Yule House, 309-311 Little Collins Street, Melbourne
Butler, Graeme1985
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Title:
Yule House, 309-311 Little Collins Street, Melbourne
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Date of work:
1985
Reference number:
BIF-CITY 105926
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Item from Collection: Heritage Collection (HC)
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Graphic materialsTextual material
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Series: Central City (BIF-CITY)
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UnrestrictedOpen access.
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UnrestrictedPlease contact City of Melbourne Libraries about obtaining permission to reproduce images.
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RESEARCH ADDED BY GRAEME BUTLER 2022:__________________________________________________Period: Inter-WarConstruction date: 1932DESIGNERS: Oakley & Parkes;BUILDER: Watts, E ANotable features include:1. First of the Moderne/ modern style central activities district commercial buildings.2. Terracotta facade.3. wrought Iron lettering on facade.GRAEME BUTLER 1985 MELBOURNE CENTRAL ACTIVITIES DISTRICT CONSERVATION STUDYStatement of SignificanceYule House , 309-311 Little Collins Street1932HistoryIt is said everything changed at architects, Oakley and Parkes, offices in 1932: evolving a new letterhead and a new imported design repertoire. In turn their design for Yule House, a modest office building investment for the Yule Estate, was a marked change for commercial design in Melbourne. Architectural historian, Donald Johnson, noted Yule House as the `new trend' in Australian commercial design in his book Australian Architecture 1901-1951, a trend which followed closely after the American neo-Gothic manner seen in contemporary Manchester Unity Building. Yule House achieved this with a subtle change of cladding over an already well-tried structural system, using the same terra cotta faience as the Gothic designs. Johnson wrote:`The architects P A Oakley and S T Parks complete their Yule House at 309 Collins (sic) Street in 1932. Many succeeding buildings in Melbourne imitated the style and its simple formula: bands of glass set in geometric patterns of fixed and opening panes, a terracotta (or stucco) surface and dominant spandrels extending well beyond the surface.'Builders, E A Watts, commenced Yule House early in 1932 to be completed in that year at an estimated cost of ₤85,000 pounds.DescriptionThree plain and two augmented terracotta spandrels divide Yule House ruthlessly and horizontally in a way never attempted before in Melbourne. The adjoining Neo-Grec styled hotel is evidence of the waning use of single windows, first in favour of the commercial Gothic's' vertical window strips and next the Moderne's enthusiasm for all things horizontal. A single span at Yule House provided the perfect opportunity for Melbourne city's first example : no columns interrupted the steel framed glazing. Symmetry appears to dominate the design except for a single off-centre 'vertical feature' at the parapet; a device used on more extensive buildings such as the Former McPherson's Building, Collins Street, to terminate the horizontal thrust of the composition, usually as an entrance bay. Here the vertical ribs, elsewhere restrained by the projecting spandrels, escape into the skyline and accumulate in their path, a succession of layered streamlines and fins. At the opposite end, above the shopfronts, nine Gill-sans metal letters spell the building's name. The shopfronts formerly curved inwards to the office entrance where another elegantly lettered greeting from the building is set in a top-light. Minor show-cases which once sat at the building's sides are housed beneath further tiered ornament as a transition from the facade proper. Yule House was the beginning of a succession of commercial buildings in the Moderne manner particularly by the architect, Harry A Norris. These included Mitchell House, Beehive Building, the former McPherson's Building, Melford Motors and Building 9, RMIT.IntegrityAir units have been set in upper windows and the eastern shopfront has been altered. Otherwise Yule House is externally original, including the subtle colouring of the facade.StreetscapeDespite the rampant verticality of the adjoining Display Block, the pair are related as two narrow-fronted buildings.SignificanceYule House was Victoria's and Australia's, first Moderne styled commercial building.,VICTORIA HERITAGE REGISTER H2233https://vhd.heritagecouncil.vic.gov.au/places/2628Date Started 1932;Storeys 5;architectural style: MODERNEStatement of SignificanceWhat is significant?Yule House was designed by the Melbourne architectural firm of Oakley & Parkes and built in 1932. The site had been owned since the early 1900s by William Yule, a wealthy Melbourne businessman, and later by his estate, but the original building on the site was destroyed by fire in 1931. Percy Oakley had been known to William Yule and his firm was commissioned to design a modern and fireproof replacement. The building was constructed during the Depression and, according to Parkes, economy was a major influence on the design, which was a joint effort of Oakley, his partner Stanley Parkes and their young employee Rae Featherstone. It was Victoria's first example of a commercial building in the new Moderne style, which became the fashionable commercial style in the city in the late 1930s. The building was intended to house retail shops on the ground floor and workrooms above, with long windows across the front to let in maximum daylight. The single span across each of the floors meant that no columns interrupted the interior spaces, each of which accommodated a single tenant. The building was owned by the Yule estate until 1985.Yule house is a small five storey reinforced concrete Streamlined Moderne style office building. Its principal facade is clad in light-coloured terracotta faience tiles made by Wunderlich Ltd. On the front facade the floors are divided by protruding horizontal banded spandrels between horizontal strips of multi-paned steel-framed windows. An important feature of the main elevation is the elegant flat plate-metal lettering, highly