A grand design for vintage property
PAUL Vandenberg is sure his parents think he has gone mad for taking on an 1850s-era Newtown house as a renovation project.
The house, one of Geelong’s oldest surviving dwellings, has no modern kitchen or bathroom, no running water or electricity.
But Mr Vandenberg can only see the positives.
“It’s quite an easy reno,” he said of the two-storey colonial Gothic Revival villa at 266 Latrobe Terrace.
“This won’t be too hard. All the hard work has been done (removing the lath and plaster).
“I’m sure I’m going to find things I may not have known were there, but it’s basically like a new house to lockup stage.”
Mr Vandenberg has paid $495,000 for the house, part of a duplex designed by architect John Matthews and built in 1854 as a spec home amid a housing shortage during the Victorian gold rush. “It was a bargain,” he said. Mr Vandenberg, whose parents live in Highton, will pick up where the vendors had left off, stripping the lath and plaster preparing to renovate before a baby changed their plans.
He has grand plans of starting as soon the sale settles at the end of this month.
He wants to celebrate this Christmas in the main house, which will become his family home.
The main house comprises four main rooms, plus the original kitchen, laundry and utility rooms.
“I’ll be aiming for original outside, as long as it wasn’t purple. Inside, there won’t be a lot of changes,” he said.
The home’s first modern kitchen will take over the existing dining room, allowing for a bathroom in the smaller, original kitchen.
Mr Vandenberg said the hard part would be the stables and loft, which he wants to convert to a separate studio apartment above a garage.
“This is hard,” he said. “This potentially has to be rebuilt and it has to be rebuilt to heritage guidelines.”
He fell in love with the house the minute he saw it, so much so he emailed the producers of Grand Designs Australia as soon as he put an offer on the house.
He has not received a reply — not yet, he said.
Mr Vandenberg is still finding new elements to love, including the bay view from the main bedroom and an intact well in the backyard.
The duplex’s most prominent residents, Mary De Garis (Geelong’s first woman doctor) and her brother Lucas, arrived after World War I.
Lucas lived at 266, but shared her kitchen and bathroom.