Taking on a substantial house restoration
is not everyone's ideal retirement plan,
but for one couple, getting their hands dirty
with a grand old Victorian was just the tonic.
Each time we did come to Ballarat..there
was a few selected streets that we used to drive around
and houses that we thought, "Oh wouldn't it
be wonderful one day?" And this was one of those places.
We would always look at them and think, "Wouldn't it
be wonderful if somebody could just
restore these properties back to their original grandeur?"
One of the streets selected for exploring
was Victoria Avenue, a small thoroughfare
tucked in behind the more well-known Webster Street.
Back in the mid-19th century, this whole area attracted some
of Ballarat's wealthiest people and merchants,
including Mr. A. Crawford.
So where those terraces actually are
belonged to Mr. Crawford, whose big premises
were is what we know as Meyer's,
the Meyer's building, that was Crawford's Emporium.
He was into land sales and speculation.
And so he bought that whole parcel
of land between Webster Street and what we know
as Victoria Avenue.
Crawford wasn't just an enterprising businessman.
He had ambitions for the land
he had just purchased on Victoria Avenue.
He bought that and set up two of his daughters
as teachers and set up a private school there,
Ellerslie College.
Originally four terraces were built: Lumeah,
Ballina, Waimea and Beulah.
Three still stand in similar style,
but the Eastern-most terrace was dismantled
and rebuilt in a more modern bungalow style.
They have a rather colourful history, being rented
out to students, and there was many
a good party had here and people stop now,
if you're out in the garden,
and tell you about those good times.
Like all good buildings of a certain age,
Sue and Peter's terrace required a bit
of help in bringing her into the 21st century
whilst maintaining her original charm.
It was probably in fairly basic condition,
relatively sound but largely untouched.
The front drawing room... that had only ever had one coat
of paint on it since the property was built.
So they were the types of things that appealed to us
because we wanted to bring the place back to original.
The back of the house was completely covered by ivy.
You wouldn't have known that there were windows
in the house at all and the ivy was growing
through into the roof cavity.
The tenants said to us when they were moving out,
you know, be careful with the power.
So we immediately got an electrician to inspect the wiring
and he said, no, the best thing to do is get
the power disconnected and he'll do
a temporary reconnection to the front switchboard.
With the electrics, plumbing, and foundations
all checked and rectified. It was time for Peter
and Sue to turn their attention to the interior restoration
which turned up quite a few surprises.
Servants' bells. Quite, quite interesting.
The formal rooms in the house
have servants' bells in them.
And during the restoration, I found some
of the ceramic batteries under the house,
because of course there was no electricity in those days.
Yeah, a really special find that. In the original drawing
room, there was a magnificent hand painted stencil
on the back of the door, which was in very good condition.
It had never been touched and with Sue's cleaning ability
very gently cleaned it, and it's come up
absolutely beautiful. All the glass is original,
and the lead light glass above the bay windows
there are hand painted birds.
For Peter and Sue, rolling up their sleeves
and tackling most of the work themselves
was all part of the experience,
but they also had help from a band of skilled experts.
Fortunately, Ballarat has some absolute
excellent tradespeople so far as heritage restoration
is concerned. We were very fortunate to
come across a very good carpenter.
He's an old-school carpenter and does things the old way,
which that really suited Sue and I.
The tiler that we used, not very old,
but he's got a very old head on his shoulders
and knows how to do heritage tiling.
Without the assistance of all of these
tradespeople, we would never have achieved this
high level that we've achieved today.
Peter and Sue have not only restored this grand terrace
back to its former glory, they've also created a home
where it's easy to slip back in time
to an era of grandeur and gold.
I think it personifies Victorian boom time architecture
with, you know, very high ceilings.
I mean they are 17 foot ceilings, ornate corners work, very
ornate marble fireplaces, which, which are all original.
The money that must have been about must've been incredible
because to build homes like this and, you know,
I don't think that would have been
any shortcuts taken at all.
You know, it's living history really.
We're fortunate enough to be a custodian
of a house like this, but, you know, treat it with
respect. I think it's just so important.
Yeah, we just love her.