Craigdarroch Castle, Victorian mansion museum in Victoria, Canada.
Craigdarroch Castle is a Victorian mansion from the 1890s set on a hill in Victoria, British Columbia. The 39 rooms spread across four floors with a central staircase that runs through the full height of the building.
Robert Dunsmuir, a Scottish immigrant and coal industrialist, had the house built starting in 1887 but died before completion in 1889. His widow Joan moved in during 1890 and lived in the rooms until her death in 1908.
The Gaelic name Craigdarroch means "rocky, oak place", describing the Garry Oak meadow of Victoria's Rockland neighbourhood where the house stands, not a family homeland. Inside, the drawing room floor is Hawaiian koa, a wood also used for guitars and ukuleles, and its ceiling keeps stencilled and hand-painted decoration uncovered between 1995 and 2007.
Climbing to the top floor requires several staircases with no elevator, so some fitness helps. A visit typically takes an hour and a half and can be done at your own pace without a guide.
The castle's name comes from Gaelic and describes the Garry Oak meadow of Victoria's Rockland neighbourhood, not the Dunsmuirs' Scottish homeland. The military hospital operated from 1919 to 1921, after the Bank of Montreal took the property in 1919. The museum opened in 1979.
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