"Riawena" a Streamline Moderne Art Deco Villa - Thornbury
"Riawena" is a wonderfully stylised Streamline Moderne Art Deco Villa in the Melbourne suburb of Thornbury. Its name is taken from the Australian Aboriginal word for "fun" or "sport", which is an unusual choice in the 1930s, when so many people were naming their houses after English or American places.
Standing on the corner of a busy main thoroughfare and a much quieter side street, this well proportioned stand alone villa is extremely large and sprawling, with its original garage next to it behind a high wall. The clean uncluttered lines of the house, the speed lines around the pedement of the rounded portico, feature bricks in geometric patterns and the overall low slung design of the house are very Streamline Moderne in design.
The whole property is surrounded by a low fence with plain pillars and wrought-iron swirls inserts and a gate featuring a geometric Art Deco pattern.
The tree in blossom in this photograph is a prunus; a genus of trees and shrubs, which includes the plums, cherries, peaches, apricots and almonds. This is an ornamental variety, which burst into blossom almost a month before usual owing to an unusually warm spell of weather just prior to the photograph being taken.
"Riawena" a Streamline Moderne Art Deco Villa - Thornbury
"Riawena" is a wonderfully stylised Streamline Moderne Art Deco Villa in the Melbourne suburb of Thornbury. Its name is taken from the Australian Aboriginal word for "fun" or "sport", which is an unusual choice in the 1930s, when so many people were naming their houses after English or American places.
Standing on the corner of a busy main thoroughfare and a much quieter side street, this well proportioned stand alone villa is extremely large and sprawling, with its original garage next to it behind a high wall. The clean uncluttered lines of the house, the speed lines around the pedement of the rounded portico, feature bricks in geometric patterns and the overall low slung design of the house are very Streamline Moderne in design.
The whole property is surrounded by a low fence with plain pillars and wrought-iron swirls inserts and a gate featuring a geometric Art Deco pattern.
The tree in blossom in this photograph is a prunus; a genus of trees and shrubs, which includes the plums, cherries, peaches, apricots and almonds. This is an ornamental variety, which burst into blossom almost a month before usual owing to an unusually warm spell of weather just prior to the photograph being taken.