34 Barons Cres Hunters Hill
Lane Cove River
The house at 34 Barons Crescent Hunters Hill was designed by Architect and Artist Lindsay Sever. It featured on the cover of House and Garden magazine in 1954. Current owners plan to demolish the house, subdivide and build 2 dwellings on the land.
This site links to the remnant bushland that follows the Lane Cove River and contains the Great North Walk. While the house is not heritage listed nor in a designated Conservation Area, it is in a location that has a particular significance to the character of Hunters Hill. The riparian land is significant for bio-diversity.
Foreshore protection zone
The Trust has urged Council to consider the implications of the DA at CAP (Conservation Advisory Panel). We need a Conservation Area declaration in this important bushland, foreshore area of Hunters Hill. DAs along the foreshore protection zone need to be very closely monitored.
If you want to keep robbing Hunters Hill / Woolwich of its character, history, safe haven, then keep doing whats being done.
Concrete slabs, congestion..ughh!
I am currently renting this house @34 barons crescent.
The remarkable thing about this place is that it is untouched since the architect built it . I realise that this lovely, carefully designed house is to be demolished but think it should be documented before this happens. The interior stonework is remarkable and the light fittings, bakelite foding window screens and unique wardrobes all remain.
Can someone photograph it ? I am only here for a couple more weeks.
Pam Coleman
0413878118
This is a kind of good news story (inspired by your Oct 20 entry – we would have bought 34 Barons Crescent if we hadn’t bought 10 Thorn Street Hunters Hill in late 2011). Our house at 10 Thorn was cited in HHT Journal in Feb 1991 as one of Hunters Hill’s interesting modern houses. I wish that had been enough to save it from changes (especially after seeing the Tim Ross architecture doco on ABC TV last night – I love the architecture of the 50s/60s!). However, the owners before us did several changes. The good news? These changes are relatively minor with regard to the size/spirit of the original house, although arguably a pitched roof is a big change for a flat roof modernist house. But given they could have easily knocked down this non-heritage listed low-line house and built a hideous mansion, I give them kudos. They sympathetically adapted the house for their 20-year ownership and kept the essential structure and organic feel of Frank Cavalier’s original design. We will be keeping the house as is, but our positive contribution will be a native garden (95% at least; we removed small exotics but of course it wouldn’t make sense to remove old exotic trees that provide shade and habitat). Since starting the garden work in 2013, we have made amazing progress. The bottom section of our block (next to the GNW) has changed the most; it is now full of indigenous plants instead of a weed-fest. I count bird species every day and we’ve seen greater biodiversity as the garden matures (more lizards too, and more native bees). In short, while the few changes to the original house would probably preclude it from the architecture purists’ trail, it is still very much a modernist house in spirit and in its bush location. That’s good news overall these days. Oh, thanks for all the work you do for HH heritage. It is a very special suburb and I agree that close attention should be paid to this section of HH (around Barons Cres). Regards, Thalia
The property has just been sold and the new owners (developersI believe) are said to be planning to start demolition soon. It is not clear whether they will be following the existing DA or doing something different. One of the builders, concerned about all the trees, said in passing “we will make it better – concrete!” I only hope some common sense will prevail and someone will see the value in preserving this unique house with its incredible setting, instead of chopping it up into two smaller properties and over-developing them. Thereby turning one amazing place into two dreadful ones. Environmental and heritage vandalism at its worst!