The entomologist's folly

The day after we’d visited the Rose Seidler House, we went a whole different direction (conceptually and physically) by checking out the Elizabeth Bay House in Potts Point. It made our heads spin a little. Visiting the Seidler House is like smoking a bowl and wandering onto a 1950s sci-fi movie set, all right angles and glass. The Elizabeth Bay House, on the other hand, is the Georgian fever dream of a colonial bigwig who thought building the ultimate mansion would solve all his problems.

Well, mostly Georgian, anyway, in that it embodies the elegance and symmetry of that period. But it’s got a lot more going on. The intrepid builder of this house, Alexander Macleay, took a detour into Greek Revival and neo-Palladian—all the rage at the time—on his way toward Georgian, augmenting his mansion with pomp, columns, and grandiosity that caused more than a few eyebrows to rise.

He chose Sydney’s most fashionable architect of the time, John Verge, who had already designed several statement villas for other wealthy colonists. Before arriving in Australia in 1828, Verge had been a successful builder in London. Initially, he tried farming in the Hunter Valley on land he named “Austral Eden.” He did not do well at it.

So, he moved back to Sydney and reinvented himself as an architect. Interestingly, he was only a practicing architect for about seven years, during which he built several houses still regarded as the pinnacle of colonial-era design. In 1837, he quit the glam life and went back to farming. He moved to another of his properties near Bong Bong¹ in the Southern Highlands to live out the rest of his days as a gentleman farmer.²

Macleay, a Scotsman, was a career civil servant in London and a famed bug collector.³ Macleay's government department was dismantled when the Napoleonic Wars ended, so he retired unexpectedly at 50. His finances were stretched thin trying to support his bug habit while also supporting his large family.⁴ Things really hit the fan when his brother’s private bank—in which he was a partner—collapsed. By 1824, he was borrowing heavily from his oldest son, William.

In 1825, he was appointed Colonial Secretary of the New South Wales colony—the most important public official in Sydney after the governor⁵—and he jumped at the chance to right his sinking financial fortunes. He and his wife, Eliza, packed up his massive insect collection, 4,000 books, and nine of their 10 children and moved into the Colonial Secretary's house on Macquarie Place in downtown Sydney.

Shortly after arriving in Sydney, the governor gifted him a sprawling parcel of 54 acres of land on Woolloomooloo Hill overlooking the Sydney Harbour. Land grants by the governor were common in the colony's early years, but this one raised some hackles. 54 acres of prime waterside real estate? In Sydney? That's like being handed the keys to a gold mine. Worse, he’d snatched land that was technically public—at a time when the colony was beginning to shift to a system of land sales instead of grants—and had been earmarked as the site for a much-needed asylum.

But after the dust settled, he relaxed into his job and started to work at improving the land he’d been given in his off time.⁶ It turns out that the bug-loving Secretary was also a plant fanatic, and he was obsessed with creating a botanical wonderland on his hill. He collected rare and exotic specimens from all over the colony and beyond, blending them with the native trees and rocky outcrops. He had terraces cut into the steep slopes of the property to prevent erosion and create more planting areas. He even constructed an artificial grotto, complete with a fountain.⁷

After spending nearly a decade creating a botanical wonderland that was part personal obsession, part scientific endeavor, and part “look how rich and clever I am” showcase, Macleay announced that he would build a house on the property. And not just any house, but “the finest house in the colony.”

It was a costly endeavor. Apparently, ol' Alex was feeling flush after 10 years on the job in Sydney. So he jumped right in and bore considerable financial strain, to the dismay of at least some of his children.

“

I am sorry to see him building so large a house…£6000 will be the cost of it at least….

The elevation is very handsome, indeed it will be the finest house in the colony,

but I do not see where the revenues are to come from to allow

the occupants to reside in it with becoming dignity.

—George Macleay writing to his brother William, 1836

”

That might not have been an insurmountable problem, except that Macleay managed to piss off the governor in 1837 and got himself fired.⁸ By 1839, the house was finally habitable enough for the family to move in. And I’m using the term “habitable” loosely here—mostly, it meant that the roof didn't leak. Much. But Macleay, unfortunately, didn't get to enjoy his fancy new digs for long.

