House

Parent Place or Precinct

25394 Union and Redfern Heritage Area

Statement of Significance

The Union and Redfern Street Heritage Area is significant for:
Aesthetic Value:
The area contains aesthetically pleasing streetscapes with a strong heritage character. In particular, cohesive streetscapes have been created by a limited palette of materials and styles.
The area contains many good, representative, suburban examples of Federation Queen Anne houses and Federation Bungalows. These include both gentlemen’s villas and modest suburban houses, and collectively illustrate a gradual evolution in architectural detailing of these places between 1899 and the early Inter-war years.
Historic Value:
The residential subdivision of this area represents the early development activities of Sydney and Melbourne based real estate agents and property developers. In this context it helps to illustrate the status of Western Australia as a place of opportunity during the gold rush era of the late nineteenth century – attracting significant interest and investment from the eastern states.
The collection of houses in the heritage area helps to demonstrate the manner in which the family residences of professional men and business owners (such as senior civil servants and merchants) existed side by side with the smaller houses of semi-professional and tradespeople.
The collection of houses in the heritage area helps to illustrate the scale and standard of housing considered appropriate for these families in the early twentieth century.
The area was a place of residence for a number of people who were prominent in the local business community or were otherwise public identities of the early to mid-twentieth century.

Physical Description

9 Redfern Street was designed as an Inter-War California Bungalow.
Key elements include:
• Asymmetrical façade.
• Visually prominent low-pitch roof, clad with terra-cotta tiles and finished with dragon finials to the original section.
• Flat-capped chimney with tapered roughcast rendered faces.
• Wide eaves overhangs.
• Prominent gable to the front of the verandah, featuring a square timber lattice face.
• Small, north facing roof gablet with matching lattice.
• Plain rendered walls to approximately 2/3 height (possibly originally tuck-pointed), with roughcast render over – the two sections separated by a sender projecting band.
• Wide, timber floored verandah returning around the north-east corner of the house.
The verandah roof is a continuous extension of the main roofline, with a projecting gable over the eastern half of the main frontage. It is supported by robust paired timber posts set on tapered roughcast pylons with smooth-rendered flat caps.
• Side entry, near the southern end of the return verandah.
This entrance has robust timber framing and half-height sidelights – typical of the prominent carpentry detailing of this style.
• Rectangular-pattern lead light window wrapping around the north-east corner of the house.
This has boxed timber casements (3 to each facade) set over a projecting rendered sill and a tapered roughcast rendered base.
• Secondary single door opening onto the front verandah.
• Stepped side wing to the south of the return verandah.
This features a pair of small casement windows on the north side, a boxed casement window to the east face (with similar detailing to the main corner window) and a secondary wrap-around window to the stepped corner.
The house is set approximately 8m back from the front boundary, which is defined by a tall fence with a low rendered masonry wall, rendered masonry posts and open, metal-bar, infill panels – backed by a low, clipped hedge. An open driveway at the eastern end of the fence leads to an open carparking area that runs along the eastern side of the verandah. Tall timber gates are located at the western end.
Two tall palm trees are the dominant elements of the well-established front garden.
Based on a streetscape inspection the building appears to be in good condition.

History

A Certificate of Title for Perth Suburban Lot 256 was issued in the name of The Intercolonial Investment Land and Building Company Ltd of Sydney NSW on 22 August 1890. This was bounded by Hamersley Road to the north, Hensman Road to the west and Heytesbury Road to the south. In June 1896 the whole of this property was transferred to James Thomas Peet and Austin Bastow of Melbourne, Estate Agents, and by August of that year Peet and Bastow had subdivided this as Deposited Plan 938, with Lots 25 to 30 along the northern side of Beryl Street (later renamed Redfern Street) and Lots 31 to 36 along the southern side.
Lots 1 to 3, 16 to 18, 28 to 30 and 32 to 34 were all transferred to Austin Bastow’s wife, Mary Ann Bastow, in December 1897. By 1908/09 Lot 33 was owned by Joseph Thomas Reilly (printer) of Northam, but Lot 32 was still owned by Mrs Bastow. Further changes of ownership followed and by 1918/19, Lot 32 and part Lot 33 were owned by Raymond Preston (tally clerk).
Raymond (Ray) Christie Preston married Ivy Jane Jewell in 1919 and they subsequently had two children who survived infancy, Raymond Trevor Preston and Valerie Jewell Preston. Ray and Ivy initially lived at 369 Barker Road, but by 1924 had moved into a newly built house at 9 Redfern Street (financed with a loan from the War Service Homes Board).
Ivy was the daughter of William George Jewell who trained as a plasterer, but was working as a building contractor (based in Subiaco) in the early twentieth century.
Buildings that have been attributed to W G Jewell include 96 Barker Road (built in 1906), 195 Townshend Road (c.1920) and his own home at 101 Hamersley Road (c.1922). A history of 9 Redfern Street (A Well Loved House, Trevor Preston) confirms that he also built his daughter’s home at 9 Redfern Street, using a similar design to the house at 101 Hamersley Road (including the unusual latticed detailing to the verandah gables and front gablets).
The Prestons lived at this address until shorty before Raymond’s death in 1970 (one year after Ivy’s death in 1969).
The major second storey additions were undertaken in 2003.
Occupants of the property from its time of construction until c.1969 included:
1924-1970 Raymond Christie Preston (clerk) and his wife, Ivy Jane Preston

Integrity/Authenticity

Note: The design of this place has been modified by the visually prominent second storey additions, but the external detailing of the original part of the house remains broadly consistent with the original design and the key elements of the traditional streetscape.

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.