Halsbury House in Montague Street, Goulburn, is across three addresses: 18 on the left, 20-22 in the centre and 24-26 on the right. Photo: John Thistleton.
In 1938, a year before he left his legal practice to join World War II, solicitor Ian Duffy opened Halsbury House in Montague Street, Goulburn, adding intrigue to a street full of unique architecture.
Constructing the two-storey Halsbury House involved remodelling three semi-detached buildings, which stood on separate ground levels, into 14 business apartments.
One of the stone terrace buildings had been the home of the Reverend Robert Cartwright after whom the nearby Cartwright Place is named.
Goulburn architect Herbert Manfred designed Halsbury House. His father and acclaimed architect Edmund Manfred had designed the distinctive 1890 Fire Station with a bell tower on the opposite side of Montague Street.
Also across the street Elmslea Chambers has stood since 1933, one of the first in Australia to use coloured polychrome terracotta on its facade.
Halsbury House is no architectural lightweight either, says prolific sketch artist Steve Ayling, who has completed online Oxford University courses looking at western and modern architecture and read extensively on the subject.
“I have always paused to admire the building,” Steve said. “I consider it to be a striking example of the ‘modernist’ or ‘international’ architectural style that had its origins in the German ‘Bauhaus’ (the building house) initiative from the 1920s,” he said.
The Bauhaus was an architectural school that attracted the leading architectural minds in Europe, including Russians.
“Not surprisingly their ideas of freedom and modernism clashed with those of the Nazi Party and it was closed down in 1933,” Steve said.
He points out Halsbury House is characterised by a minimalist rectilinear ‘industrial’ look, flat surfaces without ornamentation, geometric shapes, and steel-framed windows.
“I consider that it deserves to be appreciated as a unique and bold architectural statement that was clearly intended to place Goulburn at the forefront of modernism in Australia,” he said.
The owner, the architect, and builders were all advancing into new territory and need to be congratulated in his opinion.
“I can imagine that it was criticised as being unsuitable for Montague Street and probably only passed through council with some targeted encouragement,” he said.
Daphne Penalver, a researcher for History Goulburn, compiled some research on Halsbury House for an author.
Long-serving Goulburn solicitor Michael Galland in his office in Halsbury House. The office was a waiting room in 1967, when he first arrived to practice law at his father Bernard’s firm. Photo: John Thistleton.
Aside from accommodating a religious minister in earlier times, the three buildings that are now incorporated into Halsbury House were occupied at various times by a piano tuner, a confectioner who supplied other shops with sweets and sold them from her Montague Street shop, and an optometrist.
Since 1938 numerous solicitors have occupied Halsbury House.
Michael Galland, who is in his 60th year of practising law in Goulburn, has worked there for two periods.
His father Bernard, who was in partnership with Ian Duffy in the 1940s, continued as Bernard L. Galland & Co when Ian was called to the Bar in 1948.
Talented and hard-working in law and in amateur theatre, Bernard won an ‘Oscar’ from Lieder Theatre judges for his best performances throughout 1953.
Michael arrived in 1967 when Bernard’s firm had more work than it could handle. At the time, the office he now works from was the waiting room for his father’s legal firm.
Back then No 24-26 Montague Street comprised two offices, a staff area, strongroom, a kitchen, and male and female toilets.
No 20-22 Montague Street comprised of two residential flats upstairs. Entry was by the main door and an office on the ground floor stairwell area was occupied by Ted (“Typewriter Ted”) Morrison.
Two rooms at the eastern end of the building were known as 18 Montague Street and were occupied by optometrist David Cotterill.
Bernard did not own any part of Halsbury House. He rented the space until the firm moved across the road to 27 Montague Street, which he had bought.
In 1990 three Goulburn legal firms merged, creating Galland Elder Lulham Solicitors and the proprietors acquired Halsbury House.
A well-read and informed student of architecture, Steve Ayling has sketched much of Goulburn’s distinctive architecture. He suspects Halsbury House did not strike instant affection in Goulburn because it lacked the neo classical design of other prominent buildings. Photo: John Thistleton.
“The whole building was reconstituted internally in a major way to accommodate six solicitors and staff, upstairs and downstairs,” Michael said.
In that renovation of the entire 18-26 Montague Street, the front door of No. 26 Montague Street became a window and an internal wall was constructed to create the spacious office Michael now occupies. He has done so since 1990 with Galland Elder Lulham and later RMB Galland Elder Lawyers, the current occupiers of this elegant building.
