This store-residence, as it can be seen today, dates from 1829. In the spring of that year, merchant John McKenzie, a partner in the firm of Hector Russel & Company (dry goods), purchased from Félix Vinet dit Souligny a property on St. Paul Street with a two-storey stone house and an outbuilding, as well as an adjoining lot on St. François-Xavier Street. Three months later, he hired mason Louis Comte to undertake a major renovation of the stone house: the front façade was demolished and rebuilt with ashlar (smooth cutstone blocks laid in regular courses) and a third storey was added. The firm of Hector Russel & Company occupied the premises until the end of the 1830s. Research concerning similar buildings indicates that this type of structure combined commerce, or artisanal production, and housing. However, it is not clear if one or other of the partners lived on the premises, or if living quarters were rented out to a third party. Beginning in 1846, when the use of the building can be determined, the tenants who succeeded one another occupied the whole building exclusively for their businesses, anticipating a pattern that would become generalized in the following decades.

Sold by the sheriff in 1840, possibly as a result of the failure or dissolution of the partnership of Russel and McKenzie, the property returned to the hands of the Vinet family who in turn gave it to the Corporation of the Roman Catholic Bishop of Montreal in 1860. The latter retained ownership for nearly a century. In the meantime, tenants of different occupations followed one another in a long series; from the 1870s, when two civic addresses were assigned to the building, more than one tenant could occupy the premises. Merchants and manufacturers, including the firm Mulholland & Baker, established themselves in the building up until the end of the 19th century. Beginning in the 20th century, the premises were occupied by printers, notably Pierre Arbour and his partners, while during the 1940s the history of the building was marked by the fur business. A printing establishment again occupied this store-residence from the 1950s when Sam Jason, printer, purchased it.

In 1989, the building was completely renovated and turned into an inn.

This store-residence was originally provided with a rear courtyard accessible from St. François-Xavier Street, but reduced in size by subsequent improvements. Following the reconstruction of the building in 1829, the portion visible from the street comprises three stories and a half-storey in the garret while structures in the rear date from a later period. The party walls extend above the roof line to serve as fire-breaks, and incorporate the chimneys.

These features recall certain elements of 18th-century urban houses in Montreal, however the use of cut stone to cover the whole front facing the street was an innovation in the 19th century, as was the use of more elaborate architectural details to draw attention to ground-floor businesses; both features are characteristic of the store-residences erected in the years 1825-1850. The pilasters and entablature that frame the openings, although very simple, are part of neo-classical architectural vocabulary that was very much in style during the first half of the 19th century. These elements accentuate the large openings that were originally fitted out with mullioned show-windows. The latter made their first appearance in Montreal during the 1820s and served to display a merchant’s new wares. In keeping with the prominence of the street front, the upper stories were covered with ashlar, but the restrained treatment of the stone and the size of the window openings suggest the presence of living quarters, at least during the early years, although there is no evidence to confirm that that was the case here. As in houses erected during the 18th century, the symmetrically arranged windows diminish in size from one storey to the next.

The symmetrical architectural treatment of the ground floor is clearly conceived as having two entrances. However, various historical sources indicate that the building had only one commercial address from the end of the 1840s to the early 1870s. Evidently, the two entrances were used by the same occupant.