Fetlar

The house is one of several homes built in the 1920s on land subdivided from the estate of Stanley Hall by Edward Blume, a wealthy pastoralist. This completed the transformation of Enderley Road from a 19th century semi-rural retreat to a fashionable, upper middle class suburb. This row of mostly architect designed houses stretches from the Spanish Mission home, Breffney, (Hall and Prentice) on the comer with Alexandra Road to the Old English style house, Delcotta, (EP Trewem) on the opposite corner of Craven Street and Enderley Road.

Baxter engaged the architectural firm of Chambers and Ford to design his new home. The partnership of CW Chambers and EM Ford was established in 1920 and continued in name until 1951 despite Chambers' retirement in 1935. Claude Chambers was a prominent Brisbane architect in the early 20th century, particularly noted for his fine commercial buildings such as the Finney Isles Building (1909-10) and Perry House (with Lange Powell in 1910). However, Chambers worked mostly in Sydney for much of his partnership with Ford, leaving Ford to manage the Brisbane firm. The firm was responsible for several Brisbane homes in the newer Interwar styles, such as the Californian Bungalow and Old English style.

Chambers and Ford's design for Baxter's home appeared in the Architectural and Building Journal of Queensland in September 1923 showing both the front elevation and plan. The elevation shows a pleasingly balanced composition of roof, verandah and windows. The plan reveals quite a grand and practical design including a large hall, generous living and dining rooms and a bathroom adjoining each of the two bedrooms. The kitchen boasts built in cupboards and a servery and is separated from a maid's room by a walk in pantry. The house also appeared a few years later in the Queenslander, in a photograph showing a "group of attractive houses in Enderley Road". It features many of the classic characteristics of the Californian Bungalow style which was introduced to Australia in the 1910s — low pitched roofs with street facing gables, roughcast rendering, sleep outs, geometric leadlight glazing and verandah roofs supported on substantial masonry piers, sometimes with squat colonnettes.

The property passed to trustees in 1961 after the death of Richard Baxter and was sold in 1965.

The house has a relatively low pitched tiled roof with a dominant street facing gable. Beneath the gable which has wide eaves and typical vertical battens, is a deep verandah. A smaller gable projects over a sleepout on the eastern side of the house.

The front verandah has an attractive open lattice type balustrading which provides a contrast to the solidity of the rough cast rendered masonry pillars with their terracotta face brick trim. Pairs of pillars (sometimes referred to as. colonnettes) sit on the verandah piers bridging the space between verandah and roof. The verandah has an entry with several stairs on the eastern end and features a bay window with leadlight glazing. Other casement windows are located on either side of the verandah. A second narrower verandah runs along part of the rear of the house.

The front garden has a rendered masonry wall with a similar lattice infill to that used on the verandah.

The house has not been inspected internally.

1. Apperly, Richard et al. A pictorial Guide to Identifying Australian Architecture Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1989

2. Brisbane City Council Building Cards and Aerial Photographs

3. Brisbane City Council Sewerage Detail Plans

4. Department of Natural Resources, Certificates of Title

5. Commonwealth Electoral Rolls for Queensland 1925 and 1936

6. John Oxley Library, photographic collection.

7. Kennedy, Michael Owen, Domestic Architecture in Queensland Between the Wars, (UNSW. Master of Built Environment graduate report, January 1989)

8. Queensland Post Office of Directories 1903-1940

9. Queenslander, 1927.

10. Watson, Donald & Judith McKay, A Directory of Queensland Architects to 1940, UQ Library, 1984