A remarkable piece of Victoria’s history is coming to life online thanks to restored and colourized footage from 1907 showing the Empress Hotel while it was still under construction.
The short video captures the early stages of the iconic hotel rising along the edge of Victoria’s Inner Harbour.
As the camera slowly pans, viewers can see workers, scaffolding, and building materials surrounding the massive structure before the shot turns outward to reveal the harbour on the opposite side.
The waterfront looks both familiar and strikingly different more than a century later.
What makes the footage especially compelling is that it has been digitally colourized, giving modern viewers a more immersive sense of what Victoria looked like at the dawn of the 20th century.
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The original black-and-white film has been carefully restored, with the frame rate increased, the resolution upscaled, and colour added using AI technology by HistoryColored.
The original footage comes from Vancouver and Victoria Street and Harbour Scenes 1907 and is preserved by Library and Archives Canada, offering a rare visual record of the city during a period of rapid growth.
Construction on the Empress began in 1904, and the hotel would officially open its doors four years later in 1908, quickly becoming one of the most recognizable landmarks in British Columbia.
Set to music by Franz Gordon, the restored clip has caught the attention of locals and history buffs alike. Many are surprised by just how massive the project was for its time and by how familiar the harbour still looks compared to the city skyline today.
The video is a reminder of Victoria’s long-standing connection to the Inner Harbour and the Empress, which has been watching over the city for more than 115 years.
