By Mikayla van Loon
A heritage overlay application for a Mangans Road property has moved forward after councillors agreed to push the request to the planning minister.
The property at 131 Mangans Road Lilydale, known as Coldstream Hill, was identified as an uncommon “interwar era dwelling designed in the Spanish Mission style” during a Heritage Review Gap Study undertaken by Trevor Westmore in 2019.
This later led to an assessment from a qualified heritage consultant who confirmed the significance of the property for the Yarra Ranges and guided the proposal for the planning amendment.
Now retired, but previously a heritage adviser for the council, Mr Westmore attended the Tuesday 28 January meeting to speak in support of the motion, having previously tried to gain protection of this site himself.
“In July 2020, I nominated it for inclusion on the Victorian Heritage Register. Unfortunately due to the great number of places submitted to the Heritage Register, it is still on the waiting list, and will probably remain so for years, unless there is an immediate threat of its loss,” he said.
“In my opinion, this makes inclusion on the Yarra Ranges Heritage Overlay schedule vital for its preservation and conservation.”
Originally built in circa 1905 in Edwardian style, the dwelling was then known as Lismoyne and occupied by Henry McHenry and his family in the early part of the twentieth century.
In 1925, the property was purchased by Captain Cecil Martin Keppel Palmer and his wife Nora who engaged influential Melbourne architect Marcus Martin to design and renovate Lismoyne, renaming it Coldstream Hill.
“It is a place probably derived directly through its owner’s travels in South America and Central America,” Mr Westmore said.
“It’s a unique expression of the Spanish Mission and haciendas of these areas, and it is of considerable heritage significance to the shire.
“It’s a remarkable adaptation of an earlier building…its unique reversed layout and courtyard and its innovative cladding of mesh enforced render (sic) also make it architecturally and technically important. It therefore deserves protection on the local planning scheme.”
The Keppel Palmers were also said to be closely associated with Dame Nellie Melba who christened their eldest daughter Angela.
Newspapers of the day reported of Madame Melba’s many visits to Coldstream Hill.
Adding to the heritage significance, the property’s ownership passed through many well-known families, including Darren and Diana Margaret Baillieu, the parents of former Victorian Premier, Ted Baillieu.
The last owner then held the property for 40 years until her death.
With the site neighboured by Tudor Village Mews retirement village, over the last couple of decades, as the village has expanded, 131 Mangans Road was subdivided.
This expansion has resulted in the loss of trees, a grass tennis court, original driveway and landscaping and several outbuildings.
Speaking in objection to the proposed heritage overlay, on behalf of the estate owners, barrister Daniel Epstein said they too would be engaging a heritage expert to conduct an assessment.
“I don’t have the qualifications to comment, necessarily, on the business paper prepared by the council and the comprehensiveness of that paper, but it is my intention to have a peer review of that report prepared and then present it to the council,” he said.
“It also is my intention to have prepared a valuation of the property as is, sold as is, and then sold with the Heritage Overlay in place.
“My client’s concern as executives of the estate is that it’s going to affect the beneficiaries the overlay by restricting the possibility of sale, particularly to the adjoining property, which is, I understand, an aged care facility and a facility that would probably have interest in this very land, but perhaps not with the restrictions the overlay would cause.”
Pushing the motion through, councillor Tim Heenan said he was “very honoured as a ward councillor for this area to move the motion”.
“We haven’t got a lot of heritage that we can hang on to in the whole Shire, and there’s certain pockets of it, Lilydale has got a very rich understanding in certain quarters where that history and heritage still remains,” he said.
“And I’m very thankful to members of the community, in particular the historical society that worked so hard.”
Gaining support from seconder Cr Mitch Mazzarella said it was extremely important to recognise heritage and “remember that heritage buildings, once they’re gone, they’re gone, we can’t take them back”.
“The speaker who spoke against seemed to really revolve around property prices and property sales and I don’t think that property sales should hold up or be beholden to preservation. Preservation is far more important in this situation.
“If we decide not to go ahead with any heritage, then that building can be gone. It can be sold off.”
The vote saw all councillors in favour of the heritage overlay bar deputy mayor Richard Higgins.
The proposal will now be sent to the planning minister, with a requirement for the Yarra Ranges Planning Scheme to be amended.
