Adversity & Resilience: Domestic Architecture

Everyone wanted a bungalow
New building styles developed in the years between the wars, but one of the most popular was the Californian Bungalow and its derivatives. It evolved, as the name suggests, on the west coast of America and started to become popular in Australia by the end of World War I.

The Californian Bungalow featured rough stonework, dark oiled timberwork, gabled roofs with a low pitch and projecting rafters.

In Queensland, many architects and builders adopted some of the bungalow’s mannerisms but they built in timber and used weatherboard sheeting to imitate the bungalow’s thick pylons. The bungalow had a porch instead of the traditional Queensland verandah, it was asymmetrical and had a different plan-form, without the central hallway from the front door to the back door of the typical “colonial”.

In the 1920s and 30s, many houses built in Ipswich were a form of bungalow. Some were close to the original Californian style, but most were the Queensland variant, often with matching fence, gate posts and fern houses. Some of the best local examples close to the original Californian style were designed by architect Will Haenke. [1]

By the end of this period, the separate curved or bullnose verandah roof had virtually disappeared in favour of unbroken hipped or pyramidal roof forms. Plan forms changed gradually from the central hall or passageway in favour of less formal layouts influenced by the English Domestic Revival styles, and the Californian Bungalow style of which Ipswich has many. Workers' dwellings continued to be simple Queensland verandahed bungalow style. Chimneys gradually less popular after advent of electricity. Roof forms of the Californian Bungalow style featured large boxed and jettied gables, and pitched roof forms. Combinations of hips and gables continued. The influence of the Spanish Mission style belongs to this period and features stuccoed brick walls, arched window and patio openings, and terracotta tiled roofing.

Generally timber construction, but good examples of stuccoed brick versions of the Californian Bungalow style and Spanish Mission style exist in Ipswich. Timber houses clad in hardwood weatherboards. Casement windows, often with leadlights were favoured over double hung sashes. Joinery timber featured silky oak and stained pine in preference to cedar. Both pine and hardwood used for floors. Roofing was still corrugated galvanised iron with quadrant gutters although terra cottatiles and fibrolite shingles were preferred for the more stylistic Spanish Mission and Californian Bungalow houses. Fibrous plaster and fibrolite wall linings often used internally.

Verandahs generally less prevalent and less ornate. Ceilings often featured fibrous plaster moulded panels and cornices, while tongue and groove vee -ointed boarding continued to be used in many timber houses.

Ornament/Decoration

• Wallpaper decoration over fibrous plaster was used in more expensive houses.
• Leadlighting to window sashes and half glass doors.
• Tulip shaped cut-outs in timber balustrading and valances.
• Decorative fibrous plasterwork to ceilings and cornices.