House

Statement of Significance

Residence, 80 Townshend Road, Subiaco is of cultural heritage significance:
• As a good intact example of Federation style housing in excellent condition
• For its demonstration of earlier ways of living through its form and scale of housing
• The place has historic value as a demonstration of the period in which Subiaco underwent rapid development in the early 20th century.

Physical Description

No. 80 Townshend Road is a single storey brick and iron residence of federation style. The house appears to have been recently restored incorporating a new verandah canopy and refreshed painted finishes. The house is of brick construction with tuckpointing and two rendered string courses to the façade. The windows are traditional double hung sashes with rendered moulded sills and decorative rendered feature below. The hipped and gablet roof is clad with short sheet corrugated iron that has previously been painted green but is showing signs of paint failure.

The faceted bay creates an asymmetric plan form to the façade. The entrance door is positioned in the centre of the façade flanked by a single timber famed sash window to the left of the entrance door and the faceted bay to the right of the door.

The entrance door is a four panelled solid timber door with timber panelled and glazed side lights and three fan lights above.

The faceted bay incorporates two single sash windows, one each to the chamfered edge of the bay and a set of French doors with fanlight to the front section of the bay. The windows and doors have been secured with metal security grilles.

The bullnose verandah canopy is supported on turned timber columns with a simple timber frieze spanning between the columns. The deck is painted concrete with no balustrade. The timber columns have metal stirrups at the base.

The right side elevation of the house has been painted white over the brickwork whilst the left elevation remains as fair face brick. Neither side elevations display any of the decorative features expressed on the façade. A weatherboard addition is on the rear of the property.
The house is set back behind a small garden area with bitumen and paver finishes which have been painted red to match the verandah base. The garden is enclosed by a mid-height brick wall with 1.8m piers and railing infill panels.

History

During the early years of settlement of the Swan River Colony most of the Subiaco area formed part of the Perth Commonage. The original 5 acre lots for Subiaco were part of the wider Perth settlement surveyed in 1883 and were designated as Perth Suburban Lots (PSL). The Subiaco Municipal Council was created in 1897 and the area developed rapidly in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century with a strong and active community and pride in its identity as a ‘working class suburb’.

This portion of Subiaco was subdivided into residential lots in 1895. Lot 31 was purchased in 1897 by Henry Leopold Hind (1863-1938) an engineer originally from England who had worked in Victoria before settling in Western Australia. No residence is recorded on the site until 1903 when Hind is recorded on the Electoral Rolls as living in Townshend Road. Henry Hind had a daughter Ada Hannah Florence Hind from a previous marriage in Victoria.

In 1905, Henry Hind married Elizabeth Jane Utting and the couple lived in the house until 1910. In 1921, when Ada was 21, the property was transferred to her name. It was at this time that the place was occupied by a series of tenants some of whom, such as milliner Miss Silvester, practiced their profession from the premises.
In 1923, the property was transferred to Edward James Weaver, a police constable. In the following year, 1924, Ada Hind married William Ullman and the couple settled in Greenmount.
PC Weaver and his wife Lucy lived at the premises for only one year before it was transferred to another policeman, Detective Robert Charles Anderson (1874-1957).

Detective Anderson was 50 when he and his wife, Eda Matilda, relocated to the house in 1925. The couple lived together at the house until Robert’s death in 1957 and Eda lived on in the house until her death in 1964. Members of the Anderson family subsequently retained ownership of the house.

During the time the house was occupied by the Andersons a plan of the outline of the house was prepared by the Department of Water Supply, Sewerage and Drainage. This plan shows that the house was of a simple layout with an enclosed verandah across the rear with the bathroom located on the verandah.
Aerial photographs of the site since 1948 show that the outline of the residence has changed little since that time. In 1966, the bullnose verandah was replaced with a new verandah supported by steel columns and the timber floor was replaced with concrete. It is suggested that the green roof is likely to be a later version of the original roof cladding.

The current owners recently reinstated the bullnose verandah.

Integrity/Authenticity

Integrity - High
Authenticity - Moderate to high
Rarity/Representativeness - No rarity value
The place is representative of housing styles seen throughout the Subiaco area.

Condition

Good

Uses

Creation Date

Publish place record online (inHerit):

Last Update

Disclaimer

This information is provided voluntarily as a public service. The information provided is made available in good faith and is derived from sources believed to be reliable and accurate. However, the information is provided solely on the basis that readers will be responsible for making their own assessment of the matters discussed herein and are advised to verify all relevant representations, statements and information.