Sask. town seeks new purpose for historic convent building with 'amazing' light, 'ghost stories'

The town of Gravelbourg is looking for a developer to put new life into their historical convent.

The town put out a call for expressions of interest to repurpose the stately and storied building, constructed in 1917.

“It was a boarding school and then it expanded in 1927. They built the south and the north wing and at one time, there were more than 700 students going to school here,” Toos Giesen-Stefiuk, chair of the Gravelbourg museum said.

In the 1970s, the convent switched from a boarding school run by nuns to a public school. It held its final classes in 2015 when a new school opened.

“The nuns used to be self supporting. In the beginning, they grew all their own stuff. They had farms out there. A lot of these institutions were meant to be self sustaining,” said Ariel Haug, economic development officer for the town.

The building was constructed in 1917, with the wings being added in 1927. (Stefanie Davis / CTV News)

The town bought the building from the school division in 2016.

Haug said since then, various community groups have made use of the space as the town tries to decide what the future of it will be.

“It is used for community purposes. I like to stress that because it’s very important to me and for the community and for Saskatchewan people to see that this space is being used,” she said. “The town rents it out to community groups and small businesses, and so it is a great space for community events at the chapel, it makes a wonderful space.”

Haug said after the pandemic, the town needed to start seeing some other options for the building.

“The pandemic slowed things down for everyone,” she said. “When I came in, one of my main priorities was to look to see if there are some other options that we haven’t considered for the convent, if there are some external interest in turning it into a project.”

The chapel and reception area hosted concerts and markets. (Photo supplied by Ariel Haug)

She said originally, there was a group through Friends of the Gravelbourg Convent who conducted many studies in partnership with the town, as well their consultant to see what would be a viable use for it, which was determined to be housing.

”Unfortunately, that didn’t get all the way to the finish line but it’s still a really viable option,” she said. There’s so many people who would like to age in place in our community, in smaller communities, and we have a great hospital here, so having some affordable housing for an older demographic would be great.”

“There are people who have a whole lot of wonderful ideas out there so perhaps there are other possibilities for it.”

The building is over 76,000 square feet with three stories on the south wing and four stories in the main building. Haug said the building has tons of potential.

“The light in there is amazing. You do not get buildings that are built with this kind of light and these huge windows so there’s a lot of opportunity for people with an aesthetic vision to be in that building,” she said. “It has so much potential just to be a gorgeous light filled space, whether it was condos, or an artistic retreat centre, or whatever vision there could be out there for it, it’s got beautiful light.”

A music room is one example of what the space is being used for right now. (Stefanie Davis / CTV News)

“There’s a lot of opportunity for something unique here so I hope that people can see that,” she said.

Haug said that with a building of that age, there are bound to be stories.

“I know that the teachers who taught there for years, some of them have some ghost stories, some of them have seen things,” she said. “There are a few stories and certainly, a building that old, you feel something; it’s got 100 years of history.”

“I feel like you just feel the history, whether or not there are spirits.”

The museum set up a classroom to show what the school used to look like using the original desks. (Stefanie Davis / CTV News)

While the convent is classified as a heritage building, Haug says she doesn’t think it should just be left for historical records.

“It’s been a fixture in this community for over 100 years,” she said. “There’s many things you can do to the interior, things that have to be done for a building to be used, it has to meet certain codes. So it doesn’t have to be a relic, it can have another life.”

Giesen-Stefiuk agreed that something should be done to keep the building flourishing.

“If this would go, it would be kind of a downfall for the town. We need to do something with this building,” she said.

The deadline for the expression of interest applications is Feb. 24 of this year, but if it takes longer than that to find the perfect fit, the town said it would wait.

“The most important thing for buildings is that we can acknowledge their heritage and their history, but also give them another life so that they serve generations to come as usable buildings,” Haug said.

Gravelbourg, a town of just under 1,000 people, is 70 minutes southwest of Moose Jaw.

- With files from CTV News Regina's Stefanie Davis