Rippon Lea House & Gardens

One day around noon we made our way to the Rippon Lea House and Gardens. After I worked there the other day I thought, this would be a good idea to come back for a visit, and it was!

It was built in 1868 for Sir Frederick Sargood, a wealthy Melbourne businessman, politician and philanthropist in Elsternwick, a suburb of Melbourne and contains 11 hectares of ground. Located about 8 kilometres from the Melbourne central business district, he contracted a two-storey, 15 room house be built. An extensive pleasure garden was laid out around the house, together with glasshouses, vegetable gardens and orchards. The gardens were designed to be self-sufficient as regards water, and the large man-made lake on the property was designed to store stormwater run-off from the surrounding area. The greatest structural changes occurred in 1897 when the house was extended to the north, and a tower was added. The style of the house has been described as 'polychromatic romanesque' and the architect, Joseph Reed, was said to have been inspired by the architecture of the Lombardy region of northern Italy. The house also contained many other innovations; it was one of the first in Australia to be lit by electricity, produced by its own generators, and Sargood employed a full-time electrician to maintain the system, and the fittings included an electrically powered bell system to communicate with the servants quarters and kitchens below stairs.

Right now, you can visit an exhibition in the main building, it contains the original dresses of the movie 'The Dressmaker' which was filmed in Australia.

Other than that, the entrance to the gardens is completely free and to get to them you need to pass a shop where you can buy all different kind of stuff whether books or seeds or other things. As soon as you walk into the gardens, you realize how clean and green everything is. It's kept in good shape and very tidy condition. During a nice sunny day, it's a pleasure to walk through it. The main building is just as beautiful as the garden and somehow you can imagine how it must have been to live in there back in the day. When you make your way further into the garden, you'll find the fernery, a huge kind of garden for plants. My first thought, when I stepped in, was 'makes me think of 'Jurassic Park', the movie'. Besides that it's very beautiful and the further you walk the nearer you get to the lake, quite big with possibilities to sit down, relax and enjoy the view. Even a lookout tower is placed in the garden where you have a really nice view over the lake. 

When you get back to the main building, you'll find a cafe behind it which is just open during the exhibition but very interesting. Inside you find dresses and the decoration is detailed with stuff like sewing tissues or pattern and designs for dresses like in 19th century. To have an impression what it meant to live and work back in the days, there are steps down to the employees rooms and kitchen. It's free to visit it and give you an overview how it must have been back then. 

While exploring the property you'll find some sort of plantation with many fruit trees and all kinds of herbs and veggies which belong to a nearby restaurant. They own it and whenever they need fresh herbs or whatever, they can help themselves.

On the way back to the exit you find a tiny playground for children, even a photo wall with pictures of a girl and a boy dressed like in the 19th century and I must admit, we look pretty good by putting our heads through the wholes in the wall.

All together it was a wonderful days and we both enjoyed it very much and spent easily 3 hours there which definitely didn't feel like that.