CELEBRATING 20 YEARS OF A CATHEDRAL EDUCATION

This year, Cathedral College Wangaratta celebrates 20 years of providing a 'Cathedral' education where every child is encouraged to Discover, Belong and Achieve.

IN many works of literature, houses become characters just as central to the stories as their human inhabitants. Think about the “great continent of a house” from Tim Winton’s ‘Cloudstreet’, Anne Shirley’s beloved Green Gables, the Baker Street abode of Heights. Each seems to soak up the happenings and personalities residing within, to become much more than just a structure, and readers can almost feel them breathing, moving, living.

The North East’s wealth of historical buildings has the ability to lend a similar sense of place, and to allow for a subconscious time-slip. From walking through buildings visited by bushrangers including Ned Kelly, to strolling past those which have helped shape the development of the region, it feels as though you could hear the whispers of eras past within their walls if you really tried hard enough. It’s the same feeling that surrounds you as you step through the doors of Warra, a Road - and it’s something keenly felt by its current owners, Guy and Robyn Robertson.

The couple purchased Warra in 2012, moving from Mount Eliza to take on the historic home (which is listed with both the National Trust and Heritage Victoria), aiming to restore it to its former glory. Built in 1908, the Queen Anne Federation/ solicitor Henry Alexander ‘Harry’ Murdoch and his wife Marion, a local artist. It features a billiards room, formal lounge and understood Marion worked on her paintings, and a cellar. >>

Among its striking features are leadlight windows, Wunderlich created by Prussian–born, Melbourne–based crasftsman Robert Prenzel, including one featuring an Aboriginal man believed to be based on a photograph taken by Sydney‘s Henry King around 1890. The house, which has had only a handful of owners over its almost 115-year history (interestingly, it’s never been home to children), is understood to have been originally set amid four hectares of garden with a crescent driveway. It still features the original wrought–iron gates which were moved from the corner of nearby Crisp Street as the property was sub–divided, and as they taste of stepping back into history.

The Robertsons were captivated by the house when it was last placed on the market, and couldn’t resist the opportunity to deliver the tender loving care it needed. It had been in a poor state, with wallpaper peeling from walls and water leaks, and if left much longer, may have been lost as a link to the city’s past. Robyn and Guy each have four decades of renovation experience, with Robyn following in the renovating footsteps of her parents, and they have restored up to a dozen homes in their years together. Guy has an enquiring, technical mind, while Robyn describes herself as the decorator and labourer. The couple has so far rejuvenated Warra’s kitchen, constructed a new garage, and reinstated the garden – including a rose circle which remains faithful to the Murdochs‘ original plantings. The next stage of the development will focus on the original bathroom, which features a giant claw–foot bathtub. Through the 10 years they’ve invested in the house, Robyn said she and what was best for their home as they carried it into its next chapter, while also considering its original owners. house, and I’ll often stop and wonder whether Marion would be happy with the changes we’ve made. It’s a home that should be owned by people who love it. We’ve always lived in places we

Though they‘ve lived there for almost a decade, Robyn said their home continued to reward their passion, remaining a of a former owner of the house – they discovered it was part of a mechanism which opened a hidden space beneath the shelf in a cupboard, which revealed it to be part of the packing Robyn said the regular discoveries were fascinating, and added of albums detailing the house’s progress, with photographic when the positions of the two mantel surrounds were switched, and are fascinated by the artistic connection to the house; apart from Marion Murdoch, it has inspired former resident and

“I think it is so connected to artists because the house is a

The couple is always keen to hear from anyone with knowledge anyone with photos or stories of the house throughout its life to