17 Regent Street
A Regent Street home with generations of Belizean memory.
The stately brick structure of 17 Regent Street was built in the early 1800s. Like the historic St. John's Cathedral, the bricks used in construction served as ballast for the ships which transported mahogany and logwood from Belize to merchants abroad.
Records show that the home was gifted from father to son in 1851 and remained the Craig and Foreman family home for more than 100 years. It was a vibrant, well visited, musical home because the Craig sisters were organists for the Scots Kirk and Wesley Churches, and Helen, the musical prodigy who graces the annals of Belizean musical history, played daily and often and also gave music lessons to many Belizeans.
After Hurricane Hattie in 1961 the house, which suffered some damage, was closed up, later renovated, and rented to the Catholic public schools for offices and living quarters for Jesuit priests.
Great Belize Productions was the next tenant and used the building for both its offices and production studio for more than two decades.
When Great Belize Productions moved out, the home was once again vacant until the Craig family pooled resources to renovate once more, converting the ground and first floors to a cafe and book store, Bricks & Books. Serious efforts were made in these renovations to preserve as much as possible of the original structure, ensuring that the rich history of the Craig family home will live on.
