What lies behind the gate and those two hundred year -old walls? Easily overlooked among Hobart’s wealth of colonial buildings is the modest Markree House Museum. I must have walked past its unprepossessing exterior hundreds of times without giving it a second glance, yet it is important for several reasons. Not imposing perhaps, but important for other reasons Firstly, it marks the transition from the grand colonial mansion to the single family home which could be managed without live –in servants. Secondly, it reflects the life of an emerging affluent middle class of merchants and professionals, rather than the one consisting primarily of soldiers, landed gentry, convicts, servants and tradesmen, which preceded it. Thirdly, it embodies the principles of the Arts and Craft Movement which became popular in Europe and America in the mid C19th. This was both a revolt against the excesses of the Victorian Age and the shoddiness and soulless...
Practising Geographer - nature culture places people