Bathing Box Architectural Trail Walk (Brighton)

Walk Summary:

Start: Cnr Beach Road and South Road, Brighton
Distance: 4.2 kilometres
Walking Time: About 70 minutes
Undulations: The trail path has gentle to moderate undulations

Trail directions:

1. Spurling House
Address: Beach Rd, Brighton (cnr South Rd)
Style: Eclectic
Architect: George Sims (Victorian Railway Department)
Date: 1889

George Sims was a senior draughtsman at the Victorian Railways Department when he designed Brighton Beach Railway Station. It was built in 1889 on a triangular site between the converging tracks. It is an innovative design, the most elegant of the string of stations on this railway line built in a similar style, including Windsor, North Brighton and Prahran.

The station replaced a timber building constructed when the line reached Brighton Beach in 1861, one of the early suburban lines in Melbourne. The line was extended to Sandringham in 1887, curving off short of the station, leaving a siding and creating the unique triangular site.

A projecting bay with a large archway marks the entrance.The band under the eaves, known as a frieze, is unusually decorated with encaustic tiles. The red brick banding adds further decoration and is an early example of the Romanesque Polychrome brick style.

It is important to reflect on the proximity of the station to the beach, as it was a popular seaside destination for people in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

2. Bathing Boxes
Address: Dendy Street Beach, Brighton
Style: Vernacular
Architect: Not Available
Date: Surviving, from 1900 onwards

The iconic Bathing Boxes are believed to have been started by a gardener named Mark Hollow, who built the first box in 1862. In the nineteenth century, boxes were popular and were placed close to the water's edge because the user could change and have their healthy dip without being seen immodestly underclothed. By the early 1900s there were bathing boxes along the foreshore in Hampton, Sandringham, Black Rock, Mentone and Mordialloc; but in the 1930s the nearly 120 Bathing Boxes from these beaches were consolidated on the Brighton Beach, and photographs show them at various angles and setbacks. In 1934 they were all moved to the back of the beach and lined up as seen today.

These colourful boxes reflect a time in Melbourne's history when Brighton was a seaside resort and modesty at the beach was imperative. Currently there are 83 bathing boxes and Council has approved the construction of a further 3. They are possibly the most photographed and recognisable landmark in Brighton.

3. Belle Vue (Former Norwood Gate Lodge)
Address: 9 Norwood Ave, Brighton
Style: Queen Anne
Architect: Philip Treeby
Date: 1891-1918

This charming little house is a definitive example of the Queen Anne, and has a story to tell. Originally located on The Esplanade, it was the gate lodge of one of the more extraordinary Boom-era mansions in Melbourne, Norwood. Built in 1891, and also designed by Treeby, it was an impressive red brick melange of Queen Anne, Tudor Revival and Scottish Baronial styles, and the beach-front facade featured a massive three-storey high stair tower. The orchards and bowling greens were subdivided off in 1918, creating Norwood Ave, and the gatehouse was relocated to this site. The mansion survived until 1955, when the contents, including majolica fireplaces and stained glass windows, were auctioned off prior to demolition, and queues formed along The Esplanade of those wishing to get a last glimpse of 'the castle'. The former gate lodge features many elements typical of the later Edwardian style, such as a gable-ended terracotta-tiled roof and turned timber verandah posts. However, the small square windows with chunky stone sills and lintels, housing square and diagonally patterned lead-lighting, are more Queen Anne. These were also a feature of the long lost mansion.

4. Residence
Address: 6 Norwood Ave, Brighton
Style: Modernist
Architect: Keith Batchelor
Date: 1958

Most mid-twentieth century Modernist designers studiously avoided overtly decorative features. Robin Boyd particularly railed against 'featurism', which he saw as an American fad for applied patterns or shapes not essential to the architecture. However, some architects did at this time include expressly decorative elements within the Modernist idiom, particularly the European refugee architects, often Jewish, who arrived in the post-war period and generally practised in the southern suburbs of Melbourne.

This house features the simple low-pitched roofs, steel supports and timber-framed window-walls of the then dominant 'Beaumaris Modern'. It also includes elements designed to delight, such as the complex geometric patterned wrought iron at the front door and in the garden screen, the random projecting bricks of the side wall, and the jaunty little angled letterbox.

5. Kinane
Address: 2 Kinane St, Brighton (cnr The Esplanade)
Style: Late 20th Century Modern, Neo Modern
Architects: SJB Architects
Date: 1986

Kinane, placed prominently on the corner of The Esplanade and Kinane St, has 180-degree views of the Melbourne skyline and the Bay.

Kinane is designed around symmetrical stacked rectangular boxes, reflecting a Post Modern revival of early modernist architecture; with large areas of glass and a Miami-Los Angeles style that dominates the site. The large coconut palms (Cocos nucifera) aren't historically characteristic to Brighton, but have come to be an icon for the wealthy Bayside suburb.

The building form was inspired by the intention of the internal spaces and their function. The architect, Alfred deBruyne at SJB, worked very closely with Los Angeles based interior designer Kalef Alaton.

An interesting comparison can be made with the neighbouring property, Springfield, which as designed by the same architect for the same client, five years earlier.

6. Camelot
Address: 11 Tennyson St, Brighton
Style: Edwardian
Architect: Unknown
Date: c.1912

Camelot is the legendary place where King Arthur's palace and court were situated; it is a grand name for a house, and one that evokes many mythical dreams and fantastical ideas.

