Fairy Meadow

First called ‘Wieambilla’, this house was built for Robert Cliff Mackie in 1902. Mackie was a grazier who had established the large ‘Fairy Meadow’ station at Chinchilla in the 1880s, while his wife Fanny took an active role in public life, including in the early work of the Queensland Women’s Electoral League. The Mackies moved to Brisbane at a time when estate sales freed up considerable amounts of land in Hamilton, which had been a desirable residential locale since the 1860s. Mackie purchased two roods of what had been part of William Cooksley’s pineapple plantation. ‘Wieambilla’ became the family home until the late 1930s, although part of it was leased as flat accommodation after Mackie’s death in 1919. The large timber residence, renamed ‘Fairy Meadow’ around the 1920s, is in the Federation Filigree style common to Queensland houses of this period and features gables and decorative components such as iron railings to the verandas.