Bellevue House

Bellevue House National Historic Site of Canada was the home to Canada's first Prime Minister Sir John Alexander Macdonald from 1848 to 1849. The house is located in Kingston, Ontario.Bellevue House was constructed around 1840 for Charles Hales, a wealthy Kingston merchant who profited greatly from the prosperous decade of the 1830s. The house, which is located at 35 Centre St. between Union and King streets, is one of the first and finest examples of Italian Villa architecture in Canada. Sir John A. Macdonald moved into the house with his wife Isabella Clark and their son John Alexander in 1848.Architecture and layoutBellevue House is notable for the non-symmetrical Italian Villa style of its architecture. Features of Italianate architecture at Bellevue House include an L-shaped layout with two wings extending from a square central tower; different varieties and shapes of windows and roof gables; and multiple small balconies.The house has three main floors, but is further divided by seven levels. The first floor is notable for the very large drawing room, containing a parlour piano manufactured in London, England in about 1820 and two oil paintings whose subjects are unknown. The first floor of the house also contains the formal dining room and a room that is currently interpreted as Isabella's bedroom (though this would likely have been a morning room for other families living at Bellevue in the 19th Century).