The Willows
44 Elizabeth Street MALVERN, STONNINGTON CITY
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Statement of Significance
What is significant?
'The Willows' at 44 Elizabeth Street, Malvern is significant. It was built in 1897 by local builder, Charles F. Wheatland as his family home.
It comprises a medium-sized late-Victorian Italianate villa with unusual asymmetrical massing with a cast iron return verandah and detailing that illustrates a transition to Queen Anne influences. The house is significant as viewed and appreciated from Elizabeth Street, and is significant to the extent of its nineteenth century external form and fabric.
The modern alterations and additions are not significant.
How is it significant?
'The Willows' at 44 Elizabeth Street, Malvern is of local architectural and aesthetic significance to the City of Stonnington.
Why is it significant?
Architecturally, 'The Willows' is a late representative example of a medium-sized Victorian Italianate villa built for middle-class residents of Malvern, of the sort that began to characterise the suburb in the 1880s and 1890s. The villa exhibits typical features of this type, including an asymmetrical plan form, cast iron verandah, a hipped roof clad in slate, and rendered chimneys with heavy cornices. (Criterion D).
Aesthetically, it is distinguished by its complex massing, fine bichrome brickwork and interesting detailing that illustrates the transition to Federation influences, including the corner bay window placed on the diagonal, eaves brackets set on a ground of roughcast render, the unusual bulging rendered window sills, and notable margin glazing of the double-hung sash windows. (Criterion E)
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The Willows - Physical Description 1
'The Willows' is an unusual example of a bichrome brick single-storey Italianate villa which occupies an allotment on the east side of Elizabeth Street, north of the intersection with Beaven Avenue in Malvern. The residence is set back from the street behind a generous sized front garden and a timber picket fence. The property slopes down away from Elizabeth Street towards the rear lane which provides vehicular access to Walnut Street.
Constructed by 1897, the late-Victorian villa is an unusual variation on the single-storey asymmetrical Italianate villa type which became popular from the 1880s. The type typically adopts a canted projecting bay to one side of the main entrance beneath a cast-iron verandah fronting the street. In this instance, the building is distinguished by its more complex massing. In addition to the projecting front bay, a rectangular projecting wing sits on the diagonal at the south-west corner. The more complex form, and diagonal planning foreshadows the transition to Federation influences. The bullnose verandah encircles the corner bay and returns along the south elevation to a secondary projecting canted bay.
The building has a hipped roof, clad in slate, with three visible red brick chimneys with heavy cement rendered cornices and terracotta pots. The deep eaves have timber brackets of a pierced design set on a ground of roughcast render, which foreshadows the popular use of this material finish to the gable ends and chimneys of Queen Anne and Federation-era buildings. The walls beneath the verandah are of tuckpointed red brick with cream brick dressings expressed as quoining to the building corners and window openings. The pattern is particularly lively and unusual to the canted projecting bays with the quoins interlocking with the window dressings. Windows beneath the verandah and to the canted bay are segmentally arched double-hung sashes with unusual bulging and deeply raked rendered sills. The sills further indicate a transition to Federation influences, as does the margin glazing bars to the corner bay window. The elaborately panelled entrance door has lost its decorative glazing to the sidelights, and presumably to the highlight.
The house as viewed from Elizabeth Street is substantially intact, apart from the reproduction bullnose verandah. Real estate photos of c2010 show a substantial two-storey addition constructed in matching bichrome brick with a two storey canted projecting bay to the rear of the property (Figure 7). It appears to date from the 1990s. The extension is not visible from Elizabeth Street. The plan also shows an interesting octagonal entrance hall in the centre of the original part of the house (Figure 8).
The Willows - Local Historical Themes
This place illustrates the following themes, as identified in the Stonnington Thematic Environmental History (Context Pty Ltd, rev. 2009):
8.2.1 'Country in the city' - Suburban development in Malvern before WWIHeritage Study and Grading
Stonnington - City of Stonnington Victorian Houses Study
Author: City of Stonnington
Year: 2016
Grading: A2
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KAWARAUVictorian Heritage Register H0489
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STONINGTONVictorian Heritage Register H1608
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KATANGAVictorian Heritage Register H0935
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