Living in Silvermere

The place

Silvermere sits on the shore of Silver Lake, in a bowl framed by the Silvercrest Mountains. The valley is mountainous, the water is big, and the weather is genuinely four-season: hot dry summers, warm autumns, snowy winters, and runoff-heavy springs.

Locals describe Silvermere as a small city with a big heart and bigger ideas. Both are accurate. You can walk downtown end to end in twenty minutes and still not run into the same person twice on a busy Saturday.

Who lives here

The current population sits around 14,800. Many families have been here for generations, often with roots in the mining and mill families who built the town in the early 20th century.

The valley has a rich history, steeped in the silver rush of the 1880s and the lumber era that followed. That heritage is still visible today in the worker cottages of the Old Mill District, at the Old Mill Heritage Centre, and on the Old Mill Footbridge.

Indigenous territory

As a fictional city, Silvermere names no specific Nation. A real community on Silver Lake would rest on, and acknowledge, the traditional territory of the Indigenous Peoples of the region, whose connection to this valley reaches back since time immemorial and continues today.

Work and education

Highwater College maintains its main campus in Silvermere, drawing students from across the region for trades, university transfer, business, and arts programs.

The West Highlands Regional Airport (YSV) provides regular service to Vancouver, making Silvermere an unusually well-connected small city.

Local economy is anchored by industry (forestry, the Old Mill and successor sawmills), trades, the public sector, regional health and education services, and a growing network of small businesses serving residents and visitors.

Culture and recreation

People stay in Silvermere because of the lakeshore trails, the mountain biking, the public art (Silvermere Lakelight is a major regional draw), the affordable housing relative to the BC coast, and the small-town warmth that's getting harder to find in larger cities.

Common destinations include:

• Lantern Bay Park and Cottonwood Point
• Lakelight, the winter festival of light along the Silver Lake promenade
• The Greystone Ridge bike trail in the nearby Silvercrest Mountains
• The Old Mill Footbridge, a 1916 mill-worker-built heritage landmark