Historic Building Became A Hot Spot For Sign Depot

Posted by Lisa on 6/18/2014

It Was Heating Up At The Sign Depot

June 17 2014 was a very interesting day for us here at The Sign Depot in Kitchener Ontario. Our fire alarms began going off inside this historic building at Borden and Charles streets. We evacuated the building and were informed by The City Of Kitchener Fire Department that the fire was in a different part of the building (the 50 Ottawa St. S side) and that it was under control and it would be out shortly. This was a relief to us, but we took it as a sign that we should appreciate this historic location and we thought we would give you a brief history about this building

Before The Sign Depot Occupied This Historic Building

According to Western Libraries the history of this building begins with Doon Twines, owned by The Krug Family, needing a bigger factory to meet the high demand of rope in 1916. The Krugs renamed the company (which would now be termed as rebranding) to Canada Cordage and according to Ropecord News it was once Kitchener’s biggest employer. In 2007 Canada Cordage was sold and moved from this building. Enter Access Storage.

Access Storage took over the building and converted it into a Self Storage facility and leased industrial space to other businesses.

This is when The Sign Depot moved into the Borden Ave. S. side of the building. You can read more about our move to the building on Peter’s blog post A Good Move For Custom Signs

Present Day At The Sign Depot

Being in this building for almost five years, we have witnessed several changes in the area. Many new businesses have been drawn to the area with word that this will be a hub for Region of Waterloo’s LRT (otherwise know as Rapid Transit or the ION). This meant there were a lot of eyes on yesterday’s events. You can read about the fire in building on the THE RECORD website as well as on the Waterloo Region Police Services incident page for June 17.

Thanks To Kitchener Fire

We would like to thank the Kitchener Firefighters that worked quickly to contain the blaze and extinguished the fire. We hope that it’s a sign of how important this historic building is to the community.