Geelong 1910 woollen warehouse sells for more than $950,000

An iconic 1910 Newtown, Geelong, warehouse has sold for more than $950,000 after auction.

The property– set close to Corio Bay – passed in at $950,000 and later sold for “significantly more”. The price guide leading into the auction was mid-$900,000 to $1.05 million. It was listed by Robert Creece and Tony Young from Robert Creece Real Estate  Manifold Heights.

The Edwardian building was originally built for Collins Bros Pty Ltd Woollen Manufacturers with a second-level Early Modernist extension added in 1934.

The Latrobe Boulevard building has been under renovation for the last five years. One renovation project was finished the day before it went to auction. Parts of the property remain to be renovated.

The heritage-listed building is considered historically significant as a representative embodiment of industrial practice and the woollen processing industry in Newtown before the Second World War.

Heritage documents describe the building as “a two-storey symmetrical red brick industrial building with later two-storey additions”.

“The three-bay front is divided by flat piers, becoming semi-octagonal section over window-head height on foliate corbels.”

The leadlight windows are Art Nouveau influenced, and there is an “unusual” nine-panel door and knocker.

The manganese brown brick first floor is adorned with a massive sans serif sign in a recessed panel.

At the left of the property is an Edwardian timber veranda with an arched palisade valence and a picket fence at one side.

A 1946 obituary of Basil N. M. Collins, a member of the firm of Collins Bros Pty. Ltd, says he was a former player and president of the Geelong Football Club. He was also a Grand Lodge officer of the Masonic Lodge.

The renovation has yielded 570 square metres of internal space. The building sits on a 945-square-metre block of land.

The lower level is currently set up as an office or showroom or retail area that leads through to a open space, which is marketed as ideal for an art gallery or cafe or conference room.

That room opens through to a private paved courtyard and the rear yard.

The upstairs portion of the property is currently set up as a residential area with two bedrooms, an open plan living and dining room, kitchen and bathroom.

The former power room has undergone partial renovation towards a two level apartment.