Kelburn Hall, 51 Elizabeth Bay Road, is a four-storey apartment block of 16 apartments and one of the hidden gems in Elizabeth Bay. 

Unusually, it has two entrances with its original entrance facing the corner of Elizabeth Bay Road and Roslyn Gardens. Construction started in 1919 with completion by1920 in the pre-Art Deco period. It retains its original, distinctive Art Nouveau-style name plate above the entrance door flanked by two Tuscan columns. It has a later, more modern entrance at 51 Elizabeth Bay Road, now its current address.  

This year it celebrates its centenary since completion. 

Elizabeth Bay Road and surrounding streets were originally part of Alexander Macleay’s Elizabeth Bay estate. Macleay (1767-1848) was the Colonial Secretary of New South Wales and migrated to the colony in 1826 to take up the position. He was promised a grant of 54 hectares at Elizabeth Bay where he erected his residence Elizabeth Bay House (architect, John Verge) and developed the grounds into a private botanic garden. An elderly Carob tree in the grounds of Tresco at 97 Elizabeth Bay Road is a significant remnant from the original garden. Macleay experienced financial difficulties in the economic recession of the 1840s and left the colony in 1845. His estate at Elizabeth Bay was taken over by his eldest son, William Sharp Macleay (1792-1865), who lived there until his death in 1865 when it was bequeathed to his brother George (1809-1891). George had left the colony in 1859 but from his home in England he directed that the estate be subdivided and sold with 99-year leases. The land releases were staged and by 1882 only three hectares of garden around the house remained. Elizabeth Bay Road was part of the original driveway entrance to Macleay’s residence. After subdivision the area to the south of the Elizabeth Road saw little development. 

Today’s 51 Elizabeth Bay Road was part of lot 23 of the original Elizabeth Bay Estate. 

But by 1914 part of Lot 23 had been purchased by Daniel Sheehy, contractor. Sheehy sold the property in the same year to Matilda Clara Stockfield.

She on-sold it to Roslyn Flats Limited who then had on-sold it to Christopher Fitzgerald, builder, in 1917, during World War I. Matilda Stockfield was listed in the 1918 edition of Sands’ Urban Directory as running a private school at the site. The name, “Kelburn” first appears in the Sands’ Directories in 1919, and is noted as “under construction”. It seems likely that Fitzgerald constructed the apartments even though the property was sold in 1919 to Charles Fairfax Waterloo Lloyd. Fitzgerald also appears to have also constructed the neighbouring apartment building to the west known as Karori, circa 1917, in the neo-classical style. 

The use of builder/developers rather than architects for constructions was not new. After all, it wasn’t until 1920 that Australia had its first professor of architecture, Lesley Wilkinson, at the University of Sydney.

Mr Lloyd then on-sold the completed Kelburn apartments to Arthur Mority Bertram in 1920. 

It is therefore one of the early apartment blocks in Elizabeth Bay. 

Its interiors have been partially remodelled over the last 100 years. Many apartments still retain their original details such as polished timber floorboards, plastered masonry walls, high ceilings, sash wooden windows, mottled glass door panelling, timber skirtings and joinery including decorated timber ‘pediments’ over the door heads.  

By Andrew Woodhouse  

Heritage Solutions