The Historic Luxton Home

At 206 Beaver Street in central Banff, the Historic Luxton Home is a compact house museum dating to about 1905. Its rooms display objects collected by the Luxton family, including historic photographs, Alberta art, china and silver, vintage furniture and taxidermy. Choose it for a personal look at one family’s life and the town’s early history, rather than for an extensive museum visit. Its public season is generally summer, so confirm current dates before making a special trip.

Norman K. Luxton left Manitoba for the West in 1892 and became a Banff entrepreneur and promoter. The house dates to around the time he married Georgina McDougall in 1904. Their daughter Eleanor later established the foundation that preserves the family’s legacy and Beaver Street heritage. The furnishings and photographs give that public story an everyday, domestic scale.

The garden extends the visit outdoors, with an old lilac, peonies and Oriental poppies, and Mount Rundle behind the house. Flowers come and go through the season. When they are in bloom, include a flower bed in the foreground and the mountain behind it for a picture that places the house in its setting.