only. The end windows are four-light canted bays with pyramidal roofs and six-pane upper sashes. The ground floor has a central double door flanked by sidelights with large diamond panes and two French windows. The left side elevation contains a first floor five-light window under a cornice serving the Adjutant's Quarters. The right side has two first floor double sashes with six panes to the upper parts only, with unglazed lower sashes on both sides. All sides feature a wide verandah supported on wooden posts with carved heads and a pediment over the central entrance. The service wing is fenestrated primarily with casement windows.

The interior is centred on a substantial hall with a chimneypiece of narrow yellow bricks and an elaborate keystone, above which runs an encaustic tiled band. The walls are panelled with vertical boarding to the top, panels to the centre, and a criss-cross pattern to the base. Double doors on each side connect to adjoining rooms and are designed to retract inside the internal partition walls. The front left room has a boarded ceiling, wall panelling and pilasters. The rear left room contains plainer vertical boarding and an inserted 1980s bar. The right side contains two interconnecting rooms currently serving as dining rooms, with boarded ceilings and walls featuring vertical boards above a dado rail, panels below, and pilasters. A gun room to the rear now contains 20th-century lockers. A single flight staircase with stick balusters and square newel posts provides access to the upper floor. The Commandant's Room is larger than the other bedrooms and has a cornice; the remaining bedrooms are smaller with shelves and coat hooks as their only fittings.

The building was constructed closely to the 1896 specifications with materials donated to the project. The original specifications called for a fireplace of pressed bricks in the hall and sliding doors between the hall, reception room, reading room and messroom. A gun room and smoking room were included as required. The upper floor comprised two bedrooms for the Commandant and Adjutant and twelve rooms for team members, each fitted with a shelf and coat hooks. As the building was occupied for only about six weeks each year, the central hall fireplace provided the sole form of heating. Comparison of the architects' drawings with the existing building shows the loss of an octagonal chimney and possibly some criss-cross decoration to the lower part of the verandah, if this was built as originally intended.