Pascoe Vale Road Precinct

2. The original or early front fences at 189, 199, 203-207, 211 & 235 Pascoe Vale Road.

3. The bluestone kerb and channel and mature street trees (Elms and Oaks) in Fletcher Street, and the laneways in Pascoe Vale Road between nos. 223 and 225 (which has a pitched bluestone central drain) and nos. 235 and 237 (paved in bluestone pitchers), and the early post box outside 2 Fletcher Street.

Key attributes that contribute to the significance of this precinct include:

- the scale, form, siting, materials and detailing of the Significant and Contributory houses
- the high degree of intactness to the development dates from the late Victorian to interwar periods
- Significant and Contributory houses that typically survive with their presentation to the street being largely intact
- the consistently low height of front fences
- road alignments and allotment patterns resulting from the nineteenth century subdivision

The flats and houses at 191, 195, 201 and 215 Pascoe Vale Road, non-original front fences, and non-original alterations or additions to Contributory or Significant places are not significant (this includes the alterations and new built elements at the rear of 193 Pascoe Vale Road).

How is it significant?
The Pascoe Vale Road precinct in Essendon is of local historic, architectural and aesthetic significance to the City of Moonee Valley.

Why is it significant?
It is historically significant as a representative example of a residential area, which is associated with the suburban development and expansion of Essendon during the early twentieth century. The nineteenth century houses are a reminder of the nineteenth century origins of this area, while the Edwardian and inter-war housing provides a tangible illustration of how the opening of the electric tram in 1906 stimulated residential development along its route. (Criteria A & D)

It is architecturally and aesthetically significant as a fine collection of Edwardian villas and Inter-war bungalows, many of which are complemented by original front fences, and garden walls and landscaping. The high quality of much of the housing and the high degree of intactness to the original period of development is notable. (Criterion E)

The house at 189 Pascoe Vale Road is aesthetically significant as an intact example of the Spanish Mission style. The asymmetric, triple-fronted form with hipped roof massed like separate pavilions, the dominant porch with a decorative Baroque-inspired parapet with a scrolled cartouche above a triple-arched loggia with barley-twist columns (smaller columns frame the blind window to the side of the garage), and the Serlian moulding (with tiled detailing) above the windows either side of the porch are all expressive of the style. The house is also of architectural significance for including an integrated garage, which is an early example, as most garages of the pre-World War II period were freestanding (Criteria D & E).

The house at 193 Pascoe Vale Road is architecturally and aesthetically significant as a fine and early example of a California Bungalow, which demonstrates the Japanese influence seen in seminal examples in the United States designed by architects such as Greene & Greene. It was constructed in 1916 and designed by architects Gawler & Drummond. Of note is the low gable pitch with very wide eaves, flat verandah roof with shaped rafter ends, resting on chunky timber brackets and the use of single storey pavilions in front of a two-storey mass, which is a very unusual composition in Victoria. Other details of note include the heavy dwarf verandah posts with timber corbels at base, casement windows with diamond leadlights and Arts & Crafts floral highlights, timber shingles in gables resting on timber corbels, and walls of roughcast render above a tuckpointed red brick plinth. The significance of the house is enhanced by its high degree of intactness. (Criteria D, E & F)

The houses at 205 & 207 Pascoe Vale Road are of aesthetic significant as fine and well detailed examples of Arts & Crafts bungalows, constructed by the same builder (Shaw Bros.) with similar detailing, but distinctive designs that are complemented by original brick and render panel and pier front fences with decorative ironwork and gates of identical design. No.205 is of note for the distinctive Jerkinhead roof profile to both the roof and the porch, which is double-arched and supported by square rendered columns with buttressed corners and clinker brick highlights, while notable features of no.207 include the circular window placed at one corner with a shingled canopy and the gable ends, which have taper-cut bargeboards and an elaborate gable vent with louvered and lattice set inside a Japanese-influenced aedicule set within a band of faux half-timbering, suggesting timber post framing, and timber shingles in the apex, which sit proud above small modillions. The significance of the houses is enhanced by their high degree of intactness. (Criterion E)

Group

Residential buildings (private)

Category

Residential Precinct