It’s not often that Bendigo residents enjoy the privilege of living in a property designed by distinguished architects from yesteryear, however currently listed on the rental market is a house that was designed by a couple of the city’s most notable names and played host to a range of community happenings.
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The property at 110 McKenzie Street harks back to the heady days of the quartz gold mining boom, which transformed Bendigo from a modest mining town to a blossoming city that became home to migrant architects, builders and craftsmen, such as William Carl Vahland and William Beebe Snr.
According to Department of Environment and Primary Industries records, German-born Vahland worked in the northern German baroque revival style, with the aim of creating a “Vienna of the south”. He designed more than 100 buildings, notably Bendigo’s Town Hall, Capital Theatre and Fortuna Villa.
An English stonemason, Beebe spent 20 years building his own family a sandstone and granite house, christened Rocky Vale, in Maiden Gully in the 1870s. His son, William Beebe Jr also became a noted architect, designing numerous buildings in Bendigo.
Both Vahland and Beebe Snr were involved in the creation of this historic residence, one of the earliest buildings of its time. In 1857 a Lutheran school – a separate building to this residence but on the same grounds – was designed and built by Vahland, while this house was built for its German Lutheran pastor and his family, and acted as a manse and church. It was used for a range of pastoral activities, including weddings and christenings in the formal room at the front of the house.
The current owner estimates to have had the house for between 35 to 40 years. She purchased it from nearby Girton College, which was then owned by the Church of England and housed student borders and the music department/administration space.
While the four-bedroom home has been fully renovated, many of the property’s historical attributes remain, a quality that’s rare to find in buildings on Bendigo’s rental market. Inside are 4.5 metre high ceilings and generous-sized rooms, while outside displays the locally quarried sandstone, hipped roofs and chimneys, windows, doors, verandahs and posts all typical of buildings from this era.
There’s also a large stacked-stone cellar, which is accessable via a staircase, and a most novel entertaining space arguably not afforded to many renters.
Inside are all the mod cons you’d expect to find in a 21st century home – think polished floorboards, contemporary fitouts in the two bathrooms and reverse cyle airconditioning.
For more information about the property, visit www.domain.com.au
