North Gellibrand Street Precinct
Gellibrand Street and Hobson Street and Symonds Streets QUEENSCLIFF, QUEENSCLIFFE BOROUGH
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Statement of Significance
Extract from the 2009 study
What is significant?
This precinct includes a wide range and variety of historically and architecturally significant buildings in the one section of the street, including the opulent boom-era hotel buildings of the 1870s and 1880s with their important historical and social associations with the development of Queenscliff as a tourist centre in the nineteenth century; as well a range of more modest residential buildings dating from the 1860s through to the interwar period which display a wide range of materials and building styles reflective of their varied origins.
Specific significant and contributory buildings within the precinct are identified in the attached schedule.
How is it significant?
This precinct is of historical and aesthetic significance to the Borough of Queenscliffe.
Why is it significant?
The Gellibrand Street Precinct is associated with and demonstrates a number of key historical themes in the history of Queenscliff.
It includes a series of early residences (of the 1860s), reflecting early subdivision and residential development in the township; these are interspersed with later residences (ranging from the later Victorian era through to the interwar period) which demonstrate later phases of residential development in Queenscliff.
It also contains three of Queenscliff's key towered boom-era hotels (the Esplanade, Queenscliff and Ozone Hotels) and reflects - in a very tangible way - the development of the tourist trade from the late 1870s and Queenscliff's status at the end of the nineteenth century as Port Phillip Bay's pre-eminent fashionable watering place. In this regard, the precinct is strongly connected historically with Princess Park, the foreshore and the Queenscliffe Pier, all of which it overlooks.
The precinct is of considerable aesthetic and architectural power and distinction. It contains a series of prominent, substantial and elaborate Victorian hotels and residences of the 1870s and 1880s, featuring picturesque towers and roof forms and finely detailed facades including decorated verandahs. These key buildings are the focus of the precinct and hold it together in a visual sense, but are supported by a series of more modest late nineteenth and early twentieth century residences. The aesthetic qualities of the precinct are also derived from its topography and relationship to the parkland, foreshore and sea. It is a place which is highly valued for its aesthetic qualities, by both residents and visitors alike.
The two largest buildings in the precinct are critically situated on the highest point of the street, thus forming a focal point for the entire town.
Whilst not part of the precinct, the Princess Park on the east side of Gellibrand Street is critical to the presentation of the area.
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North Gellibrand Street Precinct - Usage/Former Usage
Until 1865, Section III fronting Gellibrand Street between Stokes Street and Hobson Street was a Customs Reserve occupied by a stone customs house built in the early 1850s. The land surrounding the house was subsequently declared surplus, the blocks to the north of the Customs House declared a Market Reserve until J90 I and the blocks to the south sold off between 1865 and 1866. Section IV of the northern section of the land fronting this part of Gellibrand Street between Hobson and Symonds Street was divided into standard allotments and progressively sold off from 1854 onwards. By 1865, three houses were standing in this section of the street, two of which are still there today although much altered in appearance.
The area, however, is of interest not so much for its oldest buildings as for its buildings of the I870s and I880s. Here is the tangible evidence of the tourist boom of the late ninteenth century that placed Queenscliff at the head of the fashionable watering places on Port Phillip Boy. The grandeur and opulence of the hotels could hardly be surpassed and their turretted and towered roofs provided a skyline unique in Victoria.North Gellibrand Street Precinct - Physical Description 1
Streetscape
This section of Gellibrand Street is characterised by the long row of Cypresses and gravel verge on the east side and concrete footpaths and kerbing and mown naturestrips on the west si de. The appearance of the street around 1910 was a wide gravel carriageway with no planting on the east side and a deep pitcher gutter on the west side separating the footpath from the road. While it is possibly not desirable to recreate this streetscape as it was at the turn of the century, it should be basically maintained in its present form. The wide gravel verge on the east side should be retained and a wide shallow spoon drain of pitchers installed to overcome the washaway problem beside the rood. On the west side of the street further street tree planting should be carried out in the nature strip. To further enhance the streetscape as a whole consideration could also be given to the replanting of Norfolk Pines in the front of the Ozone and the Queenscliff Hotels.
North Gellibrand Street Precinct - Physical Description 2
Extract from the 2009 study
This precinct takes in the west side of Gellibrand Street between Stokes and Symonds Streets. The area is generally residential in nature but includes a series of notable nineteenth century hotels and a small number of other commercial premises.
Gellibrand Street overlooks parkland and the Queenscliffe foreshore to the east. The street slopes upward from the low lying area north of Symonds Street southward to the corner with Stokes Street at the southern extent of the precinct. The street is dominated by Queenscliffe's key nineteenth century hotels, the Esplanade (1878), the Queenscliff (1887-8) and the Ozone (1881-2) as well as by Lathamstowe (44 Gellibrand Street, an unusual stuccoed brick residential duplex with flat roof used for promenading and prominent mansarded tower. These key buildings with their turreted and towered roofs are the focus of the precinct and have a powerful presence overlooking the foreshore.
Particularly in the central section of the street there are a number of early single-storey residences, including Neptune Cottage and Clydesville, both of the c. 1860s and the slightly later Caribou Cottage (mid-1870s) as well as a small number of (predominantly single-storey) residences of the later Victorian and Federation and interwar periods. There is some recent infill of broadly compatible scale and a small number of undistinguished post-WWII houses.
While physically a relatively contained precinct, the range of construction dates generates a wide mix of materials and architectural styles; the key hotel and residential buildings of the 1870s and 1880s are of masonry and are of varying degrees of elaboration (the Ozone and Queenscliff Hotels being the most flamboyant architecturally), while the earlier residences are a mix of masonry and timber and are relatively simple and modest in their presentation.
The precinct has strong historical and visual links with Princess Park, the foreshore and the Queenscliffe Pier, all of which it overlooks.
Heritage Study and Grading
Queenscliffe - Queenscliffe Urban Conservation Study
Author: Allom Lovell & Associates P/L, Architects
Year: 1982
Grading:Queenscliffe - Queenscliffe Heritage Study
Author: Lovell Chen
Year: 2009
Grading:
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LATHAMSTOWEVictorian Heritage Register H1052
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PILOTS COTTAGESVictorian Heritage Register H1618
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ROSENFELDVictorian Heritage Register H1134
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