Old Newcastle East Public School is a heritage-listed former school building at 58 Bolton Street, Newcastle, City of Newcastle,

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

, Australia. It was designed by

Walter Liberty Vernon Colonel Walter Liberty Vernon (11 August 184617 January 1914) was an English architect who migrated to Australia and pursued his career as an architect in Sydney, New South Wales. In his role as the New South Wales Government Architect he is ...

and built from 1908 to 1912. It is also known as Newcastle Public School. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999.

History

The building housed the

Newcastle East Public School {{Infobox school , name = Newcastle East Public School , image = nepslogo.PNG , motto = , established = {{start date and age, 1816 , type = New South Wales Public School , principal = Mike McCann , city = Newcastle , state = New South Wal ...

until it moved to the former Newcastle Junior High School site in 1982. It was then used as an annexe to the

Newcastle Court House The Newcastle Court House is a heritage-listed former court house located at 9 Church Street, Newcastle, City of Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia. It is now owned by Nihon University. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Regis ...

across the street, serving as the Community Justice Centre. It was sold by the Department of Attorney-General and Justice in March 2014, having become surplus to their needs due to the court house's move to a new building. It was subsequently developed as the Parque Newcastle East apartments, with the heritage-listed buildings adaptively reused and multi-storey apartments built on the unused parts of the site.

Description

The Old Newcastle East Public School is designed in Vernon's typical federation Free Classical adopted school style. The building was designed as a substantial school classroom block with a

hipped roof A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downwards to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope (although a tented roof by definition is a hipped roof with steeply pitched slopes rising to a peak). Thus, ...

dominated by several tall chimneys. The bolton Street entrance is marked by a small

gable A gable is the generally triangular portion of a wall between the edges of intersecting roof pitches. The shape of the gable and how it is detailed depends on the structural system used, which reflects climate, material availability, and aesth ...

roofed projecting entrance

bay A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a Gulf (geography), gulf, sea, sound (geography), sound, or bight (geogra ...

which features a stone capped

parapet A parapet is a barrier that is an extension of the wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/breast'). Whe ...

. The building is constructed in face brick and features contrasting

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...

trim, abutments and string coursing. Original slate roofing material was replaced with tiles .

Heritage listing

The Old Newcastle East Public School is of considerable historical, social and townscape significance being reputably the oldest continuously existing school in Australia until its closure. The substantial

Federation A federation (also known as a federal state) is a political entity characterized by a union of partially self-governing provinces, states, or other regions under a central federal government (federalism). In a federation, the self-governin ...

Free style designed building is a good example of Vernon's work. It is prominently located on a corner site within the centre of Newcastle. The Old Newcastle East Public School was listed on the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999.

References

Attribution

External links