Edith Cowan's House & Skinner Gallery (fmr)

Statement of Significance

The place has close associations with Edith Cowan, the first woman member of an Australian parliament, and her husband, James Cowan, for whom the place was constructed, and who resided there at various times. The place has close association with Rose and Josiah Skinner, for whom the additional building was constructed in 1958, and who established the Skinner Gallery there, which was a leader in encouraging and promoting modern Australian art in the late 1950s and 1960s. The Skinner Gallery was one of the first purpose designed and built, privately run art galleries in Australia and the first in Western Australia. Although denuded of some of its architectural detail, the house retains many of the characteristics of a Victorian Rustic Gothic style house and does so in a manner which allows it to be a fine, distinctive remnant of the style. The ground floor of the gallery building contains the brightly lit and elegantly simple space of the gallery at the lower or ground floor level. The place has minor landmark quality in Malcolm Street.

Physical Description

Large two storey building with pitched CGI roof and prominent gable with wheel vent facing the street. Architectural details include a gazetted bay entrance and tall chimneys with corbelling. An art gallery (Skinner Gallery) was constructed as an extensions to the house is the 1960's. The 1960s gallery building is constructed of cream brick and is of little aesthetic significance. Not part of any intact streetscape, adjacent similar homes having been demolished in recent times. The adjacent area is increasingly characterised by high rise apartment buildings.

History

Malcolm Street was settled as a residential street from the 1890's. Only the southern side of the street was settled with houses having views over the Parliament House site and the Barracks. Around the turn of the century the Public Works Department took over the colonial built barracks and developed the site with a conglomeration of utilitarian structures. Circa 1930 Kings Park road was upgraded but Malcolm Street remained a narrow suburban street (66ft wide) and something of a bottleneck between St. George's Terrace and the widened Kings Park Road. As a result, a strip was excised from the Parliament House site for road widening. House built by Edith Cowan's family 1893. Edith Cowan lived there from 1893-1896 and from 1912-1919. She later moved to No 71 where she lived from 1919 until her death in 1932. The house was later owned by Rose Skinner, patron of the arts, who constructed the Skinner Gallery at the rear of the house in the 1960's. This gallery was prominent in the art world in Perth in the 1960's and 70's.

Integrity/Authenticity

Medium level of integrity. Medium level of authenticity. House has lost original detail including the front door, verandahs and out-buildings. The 1960s extension is largely as constructed.

Condition

Fair

Uses

Creation Date

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