evocative of the Moderne period. The name YULE HOUSE appears above the entrance and is also attached to the first floor spandrel, the street number is incised into the second spandrel, and the date 1932 is inscribed into the top spandrel. The parapet is crowned by an off-centre castellated coping. At the ground floor level are two shops, one on each side of the central entrance. These have large metal-framed display windows, originally with curved glass, one of which has been altered. The entrance hall and lobby have beige-coloured terrazzo flooring with a contrasting pink edging. There is dado of terrazzo panels around the walls of the lobby and the lower staircase. Glass-fronted display cases, a tenants' directory and the original fire alarm in a brass case line the walls of the entrance hall and lift lobby.How is it significant?Yule House is of architectural significance to the state of Victoria.Why is it significant?Yule House is of architectural significance as the first commercial building in Victoria to demonstrate the principles of the emerging Moderne style, which in the late 1930s was to become the most fashionable style for buildings such as office blocks, department stores, car show-rooms and cinemas. It is a fine example of the work of the prominent MelbGRAEME BUTLER 1985 MELBOURNE CENTRAL ACTIVITIES DISTRICT CONSERVATION STUDYBUILDING IDENTIFICATION FORM cites RAIA 20th.Cent.Reg.__________________________________________________VICTORIAN HERITAGE INVENTORY H7822-1738First land sale 1837, Block 12, Allotment 2, Henry Batman. 1839 - building on site.1877 - 3 storey building, Harrison & Son, Furniture Warehouse.1888 - 4 storey building, same occupier. 1905 - 4 storey building.__________________________________________________MURPHY ARCHITECTS, JOHN AND PHYLLIS 1976. HISTORIC BUILDINGS STUDY OF PART OF THE C.B.D. MELBOURNE : { AREA 1} WITH MURPHY, JOCK, FOR HISTORIC BUILDINGS PRESERVATION COUNCIL.7.20 309-311 Little Collins Street - Yule House .• Construction Date 1933Architect Oakley and ParkesBuilder E A. Watts.Further information to be supplied by H.B.P.C .__________________________________________________NATIONAL TRUST OF AUSTRALIA (VIC)Statement of SignificanceCovers front facade of building including covered line of shopfronts and "foyer". The Great Depression gave Melbourne's Modern Movement a second chance to rationalise the build requirements of a society looking for austerity. Yule House, built in 1932, was probably the first austere offering, in Melbourne's business district after the Depression. Bereft of any of the revivalism of previous years, it ulilised modern materials in a new way. Wunderlich 's cream-coloured terracotta faience was formed into the bold geometric patterns that Europe had already seen in the work of Gropius and Meyer during the first generation of the 1900s and in Mendelsohn's Department Stores of the 1920s. A narrow frontage to Little Collins Street required that Yule House have large window areas in the facade, and these windows were not only framed in steel, but disposed in wide, horizontal bands across its full width.Eric Gill's letter face, seriphed and sans, is both incised into the terracotta and wrought in iron, forming free-standing letters at the building's base. Investment of the W Yule estate provided the opportunity for architects, Oakley and Parks, to pioneer the European style in Melbourne.Classified: 21/08/1980__________________________________________________HERITAGE BRANCH, MINISTRY FOR PLANNING & ENVIRONMENT 1987 CITY OF MELBOURNE CENTRAL CITY NOTABLE BUILDINGS CITATIONSSTATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCEYule House was Victoria's first Moderne styled commercial building and it signalled a change in architectural design in the City. A modest office building, it was erected in 1932 for the Yule estate and was designed by the architects Oakley and Parkes. A highly innovative building, it introduced European modernism to Melbourne__________________________________________________VICTORIA HERITAGE REGISTERPlaque Citation20/01/2010Designed by the architects Oakley & Parkes with Rae Featherstone, this was Victoria's first commercial building in the new Streamlined Moderne style. It is also notable for its shopfront and its Art Deco features.__________________________________________________NEWSPAPERS (TROVE)1932The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957)Tuesday 19 April 1932 - Page 5https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/4447632NEW CITY BUILDING. On the site of an old building partly destroyed by fire, at 301-311 Little Collins street, this modern fireproof building, Yule House, designed by Oakley and Parkes, architects, of 474 Bourke street, is being erected by Mr. E. A. Watts. (llust.)The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957)Thursday 13 October 1932 - Page 5https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/4503032Value of Extensive WindowsSweeping windows and the absence of vertical piers in the face of the building give what might be described as `modernistic’ or even `Futuristic’ appearance to Yule House (309 311 Little Collins street) which is now almost ready for occupationThe building has been erected to the design of Messrs Oakley and Parkes architects on the site of a building partly destroyed by fire The new building is fire proof being constructed throughout of reinforced concrete It contains two modem shops and a showroom on the ground floor and offices and showrooms on the four upper floors The narrowness of Little Collins street and the presence of buildings on three sides of the site for Yule House, between Elizabeth and Swanston streets, made it necessary for the architects to obtain as much natural light as possible from the front. This they did by carrying the windows without structural interruption, across the full face of the buildingGood internal lighting was assured and a distinctive external appearance was given to the building by the windows. Mr E A Watts was the builderMelbourne architectural firm of Oakley & Parkes..
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1254046
| Type | Reference No. | Extent | Status/Desc |
|---|---|---|---|
| Original | 105926 | 1 PDF : 1,632 KB ; A4 | Group of Items (May not be issued, may not be reproduced) |