former Wade Chambers, Leeton

Yesterday I wrote about the Wade Hotel and Leslie Augustus Burton Wade (1864-1915), the man who the pub is named after.

Next door to the Wade Hotel is the former Wade Chambers. Like the pub, the chambers also date from 1937 and were designed by the same architects, Rudder & Grant of Sydney in conjunction with local architect, G W A Welch.

Unfortunately some of the shopfronts have been modified but the one occupied by Don Brown Financial Services Group is exquisite and looks original to me.

References:
Leslie Augustus Burton Wade (1864-1915), Australian Dictionary of Biography
Leeton ~ Yango ~ Whitton - Heritage Trails Booklet, Leeton Shire Council, 2011

Wade Hotel, Leeton

The Wade Hotel in Leeton is named after Leslie Augustus Burton Wade (1864-1915), a career engineer and public servant in the state of New South Wales.

By 1913, Wade was responsible for all irrigation programs in NSW and was based in Leeton overseeing the settlement and development of the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area (MIA).

The pub that bears his name was built in 1937, designed by Sydney architects Rudder & Grant in conjunction with G W A Welch of Leeton. The main Deco detailing can be seen in the panels above the balcony overlooking Pine Avenue and on the Church Street side.

Wade died unexpectedly in 1915 and is also remembered through the building next door to the Hotel, the former Wade Chambers, also from 1937 and designed by the same team of architects. There is also Wade Avenue one of the main streets in the centre of Leeton.

References:
Leslie Augustus Burton Wade (1864-1915), Australian Dictionary of Biography
Leeton ~ Yango ~ Whitton - Heritage Trails Booklet, Leeton Shire Council, 2011

10 Tusculum Street, Potts Point

These apartments at 10 Tusculum Street,Potts Point has a fantastic Art Deco entrance and door.

Gallery 9, Deloraine

Gallery 9, Deloraine, Tasmania

90 Gray Street, Hamilton

This noodle & sushi shop at 90 Gray Street, Hamilton was originally Uren's Pharmacy. It was built in the late 1930s and designed by architects Seabrook & Fildes. The input of this Melbourne firm explains the relatively grand side entrance (leading to offices) with two fins sitting across the vertical window above the doorway.

Reference:
Hamilton - Art Deco & Modernism, Diane Luhrs & Linley Bramall, 2011

Ambulance Station, Griffith

This is the Griffith District Ambulance Station and I haven't been able to find out too much about it. If you read yesterday's post you'll see the similarity with the Ambulance Station in nearby Leeton.

Perhaps both buildings were designed by the same architect, S J O'Halloran of Wagga Wagga, or maybe the same contractor, C Churchill of Newcastle, was involved in both projects. It could be neither. Perhaps there was a bit of the fence left over from the Griffith job and they gave it to Leeton so they could use it for their gates.

Ambulance Station, Leeton

The Ambulance Station in Leeton, located in the New South Wales irrigation area near the Murrumbidgee River, was designed by architect, S J O'Halloran of Wagga Wagga, and was constructed by contractor, C Churchill of Newcastle. The date above the ambulance bay reads 1952.

A interesting aspect of the property is the concrete barrels that serve as gate posts and the metal gates composed of large interlocking circles, but more on that tomorrow.

Reference:
Leeton ~ Yango ~ Whitton - Heritage Trails Booklet, Leeton Shire Council, 2011

Portree, Sydney

This is Portree, an apartment block in Sydney.

I see it as a very Sydney building ... mostly because of the use of dark bricks. That just seems to be a Sydney thing.

The dark bricks work really well as a backdrop for the rendered white open balconies and central tower.

Clock Restaurant, Griffith

A former bank, now Clock restaurant, in Griffith.

Community Restorative Centre, Chippendale

The Community Restorative Centre (CRC) provide a range of support services to prisoners, ex-prisoners, and their families and friends.

They also live in this former bank, dating from 1933, on the corner of Broadway & Shephard Street, Chippendale in Sydney, NSW.

Hotel Broadway, Chippendale

Thankfully when they converted part of this Art Deco pub in Sydney into apartments (and added some more onto the roof) they kept the old Hotel Broadway sign.

It is still a pub, well there is a cafe/bar on the ground floor and the building is in a prime location on Broadway in Chippendale.

I didn't have time even to pop across and look inside but I imagine anything deco would have been stripped from the public areas.

Assembly Hall, Footscray

No doubt there is quite a history to this little deco Assembly Hall in the back streets of Footscray.

Who assembled here? Who uses it now and why have the windows been bricked up with such unsympathetic bricks?

I first glimpsed this building several years ago from Footscray Road, just before it takes a dog-leg and ducks under the Geelong Road overpass. Since then I have always looked for it when passing but never ventured down for a closer look and to take a few photos ... until now.

