"Eyre House" - Corner Dawson and Eyre Streets, Ballarat
Originally known as "Wandella Mansion", "Eyre House" is the large mansion found on the corner of Dawson and Eyre Streets, Ballarat.
Information on the mansion's history is very difficult to find. It was built somewhere in the 1880s during the Ballarat Gold Rush, and was undoubtedly built on the fortunes made in the Ballarat gold fields.
"Eyre House" when it was "Wandella Mansion" was built in Victorian Second Empire style, an architectural movement that existed between the 1840s and the 1890s. Althought much of the original features have been replaced with more modish design, the mansard roof of "Eyre House's" tower still remains. Such a roof with its ornate cast iron cresting was typical of the Victoria Second Empire movement.
When boom turned to bust and the money ran out, the ownership of "Wandella Mansion" passed between several very large and wealthy families, who staved off tax and death duties and maintained a comfortable lifestyle by selling off parcels of the surrounding land bit by bit during the first two decades of the Twentieth Century. It remained a grand family home until the Great Depression of 1929. In the early 1930s, "Wandella Mansion" was converted into a complex of flats and was renamed "Eyre Flats". Its facade had an Art Deco facelift to make it more fashionable and attractive to those who could afford to buy bijou apartments. Whilst altered completely internally, the new flat complex did maintain the original cornices in the main entrance. Eventually, as times in Ballarat worsened, "Eyre Flats" entered its final incarnation as "Eyre House", a twenty-three bedroom, six bathroom rooming house, which it remained throughout the Second World War and through the later half of the Twentieth Century. In the Twenty First Century it became short stay apartments and has only recently been put up for sale yet again, as the current owners, who have been renovating for the past five years, prepare to move on.
Who knows what "Eyre House's" future holds?
"Eyre House" - Corner Dawson and Eyre Streets, Ballarat
Originally known as "Wandella Mansion", "Eyre House" is the large mansion found on the corner of Dawson and Eyre Streets, Ballarat.
Information on the mansion's history is very difficult to find. It was built somewhere in the 1880s during the Ballarat Gold Rush, and was undoubtedly built on the fortunes made in the Ballarat gold fields.
"Eyre House" when it was "Wandella Mansion" was built in Victorian Second Empire style, an architectural movement that existed between the 1840s and the 1890s. Althought much of the original features have been replaced with more modish design, the mansard roof of "Eyre House's" tower still remains. Such a roof with its ornate cast iron cresting was typical of the Victoria Second Empire movement.
When boom turned to bust and the money ran out, the ownership of "Wandella Mansion" passed between several very large and wealthy families, who staved off tax and death duties and maintained a comfortable lifestyle by selling off parcels of the surrounding land bit by bit during the first two decades of the Twentieth Century. It remained a grand family home until the Great Depression of 1929. In the early 1930s, "Wandella Mansion" was converted into a complex of flats and was renamed "Eyre Flats". Its facade had an Art Deco facelift to make it more fashionable and attractive to those who could afford to buy bijou apartments. Whilst altered completely internally, the new flat complex did maintain the original cornices in the main entrance. Eventually, as times in Ballarat worsened, "Eyre Flats" entered its final incarnation as "Eyre House", a twenty-three bedroom, six bathroom rooming house, which it remained throughout the Second World War and through the later half of the Twentieth Century. In the Twenty First Century it became short stay apartments and has only recently been put up for sale yet again, as the current owners, who have been renovating for the past five years, prepare to move on.
Who knows what "Eyre House's" future holds?