33 Albert Street in North Perth was one of those old houses that most people probably drove past without thinking twice about. But once you start looking into it, the place tells an interesting story about how Perth grew, how people lived and how quickly this type of housing is disappearing as fast as its history.

 

The suburb of Woodville

Built in 1905, the house sat on a 486m² block in North Perth, which at the time was still developing into one of Perth’s early tram-connected suburbs. Before all the housing estates were established, much of the area around North Perth (previously called Woodville) consisted of paddocks, semi-rural land and market gardens. As Perth expanded north from the city during the late 1800s and early 1900s, the area was progressively subdivided into residential estates, aimed at working and lower-middle-class families.

 

The nearby tram routes were a major selling point and advertisements from the period regularly promoted how close houses, like those located on Albert Street, were to tram services into Perth.

 

Describing the house

An advertisement from September 1911 describes the house as a “double fronted jarrah” house with five rooms, kitchen and bath, selling for £260. “Double fronted”, a common real estate term at the time, referred to the classic layout where the front door sat in the middle with rooms on both side and a hallway running through the centre of the house.

 

The house itself was a fairly typical Federation-era timber cottage, built during the huge housing boom occurring across Perth between 1895 and 1915. It was timber framed and clad in horizontal weatherboards, comprising of local jarrah timber, which was heavily prized in Western Australia because it was extremely durable, naturally termite resistant and well suited to framing, flooring and joinery.

 

Architecturally, the house combined elements of late Victorian worker’s cottages and early Federation domestic housing. It featured decorative details common to the period including:

• turned timber verandah posts (shaped on a lathe with decorative curves and detailing)

• decorative timber window valances (ornamental timber trim beneath windows)

• high ceilings

• timber sash windows (vertically sliding timber-framed windows)

• corrugated iron roofing

• timber panel doors

• masonry chimneys

• ornate fireplaces

• decorative ceiling roses.

 

Changes over time

The proportions of the house were also typical of the era. Early houses often had higher ceilings and steep roof pitches (sharply angled roof slopes) to help deal with heat before air conditioning existed. Even by the time it was demolished, the original house could still be recognised under decades of alterations. Rear additions, altered rooflines, an updated kitchen and a mix of older and newer materials showed how the house had gradually changed over more than a century.

 

Internally, the house retained a surprising amount of original fabric. The walls revealed more than a century of alterations and updates. Some rooms still had tongue-and-groove timber wall lining boards, particularly in the kitchen, while other sections had fibro or plasterboard sheeting installed during mid-20th century modernisations.

 

The kitchen probably would’ve had a wood-fired stove, basic shelving and very little built-in cabinetry. By the mid-20th century it had been updated with a freestanding gas stove, sink cabinet, laminate-style surfaces and painted cabinetry. The recessed stove alcove and blackened brickwork shows the original fireplace opening survived behind later modifications.

 

The bright yellow tongue-and-groove wall lining in the kitchen was likely much older than the paint itself, which was probably added sometime between the 1960s and 1980s. The room also showed major floor failure caused by long-term moisture, stump movement, rot, termites or a combination of all four, which tends to be extremely common in old Perth timber houses.

 

Several fireplaces survived internally, including at least one ornate timber mantelpiece which appeared original or close to original. It featured turned columns, decorative vertical incised detailing and an arched opening, sitting somewhere between a late Victorian and Federation-era domestic design. Another fireplace appeared to have been remodelled in the mid-20th century with faux stone finishes more typical of the 1940s to 1960s.

 

The decorative ceiling rose was another surviving Federation-era feature. These were commonly installed during the transition from gas lighting to electricity and were used to decorate the centre point of hanging light fittings.

 

Much of the original joinery also survived including:

• four-panel timber doors

• timber skirting boards

• timber architraves (decorative timber trim around doors and windows)

• sash windows

• rim locks

• brass door knobs.

 

One of the locks photographed was a classic surface-mounted rim lock, also known as a box lock, which was extremely common in Australian houses from the late 1800s into the early-mid 20th century, although the ribbed brass door knobs appeared slightly later than the lock body itself.

 

The floors in some rooms were still old sheet lino or vinyl flooring, probably dating from the 1950s to 1970s. The blue-green floral geometric patterns were very typical of mid-century domestic flooring sold as modern, easy-clean surfaces after World War II.

 

Past occupants

Frederick William Franks appears to have been living at the house with his wife and daughter in around 1927, although it’s unclear whether he owned the house or was just a tenant.

 

By 1933, Norman Victor Walton and his wife Catherine “Kit” Walton were residing at the property. Norman later died in September 1953, at the young age of 44, after passing away in his sleep. He didn’t appear to have had any children but left behind his wife and four siblings.

 

The property later became associated with the Randazzo family, who appear to have owned the house for decades prior to its final sale in 2024.

 

The North Perth area had strong links to migrant communities, particularly Italian families involved in market gardening and small business, although 33 Albert Street itself appears to have only had a family-oriented garden for household sustenance.

 

End of an era

The house sold in September 2024 for $1.2 million. Confusingly, property records also show a 2013 “sale” for $93,750 where the owners remained the same, which appears to have been an internal transfer involving ownership restructuring or a related family arrangement.

 

By the time the house was photographed in early 2025, it was in very poor condition. Parts of the floor had collapsed, walls were cracked, ceilings damaged and the place appeared long neglected.

 

Scattered debris throughout the house included cigarette butts, miscellaneous rubbish, cotton buds, bottle caps and a clip-seal drug bag. A funeral bookmark was also found for a Victorian man who had died in December 2011 at the age of 74. Whether that item belonged to a squatter or someone temporarily staying there remains unknown.

 

Despite the deterioration, the house retained a remarkable amount of integrity for a 120-year-old worker’s cottage. Many similar houses across Perth have long since been stripped, heavily modernised or demolished.

 

Development

The house was demolished in April 2025 and in January 2026, a development application was approved for a new single house valued at $800,000.

 

Houses like 33 Albert Street usually fall somewhere in between not being considered architecturally spectacular enough for heritage protection, yet still representing an important part of the suburb’s history. Particularly as most people historically lived in modest timber cottages exactly like this one.