Carlton Court House
345-349 Drummond Street,, CARLTON VIC 3053 - Property No B5131
Statement of Significance
What is significant? Constructed by John Short in 1887 to the design of Public Works Department architect G B H Austin. The building is a single-storeyed Gothic style structure composed in a symmetrical but picturesque form. Red face brick walls sit on a basalt plinth. Dressings are cream face brick, stone or stucco. The bulk of the building comprising the court room sits beneath a parapeted gable slate roof running parallel to the street. Large tracery pointed-arch windows light these gable ends. Two louvred gablets puncture the roof. The cornice incorporates a trefoil motif. A transverse parapeted gable with tracery window and flanking chimneys dominates the centre of the composition. A lower block sits in front of the main body of the building, comprising two chequerboard polychromatic gabled end porches linked by a three bay arcade with balustraded parapet.
Why is it significant? It is architecturally significant as a highly unusual Gothic style. The Gothic style was not generally favoured by the Department during the 1880s and 1890s. The composition of intersecting transverse gables presents a strikingly bold facade to the street. Itis historically significant as part of the civic core of Drummond Street.being directly opposite the 1878 Carlton Police Station. The Court House was illustrative of the rise in the commercial and social status of the area in the 1880s.
Adapted from Heritage Victoria Statement: 10/09/2012
Classified: 03/03/1983
Revised: 03/08/1998
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ROSAVILLE
Victorian Heritage Register H0408 -
MEDLEY HALL
Victorian Heritage Register H0409
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DRUMMOND TERRACE
Victorian Heritage Register H0872
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