JH BOYD GIRLS HIGH SCHOOL
207-229 CITY ROAD SOUTHBANK, MELBOURNE CITY
Statement of Significance
What is significant?
The JH Boyd Girls High School was constructed in 1884-1885 to the design of the Education Department's Chief Architect Henry Bastow. It opened as State School No 2686, replacing No. 222 St Luke's South Melbourne Church of England School in Clarendon Street, Emerald Hill. In 1929 it was amalgamated with the Eastern Road State School No. 1852. The building was reconstructed in 1930 by WH Bolger to become the South Melbourne Girls' School devoted to the training of girls in domestic arts. In 1932 it was renamed the JH Boyd Domestic College after its patron, a successful grazier, who bequeathed a large sum of money to establish a school of domestic science so "that women should be taught to manage a home correctly". The school occupies a prominent corner site on City Road, and is a two storey brick building with a third storey of one room and entry to a tower. It was closed as a school in 1985 after 100 years of operation. The extant section of the original school is a commanding Tudor Revival design executed in Hawthorn bricks, embellished with bands of cream brick and render mouldings. The Tudor influence is repeated in a castellated parapet and octagonal turret.
How is it significant?
The JH Boyd Girls High School is of architectural and historical significance to the State of Victoria.
Why is it significant?
The JH Boyd Girls High School is of architectural significance as one of the most ornamental and distinctive of the Education Department schools of the 19th century. It was the only 19th century State School to have a three storey central block, reflecting its prominent location in full view of the railway line from Port Melbourne to Flinders Street. The school's size and style are evidence of the rapid growth in population and wealth in Melbourne's suburbs as a result of post-gold rush consolidation and prosperity.
The JH Boyd Girls High School is of historical significance as a reminder of earlier philosophies of educational provision, especially for girls. Domestic Arts schools developed in the years during and after WWI, at a time when there was a wider concerted push for 'scientific' mothering education. It was considered that mothering skills were not innate and needed to be taught, in the same way that domestic skills needed to be inculcated at school. The school's emphasis on the domestic arts demonstrates the different approach to girls' and boys' education that characterised the school system for much of the 19th and 20th centuries. Less emphasis was placed on academic achievement than on domestication, to produce young women who would find their place in private rather than public life. Nevertheless, these domestic arts schools were the predecessors of the Girls High Schools and, despite the emphasis on domestic skills, they were a means of expanding secondary education to girls at a time when State Governments were reluctant to provide post-primary education.
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FORMER NATIONAL MUTUAL LIFE ASSOCIATION BUILDING
Victorian Heritage Register H0036 -
FORMER AMP BUILDING
Victorian Heritage Register H0421
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OLDERFLEET BUILDING
Victorian Heritage Register H0037
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'ELAINE'
Boroondara City -
-oonah
Yarra City -
..eld House
Yarra City
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