East Melbourne, George Street 037, Kingscourt
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Two blocks of 1930's style flats with strong horizontal and vertical accentuation to the facade. They are interesting for their site planning and inward looking outlook to an extensive central garden. The principal building materials are cream brick with tapestry brick, brown brick and render panels. Windows are steel and timber. Notable features include unpainted decorative brickwork. No. 37 George Street and its partner at number 29 were both designed by IG Anderson, for members of the Ryan family, in 1940. Anderson is remembered as a prolific designer of flats during the 1930's. Although distinct buildings, the pair give the appearance of a single garden court development, constructed on a u-shaped plan and presenting an almost symmetrical pair of wings to the street. Each is a three storey block of flats broadly reflecting the plan and massing of its partner. However, each employs a subtly different range of decorative devices. While number 29 draws its mildly curving lines from a broadly Moderne mode, its partner draws its inspiration, in part, from Modern European antecedents with finely detailed steel windows used in conjunction with more typical timber joinery, contrasting bands of decorative brickwork and a more exaggerated rectilinear character. [i-Heritage database] A mixture of one bedroom flats and bed-sits, with one two bedroom flat on ground floor middle.
Index to Building Permit Applications dated 25 Oct 1940. First page of Application dated 18 Nov 1940. Letter from Building Surveyor to owners dated 19 Nov 1944 saying 'buildings not yet completed in accordance with specifications approved by this office in as much as fire hoses and chemical extinguishers have not been installed. Reference to this ommission has hitherto been witheld by this Department in view of the effects of war conditions ...' 1942 Rate Books have it as 'I.C.E' (In Course of Erection); but features in a Public Notice in Argus in June 1942 (1). Take 1942 as completion date. With its partner, 29-35 George Street, the building was erected on land previously the site of the iron foundry commenced by Thomas Main circa 1859 and continued by his descendants for the next eighty years.
Ryan family, pastoralists with properties all over Australia.
(1) Argus, 12 June 1942, p.7, col.4. Building Permit Application No. 21609. VPRS 11201/P1/262; VPRS 11200/P4/585
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