141-143 Flinders Lane, Melbourne

An Art Deco building at 141-143 Flinders Lane in Melbourne adapted for a variety of uses including a gallery and a restaurant.

Windows, Footscray Town Hall

Early this year I wrote about the former City of Footscray Town Hall designed by architect Joseph Plottel and opened in 1936. I'd never been inside and I got the chance to have a quick look the other day. Unfortunately I didn't get to see any of the grander rooms and I imagine there are some in this fine building. No I got to duck up some side stairs to have a look at an exhibition. On the way I snapped these leadlight windows.

Go Borough!

Port Melbourne won the VFL Grand Final today beating age-old rivals Williamstown 22.12.144 to 13.10.88. It's been 29 years since our last premiership and there are a lot of happy people in The Borough tonight. This is one of the banners that the local Council hung on the Port Melbourne Town Hall earlier in the week to celebrate the team reaching the Grand Final.

No doubt you are wondering what this has to do with Art Deco, especially since the Town Hall is very clearly a Victorian building, designed by J J Wild and constructed in 1882. However in the late 1930s, the then Port Melbourne City Engineer, Fred Cook, redesigned the auditorium and Council Chamber in Art Deco style.

courtesy Port Melbourne Historical & Preservation Society

Above is a photo of the Red Cross Ball held for the official opening of the remodelled auditorium on May 24th, 1938. The auditorium has been modified several times since then and sadly little or none of the 1938 hall remains. This ship plaque (below) was salvaged and is now part of the collection of the Port Melbourne Historical & Preservation Society.

courtesy Port Melbourne Historical & Preservation Society

I mentioned that at the same time Cook also designed the Council Chamber but around the 1960s a false ceiling was put in and the lovely deco ceiling he designed was covered up until several years ago after a severe storm when part of the ceiling collapsed. Here is some detail from Cook's ceiling which I was lucky enough to photograph before it was removed and replaced with a very, very plain, dare I say boring, barrel vaulted Victorian facsimile.

I know PMTH is a Victorian building so I can understand the desire to put in a Victorian ceiling but I think there was a very strong reason to retain at least some of the Art Deco. Cook also designed some furniture for the room and this is his original hand-drawn sketch.

courtesy Port Melbourne Historical & Preservation Society

And this furniture still sits in the Council Chamber somewhat at odds with its Victorianised surroundings.

The Rutland, Darlinghurst

I like the shape of the decoration on the roofline of The Rutland, an apartment block in Sydney's Darlingurst area. I also like the incised lines on the balconies but why are they such a dull colour?

Campbell Town School

This State School in Campbell Town, Tasmania was built between September 1937 and June 1938. It was designed by S W T Blythe of the Public Works Department assisted by J H Walter.

An article in the Hobart Mercury newspaper from September 23, 1937 referring to the plans described the new school as follows.

Architecturally the building has been designed in a modern style, with a tower at the corner as its dominant feature. The tall glass brick panel in the tower will offer a pleasing contrast to the marked horizontality of the class and cloak rooms.

References:
PLAN OF CAMPBELL TOWN SCHOOL. (1937, September 23). The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1954), p. 7. Retrieved September 23, 2011, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article29198046

NEW SCHOOL. (1938, June 22). The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1954), p. 10. Retrieved September 23, 2011, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article25479858

A House on the Golf Links Estate

The Golf Links estate in the Melbourne suburb of Camberwell offers a wonderful variety of interwar house designs. I've written about several Golf Link houses previously and this is another example.

The main design feature are the crazy brick patterns arranged in large semi-circular panels above each of the ground floor windows but I think the most interesting aspect of the decoration is the arrangements of bricks on the gable end of the house.

Corner Building, Portland

Next door to the Audley Building in Portland, the subject of yesterday's post, is this corner building.

The corner building has been rendered but still uses the thin dark brown bricks as decoration. A line arranged vertically form the roofline. Two dark bands then ring the building high up on the façade and those same coloured bricks form the columns between the windows.

An extra bonus is the square tower on the actual corner of the building. Like the rest of the façade, the tower has two bands around the top but also has a series of stepped triangle motifs along each side. It also has a squat flag pole, a deco staple.

Audley Building, Portland

Audley Building in western Victoria town of Portland is a long horizontal cream brick building that uses thin brown bricks to provide minimal decoration.

Each of the windows is surrounded by a dark border while two dark bands link all but the central two openings which sit on a portion of the façade jutting out towards the street.

That central section also features a thick vertical bar of dark brick running up to two horizontal bands much higher up the façade than those at window level. This arrangement providing a platform for the name of the building.