Steel shipyard sheds and cranes stand on the harbour, with brick storefronts climbing Lonsdale Avenue behind them.
What Lower Lonsdale looks like
Timber and steel shipyard sheds line the waterfront at the foot of Lonsdale Avenue, with structures dating from 1906. A restored shipbuilding gantry crane stands in between the sheds and the water, and the extends into Burrard Inlet from the same yard.
, a former pipefitters' building on Victory Ship Way, keeps its heavy timber frame and original wooden beams and now operates as an event space. , a short walk away on the waterfront promenade, is a newer building whose saw toothed metal roof and glass front were designed to echo the timber and steel sheds still standing around it.
sits at the foot of the avenue next to the SeaBus terminal, where a passenger ferry crosses Burrard Inlet to downtown Vancouver. Lonsdale Avenue climbs uphill from the quay as the neighbourhood's commercial spine, with brick storefronts on both sides of the street.
is a three storey brick building with a chamfered corner entrance and ground floor storefronts, one of several brick and sandstone Edwardian blocks built between 1910 and 1911 further up the hill. keeps a large submersible dive tank in its own parking lot on East Esplanade, with a wall of heavy optical glass built into one side.
Shot in Lower Lonsdale
Nuytco Research keeps a large submersible dive tank in its own parking lot at 216 East Esplanade, with a wall of heavy optical glass built into one side for underwater filming. Remarkably Bright Creatures, a 2026 Netflix film starring Sally Field and Lewis Pullman, shot its opening ocean scene in the tank.
Remarkably Bright Creatures, 2026
The Nuytco dive tank
Played the film's opening ocean scene
The dive tank sits over parking spots behind Nuytco's own building. Its optical glass wall lets a camera film through the side of the tank without breaking the water's surface, which is what the production used it for on its opening scene.
Unbroken used Cockatoo Island's former naval shipyard, closed as a working yard in 1991, to build a Japanese prisoner of war camp inside its industrial sheds and dry docks. Lower Lonsdale's own shipyard sheds and dry dock frames read the same way on camera, weathered steel and timber structures with cranes still standing over the yard. Cockatoo Island's dry docks are cut into sandstone cliffs, a scale Lower Lonsdale's flat concrete work yard does not match, so a wide shot that includes the rock face gives the difference away. Try searching industrial sheds and dry docks now.
Exchange Street in Portland, Maine
Portland's Old Port has brick warehouse blocks built after an 1866 fire, climbing uphill from the working piers to Exchange Street the way Lonsdale Avenue climbs from the shipyard to the commercial blocks above it. Casco Bay Lines runs a passenger ferry from the same waterfront, the same arrangement as the SeaBus crossing from Lower Lonsdale. Portland's brick blocks run taller and more uniform than Lonsdale Avenue's mixed row, and the cobbled streets near the pier would need to be avoided or dressed out. Try searching brick warehouse blocks now.
Portsmouth Historic Dockyard has boathouses, a mast pond, a dry dock and other buildings from its working navy years. Lower Lonsdale kept its own shipyard the same way, in the Burrard Dry Dock frames and pier that stayed after the yard closed. A harbour ferry to Gosport crosses in front of the Portsmouth dockyard, the way the SeaBus crosses Burrard Inlet. Portsmouth's dockyard buildings are centuries older and built in stone rather than timber and steel, so a close shot of any wall gives the difference away immediately. Try searching dry dock and other buildings now.
