Clifton Estate Residential Precinct
Florence Avenue KEW, BOROONDARA CITY
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Statement of Significance
What is Significant?
The Clifton Estate Precinct, comprising 1-7 & 2-28 Florence Avenue, Kew, is significant. The street was created in 1911 as part of a small subdivision comprising 61 lots on Cotham Road, Park Hill Road, Florence Avenue and Adeney Avenue (east side).
All properties, excepting the Non-contributory units at 4-4A Florence Avenue, are Contributory to the precinct. The original brick front fence and rear garages of St Joan Flats, 2 Florence Avenue, are also contributory elements.
How is it significant?
The Clifton Estate Precinct is of local historical and architectural significance to the City of Boroondara.
Why is it significant?
The Clifton Estate Precinct is historically significant for the evidence it provides of the pattern of settlement in this part of Kew during the early interwar period, which comprised subdivisions on the grounds of larger estates. The scale and high-quality design of the houses and the St Joan Flats, and the 'respectability' epitomised by their architectural styles and associated elements, remain as important evidence of the strength of Kew's development during the interwar period. (Criterion A)
Architecturally, the Clifton Estate Precinct, Kew, is significant for its concentration of gracious houses on generous allotments of high quality design and with a high level of integrity, comparable to other precincts in Kew. The first and most substantial houses were built at the south end, starting in 1915, with the final examples completed by 1942, thus spanning the entire interwar period. The precinct features high-quality interwar building stock, with houses designed in styles that were fashionable during this time, including Arts and Crafts, Bungalow, interwar Mediterranean, Georgian Revival and Old English. Tender notices indicate that many of the houses were architect-designed, with the authorship of No. 7 (Blackett & Forster, 1915-16) and No. 2 (James Wardrop, c1938-42) confirmed. (Criterion D)
Grading and Recommendations
Recommended for inclusion in the Schedule to the Heritage Overlay of the Boroondara Planning Scheme as a precinct.
For a full list of individual place gradings within the precinct, please refer to the attached PDF citation, or individual child records attached to this parent record.
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Clifton Estate Residential Precinct - Physical Description 1
Florence Avenue is a wide street running north from Cotham Road to Parkhill Road. Street trees along it are small, though mature and semi-mature trees in front yards lend greenery to the streetscape. Kerbs and channels are of bluestone pitches, and the footpaths and roadbeds are paved with asphalt.
The earliest houses, at the south end of the street, were built first and are quite substantial in scale and architectural quality. These include the Arts and Crafts residences at Nos. 3, 6 and 7, and the later 1920s Georgian Revival dwelling at No. 8, all of which sit on double blocks befitting their grandeur. Moving further north, the houses are somewhat smaller though still larger than average and fashionable in their architectural detail.
As noted in the History, the houses in the precinct were built over the course of the entire interwar period (1915 to c1942), though all but four were completed within the first ten years.
The earliest houses can be described as Arts and Crafts in style, including Nos. 3, 6, 7 and 10, and the three largest ones (3, 6 & 7) take the attic-storey form that was a popular version of this style. The most elaborate one of them is the c1915-17 mansion at No.6, which combines high transverse gabled roof with a major and minor gable facing the street. The larger of the two is austere in design with three indented rectangles at the apex, while the smaller one has elaborate half-timbering. The entrance porch (possibly a porte-cochere) is a large hipped-roof structure resting on tapered piers. Chimneys are tapered and the walls of the house are finished in roughcast render. Across the road, No. 7 is distinguished by its wide attic gable front and tall sculptural chimneys. Its walls are also finished in roughcast render. The witch's hat tower on the south-west corner appears to be a recent addition.
Though of the same age, the two remaining Arts and Crafts houses demonstrate the transition to the bungalow form and materials that would characterise the 1920s. Both have red face brick walls and chimneys, as well as gables decorated with timber shingles. No. 3 has a transverse gable roof with a central gabled bay that retains a still unenclosed sleepout at attic level. The sleepout and the ground-floor porch, which sits beneath the roofline, are supported on heavy square timber posts with solid timber corner brackets. No. 10 is smaller but quite picturesque with its paired front gables where ornament is concentrated. This includes the slender 12-over-one sash windows in the bays, scalloped timber shingles to the bay window hood and gable apex (which also has three slit openings in a decorative pattern), and exaggerated curved timber brackets beneath the gable eaves which are pierced with a grid of square openings. The house also retains long leadlight sidelights and glazing to the front door.
The 1920s houses are bungalows of various types, with the exception of No. 8. One group could be called California Bungalows, though they are more varied in roof form and detail that is typical. They include Nos. 12 (early - c1915-17), 14, 20 and 24. Of these, No. 20 is the most classic in form with major and minor gables forming the facade. The others have varied roof forms including hipped with a large projecting gabled porch (No. 14), hipped with a gabled window bay (No. 12), and transverse gabled with a flat roof porch. Two variants of this type are the cross-gabled attic bungalow at No. 22, and a Mediterranean Revival example with a pyramidal roof and arched porch beneath it at No. 16. This group is unified by walls of face brick (usually red) or a combination of roughcast render and brick (usually clinker brick). Porch supports are heavy square or tapered piers, and gables are finished with timber shingles. Ornament is sparse but visual interest is created by bay windows and multipaned sashes.The two-storey rendered dwelling at No. 8, built in the late 1920s, is an elegant and restrained example of the Georgian Revival style. It is massed beneath a dominant hipped roof with a central projecting pavilion supported on paired piers at both levels. The same piers are also used at the ends of the first-floor verandah (set beneath the main roof), bracketing the mild-steel balustrade. The ground-floor windows have simple concrete hoods, foreshadowing a form that became very popular in the 1930s as part of the Moderne style. The house sits in an expansive and gracious garden setting.
The final dwellings in the precinct were built just before the outbreak of World War II, at Nos. 1, 2 and 26-28. The two-storey clinker-brick house at 1 Florence Avenue is a later version of the Georgian Revival style, in the simplified form popular just before and after the war. The distinguishing features of the late version of this style are the hipped roof, multipaned (8-over-8) sash windows, and a feature window in the shape of an elongated octagon.
The two remaining buildings are in another popular style of the late interwar period: Old English (or Domestic Revival). The sprawling single-storey clinker-brick semi-detached pair at Nos. 26-28 displays the most characteristic feature of the style: vergeless corbelled eaves. In this example, the wide block allows for three such gables to be used to the front facade, along with varied massing. The two-storey St Joan Flats at No. 2 are a more embellished version. Brickwork is subtly banded in mottled clinker bricks and lighter apricot-toned bricks. Two vergeless corbelled gables form the front facade, one embellished with an external chimney breast and the other with and inset triple cross motif. Side windows are protected by timber hoods on heavy timber brackets. An element of the Moderne style is introduced by curved concrete balconies to the first floor. The flats retain an original low clinker brick front fence, as well as parapeted garages with timber doors at the rear.
Heritage Study and Grading
Boroondara - Municipal-Wide Heritage Gap Study Volume 4: Kew
Author: Context
Year: 2018
Grading: Local
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SPRINGTHORPE MEMORIAL, BOROONDARA GENERAL CEMETERYVictorian Heritage Register H0522
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ROSS HOUSE (KEW)Victorian Heritage Register H0202
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GENAZZANO FCJ COLLEGEVictorian Heritage Register H1902
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