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Villa Bereguardo

Location 32-36 PERVERSI AVENUE DIAMOND CREEK, NILLUMBIK SHIRE Level Included in Heritage Overlay

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Statement of Significance

The house at 32-36 Perversi Avenue, Diamond Creek, built in 1924 to designs by the architect FW Thomas for Giuseppe and Sicilia Perversi, is significant. Elements that contribute to the significance of the place include its original form, materiality and detailing, and the early or original outbuilding to the northeast of the house. Later alterations and additions including the garage, pool and associated infrastructure and other outbuildings to the rear of the dwelling are not significant.The property at 32-36 Perversi Avenue, Diamond Creek is of local historic and aesthetic significance to the Shire of Nillumbik. The property is also significant for its rarity within the Shire.The property at 32-36 Perversi Avenue, Diamond Creek, is historically significant as a house built as a weekend residence for a prosperous Italian family based in Melbourne. Constructed in 1924, the property was initially used for leisure until 1929, when the family relocated to the site as their permanent residence. The house was named Villa Bereguardo after the town in Italy from which the Perversi family came. The presence of the Perversi family demonstrates pre-WW2 Italian migration to the Nillumbik area, and more broadly within Victoria. The house is also historically significant as an example of the increasingly popular use of concrete for residential construction in the early interwar period. (Criterion A) The property at 32-36 Perversi Avenue, Diamond Creek is significant as a rare and substantially intact example of a 1920s residence demonstrating the early use of reinforced concrete in the Shire. Surviving examples of this type of construction from this period are rare, and were usually concentrated around the inner suburbs of Melbourne rather than rural areas, as the Shire of Nillumbik was at the time. (Criterion B) The property at 32-36 Perversi Avenue, Diamond Creek is aesthetically significant for the substantially intact 1920s architect designed concrete house that retains many of its original features including its overall original form with hipped roof, veranda to three sides, and corner wings to the rear. The pavilion form of the house, decorative undulating veranda balustrade, timber fretwork, leadlight windows, chimneys and small gables make it a particularly good example of non-suburban bungalow design in the 1920s. The location of the house on the crest of a hill, facing the valley contributes to the aesthetic significance of the site. (Criterion E)