Crestwood Estate

Statement of Significance

The Crestwood Estate has historic value for its association with Ron Sloan, the visionary landowner who initiated Crestwood Estate as an experiment in providing fully-integrated facilities and services to home-owners; and for its association with Paul Ritter the architect planner, who based the Crestwood Estate on the Garden City philosophy and American residential developments which followed the Radburn Technique.

The Estate design has aesthetic and historic value as it was a great contrast to surrounding suburbs with its grid pattern of streets, and subsequently became a significant influence of suburban planning in new developments that included curved roads, more parkland connecting areas and underground power.

Physical Description

Each house was individually designed, some through a design competition organised by the Institute of Architects. Some homes were two storey with simple roof planes and clerestory windows. The homes on the smaller than usual lots were set close to the road with landscaped gardens to the roads edge with no front boundary delineations (fences). The homes opened onto community open space at the rear. The open space is linked through the entire estate which was designed to separate cars from pedestrians, via pedestrian underpasses.

History

Part of Walter Padbury's Thornlie Park Estate was sold in 1937 to mine-manager and investor, Nathaniel Harper. The 1,715-acre property was put up for auction in two lots in September 1954. The first development took place on 228 acres (0.92 km²) of Lot 1, purchased by D. and M. O'Sullivan, with forty houses completed by March 1957. The area was aimed mainly at middle-income earners and inner city dwellers, but it was the more up-market Crestwood Estate, begun in the late 1960s, which was more innovative in design.

Crestwood was an experiment in providing fully-integrated facilities and services to home-owners. While only a small residential development, Crestwood is notable for being decades ahead of its time. In an advertising brochure the developers stated that:
Crestwood Estates sent forth its manager and an architect planner to seek out the very best features of the finest developments in twenty countries of the Western World.
Travelling over 20,000 miles across America, Scandinavia and Europe many hundreds of the most wonderful projects were visited - and out of this intensive investigation, and a desire to contribute to the permanent welfare of Western Australian families, has come exciting advances not yet achieved elsewhere…

The developer of this estate was Ron Sloan and he engaged architect planner Paul Ritter who based Crestwood on the Garden City approach to planning and on American residential developments that followed the Radburn Technique. This technique was a 'separation of man and motor, providing peace, safety and security'. This approach included unfenced communal living, shared facilities, parks connected to every house, underground power, and reticulated water supplies. Homeowners were to pay $2.90 a week for the maintenance of surroundings and all community facilities, which included a swimming pool and sporting facilities.

Covenants were established to maintain a high standard of design and maintenance, with each home to have a minimum value of $14,000. The blocks were smaller than the usual quarter acre and each house was to be individually designed. The Royal Australian Institute of Architects approved the participation of its members in a competition for residential design solutions. Some of the homes built were two-storey.

Crestwood Estate was officially opened at a buffet dinner in the Members Pavilion of Claremont Showground by Minister for Housing D. H. O'Neil MLA on 16 October 1969. While eight villages were planned (Royale Ridge, Castle Glen, Explorer Glades, Regal Grove Ridge and Realm Ridge, and the higher density villages of Sovereign Heights, Knights Brook and Monarch Lodge) only one, Royale Ridge, was actually developed. It comprises the streets of Regency Drive, Coronet and Princeton Courts and Grenadier Drive complete with parkland strips, a central community centre with swimming pool, and pedestrian underpasses. Houses in the surrounding streets that back onto Royale Ridge, such as Cavalier Court, Lachlan Road and Ovens Road, enjoy the benefits of the Crestwood design with a lack of streets to cross, and all have the same direct parkland access to Thornlie Senior High School and South Thornlie Primary School.

The design of the development was a great contrast to surrounding suburbia with its grid pattern of streets, and it was to be some time before the principles that Ritter applied to Crestwood, such as curved roads, more parkland connecting areas and underground power, were implemented across new suburban developments. Over time however, due to security reasons, property owners have installed fences at the rear of properties where they connect to the parkland.

Integrity/Authenticity

Integrity: High degree
authenticity: High degree

Condition

Good

Uses

Creation Date

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This information is provided voluntarily as a public service. The information provided is made available in good faith and is derived from sources believed to be reliable and accurate. However, the information is provided solely on the basis that readers will be responsible for making their own assessment of the matters discussed herein and are advised to verify all relevant representations, statements and information.