An enlargement of a previous house, it was a private residence until the 1940s. It then became the Camelot Convalescent Hospital, before returning to a private residence. It was probably designed originally with unpainted red brick, as was common in the Edwardian era. The verandah is supported on turned timber posts with unusual carved brackets, decorative fretwork and matching balustrade. A lookout with a flagpole sits on top like decoration on a cake. The enclosed front entrance features leadlight windows.

Camelot is unusual in Brighton as there are few two-storey houses in the Edwardian style. Other name: Camelot Convalescent Hospital

7. Winmarleigh
Address: 20 Were St, Brighton
Style: Italianate
Architect: Unknown
Date: 1879

Winmarleigh was built in 1879 for jeweller John Powell, who was related to architect Levi Powell, designer of Trawalla, Lascelles Avenue, Toorak (1867-68). This singlestorey villa has an elaborate cast-iron verandah that wraps around three sides of the house. It also has a small tower and bay window. The house is set in an expansive garden with some of the original trees remaining. When built, the gardens of this grand property extended right down to the Bay.

In 1946, the Finlay family bought the property and restored Winmarleigh to its former glory. (All the servants' bells are said to still jingle.) The property appeared in the October 1948 edition of the influential magazine Home Beautiful.

The grand cast-iron lantern in the front drive is one of many that graced the streets of the city of Melbourne in the 1920s until they were almost all removed in the 1960s. Other name: Bersham

8. Blair Athol
Address: 5 Leslie Gr, Brighton
Style: Italianate, Gothic Revival
Architect: Lloyd Tayler
Date: 1870

Built in 1870 for William Campbell, a squatter who lived in this residence until 1883, Blair Athol is a double-storey Italianate bichromatic brick villa. Very grand in appearance, it has Gothic influences such as pointed segmental arches above the windows. The fence on the corner of Menzies Avenue and Hartley Street is the remains of the original boundary for Blair Athol, illustrating that it was once an expansive estate in Brighton.

In 1906 a portion was sold off, and by 1912 most of the property had been subdivided into allotments. Given the possible origin of the first owner, the house may have been named after the Scottish whisky distillery, Blair Athol, or the nearby town of Blair Atholl.

9. South Lodge
Address: 43 Were St, Brighton
Style: Gothic Revival
Architect: Lloyd Tayler
Date: 1840s, Extended c.1880

First built as the gardener's residence for J B Were's estate in the late 1840s, South Lodge is rich in history. Rumour has it that the ghost of the original resident gardener, Thomas Ricketts, can be seen walking around in his gumboots and funny hat. South Lodge was formed around the original cottage, possibly around 1880, and has been extended and renovated a number of times, all with a sympathetic thought to the delightfully picturesque style of the building.

The Gothic Revival character of the residence is identifiable by its asymmetrical layout, steeply pitched slate roofs, timber fretwork to the gables (known as barge-boards), and battlemented parapet above the bay window.

10. Residence
Address: 6 Seymour Gr, Brighton
Style: Edwardian, Federation
Architect: Unknown
Date: 1908

Thomas Quayle was a builder, and he built this house as his own residence. He may well have been the designer, but, if so, he chose to incorporate a number of unusual elements in this otherwise typically Edwardian house. The hipped terracotta roof, the verandah on two sides with a diagonal gabled entry, and the projecting square window bays are hallmarks of the Edwardian / Federation style. However, the simple Doric verandah posts and the tall Dutch gable ends, complete with scrolls, are more unusual choices, found on very few other properties of this period. They may reflect the influence of the South African Dutch Colonial style.

11. Kostka Hall Chapel
Address: South Rd, Brighton (cnr Hartley St)
Style: Modernist
Architect: Alan Robertson
Date: 1967

The Chapel, an interesting 1967 addition to the grounds of Xavier's Brighton campus Kostka Hall, was designed by Alan Robertson. High light (clerestory) stained glass windows encircle the entire Chapel, designed by accomplished painter and stained-glass designer, Alan Sumner (1911-1994).

The lantern section is adorned with a tall and elegant spire and cross, which can be seen from far away. No alterations have been undertaken on the Chapel to date. Chocolate brown wire-cut brickwork was a ubiquitous material in 1960s and 1970s architecture, and leaving materials raw and exposed was part of the 'Environmental' approach to architecture.

12. Maritima
Address: 47 South Rd, Brighton (cnr Hartley St)
Style: Italianate
Architect: Unknown
Date: 1867

Maritima was built in 1867 as the home of Sir Frederick McCoy (1817-1899), professor of Natural Science at The University of Melbourne. In 1936 the property was bought by Xavier College to establish a campus in the southern suburbs. In 1937, Maritima officially opened as a school, and was renamed Kostka Hall after the Polish Jesuit Saint, St Stanislaus Kostka.

Maritima is a sprawling single-storey nineteenth century villa that has undergone many alterations and additions. The South Road facade is symmetrical, with a large curved portico probably added during its use as a school, flanked by original projecting faceted bays. It is still owned by Xavier College and has been altered internally in response to changes in function as the school has developed. Other name: Kostka Hall

A. Chevy Chase
Address: 203 Were St, Brighton
Style: Italianate
Architect: Frederick Williams
Date: 1881

For people driving or walking along Were Street, Chevy Chase commands attention as the road sweeps around the front entrance. Originally named Bona Park, it was renamed Chevy Chase when sold in 1885, after the Scottish ballad commemorating the 1388 Battle of Otterburn.

With a three-storey tower above the entrance and symmetrical bays to either side, Chevy Chase features a delightful veil of cast-iron lacework across its doublestorey verandah on three sides. Interestingly, there is an identical mansion built by the same architect at the same time on the southern half of the original property, now at 29 Heathfield Road. This building is currently used as a hospital. Other name: Bona Park