"Leeton" Residence

Location

57 Maud Street, GEELONG VIC 3220 - Property No 215645

Level

Incl in HO area indiv sig

Statement of Significance

C Listed - Local Significance

STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE

The house at 57 Maud Street, Geelong has significance as a substantial and considerably intact example of the interwar Bungalow style. This house was built in 1927-28 for Albert Leslie Backwell, stove manufacturer, and it is still owned by a member of the Backwell family today. The house appears to be in good condition when viewed from the street.

The house at 57 Maud Street is architecturally significant at a LOCAL level. It demonstrates original design qualities of an interwar Californian Bungalow style. These qualities include the gabled roof form that traverses the site, together with a gable that projects towards the street frontage, and the flat-roofed verandah at the side. Other intact or appropriate qualities include the asymmetrical composition, two storey height, tiled roof cladding, unpainted rendered brick chimneys with unpainted brick strapping, wide eaves, unpainted red brick verandah piers with soldier course capitals, timber framed double hung windows arranged as a large projecting bay at the front and as banks of boxed windows and as a projecting flat-roofed side bay, dichromatic brick construction (whereby the base walls are the delineated from the upper red brick walls by darker brick construction), soldier course stringcourse at ground floor level, brick buttress on the south-east corner, unpainted cement rendered wall construction about the gable ends, second storey gable and under the eaves, concrete verandah steps with solid brick balustrades and painted concrete cappings, window leadlighting, timber gable brackets, and the gable infill (timber battening and panelling, shingling and brackets). The brick-terraced garden frontage and fence also contribute to the significance of the place.

The house at 57 Maud Street is historically significant at a LOCAL level. It is associated with the subdivision of the former Geelong Grammar School Reserve in 1916, and especially with residential developments in the area during the interwar period (1920s-1940s). Built in 1927-28, the house has long associations with the Backwell family who continue to own the property. The house was originally built for Ebenezer Backwell, who continued his father's stove manufacturing business and further establishing the Backwells as a well-known family in Geelong.

Overall, the house at 57 Maud Street is of LOCAL significance.

References

Drainage Plans and Reports, 1927, 1928, Barwon Water profis system, City of Greater Geelong.

Voters' Roll, Barwon Ward, 1992, Geelong Historical Records Centre.

Electoral Roll, Division Corio, Subdivision Geelong, 1984, Geelong Historical Records Centre.

Sands & McDougall Directory of Geelong, 1972, Geelong Historical Records Centre.

Sands & McDougall "Invicta" Geelong Directory, 1968, Geelong Historical Records Centre.

Victorian Deaths Index, 1920-1985, Geelong Historical Records Centre.

Geelong City Rate Books, Barwon Ward, 1927-1960, Geelong Historical Records Centre.

Old Geelong Grammar School Estate, auction notice, 8 April 1916, Geelong Historical Records Centre.

Geelong Town Plan, 1923, Geelong Historical Records Centre.

Group

Residential buildings (private)

Category

Residence