158 Mont Albert Road
158 Mont Albert Road CANTERBURY, Boroondara City
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Statement of Significance
158 Mont Albert Road, Canterbury is of local historical and architectural significance as a fine and relatively intact example of a generously proportioned society house of the interwar period influenced by contemporary design in the United States. It retains an original cabana-garage and a fence which may be original or early. The building has a bold asymmetry, particularly in its north elevation, that works well in bringing a sense of informality to a design otherwise marked by imposing Renaissance components. The use of a heavy commercial awning is a vigorous and successful gesture, enlivening the presence of the house.
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158 Mont Albert Road - Physical Description 1
158 Mont Albert Road was a house and detached cabana-garage, designed in 1919 and completed the following year.[i] The house is two-storey in rendered brick, with a shallow hipped roof with deep bracketed eaves (reading almost as a cornice element) and simple cuboid central massing, broken by a rectangular balcony on the east side and a canted bay on the west, both two-storeyed. The east side balcony has a sheltered terrace underneath with tiled flooring. The house is surfaced in stucco, smooth for the expressed structure in the piers and pilasters, and textured on the wall surfaces in between. Compositionally the house reads as broadly asymmetrical, the regularity of its pilaster and voussoir details interrupted by an off-centre stair window with two tall arched lights and circular window at the top, in between. This drives through to the ground floor, interrupting the awning on the north side. The flanking windows are fairly plain sashes, with small panes in their upper facets. The most distinctive detail in the house, though, is the commercial touch suggested by the awnings, which were thick iron shop awnings braced with tension rods from the first floor, and seem to have transplanted a CBD retailing form.
The cabana/garage block is asymmetrical, with a two-storey lodge at one end and originally a lower run of garage spaces at the other. This was later converted into a pool house.[ii]
The house appears to be broadly intact as viewed from the street (other than for the overpainting of the stucco noted by Graeme Butler in 1991, and the introduction of cedar planking for new awning soffits). Both house and cabana/garage are undergoing renovation at the time of writing. The current works appear to be focused on the rear sections of the house where some demolition and new building works are occurring. The one exception is that a section of the front awning (at the north-west corner) appears to be identified for demolition.[iii]
A swimming pool was installed in 1986; this is now being rebuilt. A tennis court was placed alongside, and this is now being resurfaced as a piazza. The mature trees in the front garden remain; Butler notes a Canary Island palm among them. The Renaissance-derived facade details on both the house and outbuilding have the stylization and exaggeration associated with the Edwardian Baroque. Graeme Butler has suggested that the existing high rendered brick fence may be original.[iv]
[i] Details sourced from Butler, Camberwell Conservation Study 1991, v. 4, p. 201-2. Butler remarks that the stucco walls were unpainted until shortly before he made his study.
[ii] Based on site observations.
[iii] Drawings by Catt Architects dated March 2005. sourced from City of Boroondara Building File #40/408/26852.
[iv] G Butler, Camberwell Conservation Study 1991, v. 4, p. 202.
Heritage Study and Grading
Boroondara - Review of B Graded Buildings in Kew, Camberwell and Hawthorn
Author: Lovell Chen Architects & Heritage Consultants
Year: 2006
Grading: BBoroondara - Camberwell Conservation Study
Author: Graeme Butler
Year: 1991
Grading:
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CANTERBURY MANSIONSVictorian Heritage Register H0869
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RESIDENCE (FORMERLY COLINTON)Victorian Heritage Register H1399
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SHRUBLANDSVictorian Heritage Register H2037
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"1890"Yarra City
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"AMF Officers" ShedMoorabool Shire
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"AQUA PROFONDA" SIGN, FITZROY POOLVictorian Heritage Register H1687
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