Painted into memory

The colourful, larger-than-life mural being painted on the side of a building beside the former Balmoral Hotel lot is both a memorial and a historical record of the hotel and the people connected to it.

The Balmoral stood at 159 E. Hastings St. for more than a century. Built in 1911–1912 as a nine-storey, Chicago-style hotel, it later became one of the Downtown Eastside’s single-room occupancy hotels, providing some of the city’s lowest-cost housing.

But over the years, the Balmoral also became associated with neglect and unsafe living conditions. In 2017, the city ordered the building evacuated because of serious fire and safety concerns, forcing 173 residents to leave their homes. The city eventually took ownership of the building in 2020, after years of attempts to have it repaired. It was later determined to be beyond saving and was demolished in 2024.

For many people in the Downtown Eastside, its history is not simply the story of a building. It is also a story about the people who lived there, the loss of their homes and community, and the failures that allowed the building to deteriorate around them.

The mural commemorates that history, while acknowledging the trauma, displacement and injustices associated with the site, which is currently being used for one of the Carnegie Centre’s Indigenous wellness programs and is expected to eventually be redeveloped as social housing.

At the centre of the mural, Trey Helten is depicted spray painting an image of Angel Gates — an artwork he always wanted to do. Both have passed away, Helten in 2025 and Gates in 2022. Both were strong advocates for local people living in extremely difficult circumstances. They came from different life experiences and carried different kinds of knowledge, but both used what they had learned to make the community better for the people around them.

Gates did many powerful and influential things. She shared her personal story with a live audience, speaking openly about her experiences as an Indigenous woman (Haida) and a survivor of trauma and abuse. She was proud of who she was and stood up for people she felt were being misrepresented or denied the respect every person deserves.

That was one of the things Gates and Helten had in common. They were both committed to giving back to the community and to the people in it. They were non-judgemental, respectful and empathetic, supporting people wherever they were in their lives.

Helten reversed hundreds of overdoses and was loved by the entire Downtown Eastside community through his tireless work at the Overdose Prevention Society.

Both are sorely missed.

The mural is being painted by Smokey Devil, Kyle Shipman and Jesse Gouchey, alongside community artists including Ken Foster, Edgar Alan Rossetti, Girl 23, Sugar, Copy, Lesen and others.

Julie Chapman is a born-and-raised Vancouverite who has been living, working and surviving for more than 20 years in the Downtown Eastside. She is one of The Crew, a.k.a. Research 101 co-authors, and works part-time for Vancouver Coastal Health. She has been a Megaphone vendor since 2003. Jules is a published poet and writer, and is a self-taught pianist. 

Amy Romer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter works as a mentor for Megaphone’s The Shift in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. The Shift is made up of a diverse group of individuals with lived experience of poverty, who are reporting from the DTES instead of being reported on.