HO121 - Former Rose & Crown Hotel
2057-2083 Western Highway ROCKBANK, Melton Shire
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Statement of Significance
The Sundowner Caravan Park office building (former Rose and Crown Hotel) at 2057 Western Highway, Rockbank, is significant as one of only two surviving hotel buildings in the Melton Shire. Although considerably altered, the historical significance of the place is embodied in the surviving fabric of both the Victorian and interwar periods.
The Sundowner Caravan Park office building (former Rose and Crown Hotel) at 2057 Western Highway is historically significant at a LOCAL level (AHC A4, B2). It is one of only two surviving intact nineteenth century hotels in the Shire. It has been the most substantial and enduring building in Rockbank, a hamlet that had not been identified or surveyed by the colonial government, and whose beginnings and sense of place were closely associated with the hotel. The hotel is also significant as evidence of the purge of Victoria's hotels by the Licence Reduction Board in 1911, a result of the influence of temperance crusaders, medical opinion and middle class electors. It is also significant for its association with the large extended Missen family, one of the most successful Rockbank farming families, who had, with many others, arrived in Melton from South Australia for the 1860s Selection Act sales.
The Sundowner Caravan Park office building (former Rose and Crown Hotel) at 2057 Western Highway has architectural interest. The building has surviving fabric of the Victorian era and also of significant change during the interwar period. The architectural qualities of interest are the single storey height, bluestone wall construction (but not the painted finish), gable roof forms, skillion form of the front verandah, corrugated profile roof cladding, masonry chimney (but not the painted finish), wide eaves on the gable roof forms, front timber framed double hung multi-paned windows, central timber framed door opening, gable ventilator and the timber strapping.
Overall, the Sundowner Caravan Park office building (former Rose and Crown Hotel) at 2057 Western Highway is of LOCAL significance.
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HO121 - Former Rose & Crown Hotel - Physical Description 1
Physical Description -
The Sundowner Caravan Park office building (former Rose and Crown Hotel) at 2057 Western Highway, Rockbank, is surrounded by shrubs and trees at the sides, together with two small shrubs at the front.
The single storey, painted bluestone, altered Victorian styled former hotel building is characterised by a gable roof form, together with a gable wing at the rear. The main gable roof appears to have replaced a nineteenth century roof (possibly a hipped roof) during the interwar (1920s-1940s) period. A skillion verandah projects at the front and may have replaced an earlier verandah. The roofs are clad in green corrugated Colorbond and the verandah is supported by simple timber posts. A curved flat timber picket balustrade forms the verandah boundary. A painted masonry chimney adorns the roofline and there are wide eaves.
Apart from the bluestone construction, other surviving Victorian style features of the design include the front timber framed double hung multi-paned windows and the central timber framed door opening.
Surviving features as a result of the changes possibly during the interwar period include the gable ventilator and possibly the timber strapping. A rectangular sign is also located on the gable end, partially covering the lower parts of the strapping and the ventilator.
The former hotel has been converted to the office of the Sundowner Caravan Park. Although its 'presence' on the highway has been very much altered by the flourishing trees that have flourished as part of the caravan park's borewater, the 'busyness' of its immediate context, and the external alterations to the building itself, its history as a wayside service to travellers on the Ballarat Road / Western Highway has been preserved by its present use.
HO121 - Former Rose & Crown Hotel - Historical Australian Themes
Shire of Melton Historical Themes: 'Transport'; 'Community'.
HO121 - Former Rose & Crown Hotel - Integrity
Integrity - Substantially altered
HO121 - Former Rose & Crown Hotel - Physical Conditions
Physical Condition - Good
Heritage Study and Grading
Melton - Shire of Melton Heritage Study phase 2
Author: David Maloney, David Rowe, Pamela Jellie, Sera Jane Peters
Year: 2007
Grading:
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