Wool prices dropped precipitously in 1840—the same year Britain stopped sending convicts to Australia—plunging the colony into depression. And, surprise, collecting bugs is not a sustainable financial strategy. Macleay tried to subdivide the land in 1841, but the plots didn’t sell. By 1845, he was so deep in debt that he had to hand over the keys to his eldest son, William Macleay, who forced the rest of the family to move out, kept his father’s insect collection, and lived there alone for another 20 years.⁹

But the house was never fully completed or furnished. While the interiors were designed to be lavish and grand, financial constraints and the economic depression of the early 1840s prevented the Macleays from finishing the house as originally envisioned. Some elements were never built, and the grand interiors likely lacked some of the finishing touches and furnishings that were part of the initial plans.

That said, it’s still pretty magnificent, and it’s clear that no expense was spared. The facade is a little severe because the house remains technically unfinished. It was supposed to have a colonnade porch that ran around the whole house, but that was a no-go.

The square entrance hall opens onto a salon, the dining room, and a soaring oval saloon with a spectacular cantilevered elliptical staircase rising to a gallery and crowned by an ornate dome. The stairway is built into the sandstone wall, with each tread resting on the one beneath, and cast-iron banisters are painted to look like bronze. Perfect for dramatic entrances. The rooms upstairs have breathtaking views of Elizabeth Bay and the harbor beyond.

The drawing room has been spruced up with fancy window treatments. William Macleay specially ordered decorative boxes above the curtains¹⁰ from London. They're not your average curtain toppers—they’re decked out with gold-colored Louis XIV trim, along with some Greek egg-and-dart designs for good measure.

And let's not forget the pièce de résistance—the library. Of course, it is the largest room in the house. Nothing says “I'm an intellectual," like dedicating the biggest space in your home to house your massive library and extensive dead insect collection. The library featured specially designed cabinets and shelves to house it all—a hybrid library-slash-natural history museum with just a dash of "crazy" thrown in.¹¹ The room is a stunner, with a coffered ceiling and elaborate plasterwork.

Even crazier, the whole house is a giant sundial-slash-compass. Modern architecture nerds have discovered that the house is perfectly aligned with the sunrise at winter solstice, the shortest day of the year.¹²

On the solstice, the rising sun perfectly bisects the house in a path from the front door through the back, illuminating the sandstone cliff face at the rear of the house, lasting for about a minute. Nothing in the planning or design documents talk about this, so we have no idea if it was intentional. But it is undeniably cool.¹³ The Australian Stohehenge!

A different service wing at the back of the house held a kitchen, laundry facilities, and servants’ quarters, but it was destroyed at some point. So was a large stable built elsewhere on the estate. There were even plans for a bathing pavilion designed to look like the Tower of the Winds in Athens and set on the very tip of a point facing the bay, but it was not to be.

In a tale as old as time, Macleay’s extravagance was his undoing. In the years after William’s death in 1865, the house was vandalized and partially demolished before being carved up like a Thanksgiving turkey in the  1920s and transformed into 15 studio flats. It became a bohemian paradise for the artsy types of Kings Cross throughout the interwar period.

In the 1950s, the house was slated for demolition before the Elizabeth Bay House Preservation Committee swooped in to save the day. Too late for the gardens, though. Today, the house sits in the middle of one of Sydney’s poshest, most densely packed neighborhoods, famous for its harbor views and abundance of swanky Art Deco apartments.¹⁴

The New South Wales state government bought the house in 1977 in a fit of “Crikey, we should probably save some of this colonial stuff.” After a massive restoration project that probably cost more than Macleay's original bug collection, Elizabeth Bay House opened to the public in 1977. The house is managed and kept by Sydney Living Museums (formerly the Historic Houses Trust) and looks as swish as she did in the early 1840s. Most of the rooms are fully decked out in period style, letting visitors experience the full glory of colonial excess without any of the pesky issues around, you know, actual colonialism.

So there you have it. Elizabeth Bay House—a testament to one man's vision, ambition, and complete lack of financial sense. It's a must-visit for anyone who wants to experience the height of colonial excess and walk away feeling slightly better about their own life choices. Remember, though, as you admire the fancy furnishings, that this entire folly was built on the back of colonialism, questionable land acquisition, and a bizarre obsession with dead bugs.

But hey, at least it makes for a good story. And isn't that what really matters in the end?