Two certainties are apparent here:
- This home is one of magical Mid-Century Modern expression, even if we only glance at 2 images. That streetface alone; a skillion roofed, geometric configuration of textures – brick, stone, windows, and panel, is enough to get us salivating. Timber interiors, clever living/sleeping zoning and that to-die-for mature garden all contributing to excel the heart-rate.
- This home is on deathwatch. It is being sold off in concert with 117 next door (a rather lovely clinker brick residence of a sensible size, acceptable condition and similarly breathtaking gardens) seemingly at the mercy of fiscal gluttons who’s only metric of worth (self or otherwise) is the sum of bedrooms and portion of marble one may squeeze onto 2/3rd of an acre. Ew.
Can someone, anyone step in? Is there any money left in Sydders not hoarded by the aesthetically and spiritually stunted? So many events of late have made us so very unsure and less optimistic of such hopes. Let’s put it to the universe that we may be proven wrong.
**Update** We have since been contacted by a relative in the know, and now can claim this home as the c.1957 work of architect Kevin J Curtin noted in this particular NSW Modernist heritage study as:
“….a prolific church architect, responsible for over 50 new Catholic churches and chapels, and over 200 schools.68 His St Bernard’s Catholic Church in Ramsgate Street, Botany, exemplifies the new approach….”
A commission for one of his colleagues, a Mr B. Bailey, it is clear this residence has more than a little Modernist significance and as a domestic work by an architect well versed in large public buildings goes some way to explain its dynamic, ‘landmark’ quality. For further reading see this feature article in ‘Our Home’ from May 1958.