Untouched for maybe 50 years

4 June 2023

Old terrace house in my street that’s looked abandoned for the 6 years I’ve been here (though someone is occupying a few rooms upstairs), now for sale. Hasn’t been touched since the 50s or 60s ? Most exciting thing is all the linoleum- in every room ! Most looks from then, but some decorative edges that look maybe 1930s or earlier. And some lovely chinoiserie wallpaper in what was the back hall. There were 3 kitchens, so it was obviously flats of some kind. Address 44 Dalgety Street, St Kilda. Update : sold $1.8 mill, sounds cheap, but needs lots of work.

26 October 2023

I wondered what was happening- turns out they removing paint in order to repair the tuck pointing on that semi-abandoned terrace house in my street. So eventually it will look amazing like the one next door, shown in last pic. They’ve also scaffolded out the back, to either just repair, or maybe take off the back for a much too big extension. It’s actually a chemical steal paint removal process by SB Tuckpointing, so it will hopefully end up looking like the house next door.

7 January 2024

That house down the road from me with all the interesting old Lino is being renovated, so it’s goodbye to the old and worn stuff. They’ve already stripped the paint off the bricks, and removed the glassed in balcony. A freind chatted to the man working there who said he was the owner, and a builder, doing the work himself ! Out the back has been fixed up too, not knocked off for a giant extension. Photos from 30 October last year.

26 January 2024

The scaffolding is off ! That terrace house in my street that’s being restored – it looks so much better. Pity they couldnt get all the paint off the bricks, or maybe there’s more work coming. And the deep cream trim doesn’t quite match the super restored one next door, but it’s close. And I wouldn’t have chosen that very dark brown for the lace, you can’t see the pattern ! But it was a popular Victorian colour.

1 April 2025

The restoration of the facade of this terrace house in my street is practically complete. What a lot of work. They took the paint off with steam cleaning, but lots of flecks left, which were then stained to match the bricks ! The owner, who is a builder, did that part himself. And the tuck pointing was all redone too. And and they chose a dark brown for the cast iron, which would have been a likely colour. Polychrome brick was super popular on the 1880s, and an awful lot, perhaps the majority, were painted from the 1950s onwards, and many are still painted today, so it seems less common than it actually was.