National Historic Site of Canada

Christ Church / Quidi Vidi Church National Historic Site of Canada

St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador

Also known as Christ Church / Quidi Vidi Church, L'église Christ Church de Quidi Vidi

View of the façade of Christ Church / Quidi Vidi Church, showing its Gothic Revival style, including its square side tower, capped by a spire, 1994.

View of the façade of Christ Church / Quidi Vidi Church, showing its Gothic Revival style, including its square side tower, capped by a spire, 1994.

Photo: Parks Canada Agency / Agence Parcs Canada, J. Butterill, 1994.

Built
1842
Recognized
1966
By
Government of Canada

The register’s text, word for word

Description

Christ Church / Quidi Vidi Church National Historic Site of Canada is a modest, 19th-century, Gothic Revival style wood church, based on a modified cruciform plan with a side tower. It is located on a fenced lot on a steep hill overlooking the harbour in the former village of Quidi Vidi, now part of the city of St. John’s. The building is no longer used as a church and the interior has been altered. Official recognition refers to the building on its property at the time of designation.

Heritage value

Christ Church / Quidi Vidi Church was designated a national historic site of Canada in 1966 because:

  • it is representative of the architecture of an early 19th-century out port villages of a type rapidly disappearing.

The heritage value of this site resides in its design, form and materials. Christ Church / Quidi Vidi Church was opened in 1842 as a chapel of ease for St. Thomas’s Anglican Church in St. John’s. Its original design by James Purcell, an architect and builder, was based on a cruciform plan with Gothic Revival detailing, an architectural form and vocabulary favoured by the Anglican Church from the mid-19th century to the beginning of the 20th century. Christ Church / Quidi Vidi Church was modified by a series of additions in the 19th and 20th centuries, including the addition of a bell tower in 1890. In its wood construction, scale, plan and evolution, it is consistent with churches constructed across the island of Newfoundland in outport communities.

SourceHistoric Sites and Monuments Board of Canada, Minutes, October 1966.

Character‑defining elements

Key elements that relate to the heritage value of the site include:

  • its location on a steep hill overlooking the harbour;
  • its Gothic Revival style, including the cruciform plan of the church body under a crossed gable roof, the three-bay facade with central door flanked by pointed arch windows under drip mouldings, and its square side tower, capped by a spire;
  • its elements typical of outport construction, notably its relatively small size, the entry through a storm porch, and its interpretation in wood of traditionally masonry construction with elements such as wooden Gothic Revival style detailing and clapboard siding.

End of the register’s text

Location

100 The Boulevard, St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, A1A, Canada

47.58283° N, 52.69241° W

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Nearby

All 222 places in St. John's

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From the Canadian Register of Historic Places, as last updated on December 12, 2025. The register’s text is shown word for word.