Shrewd poeticism: Warders Hotel and Emily Taylor

Matthew Crawford Architects has re-imagined a historic row of cottages with significant cultural heritage as a boutique hotel and restaurant–bar.

Fremantle, or “Freo” to those in the know, wears its convict-cut limestone buildings with poignant reverence. Pregnant with a layered and multifaceted history, Perth’s port city has, for almost 200 years, seen the to and fro of trade and, with it, travellers whose stories are now etched inherently into every rifted surface. Among the many heritage-listed structures built by convict hands is a familiar row of terraces on Henderson Street, the once-crowded homes of the Fremantle Prison warders and their families now offering a place of respite for travellers of another era.

Warders Hotel and Emily Taylor by Matthew Crawford Architects recasts the warders’ cottages as a boutique, eleven-room hotel, with a rear restaurant–bar that hums with the good cheer of up to 450 patrons, locals and visitors alike. The restaurant’s mark – a crescent moon hovering over a ship – emits a red glow that beckons passersby to the discreet entries in the site’s original bounding limestone walls on Market Lane and William Street. “It’s very much been a case of ‘touch it lightly;’ make clear what’s new and what’s existing,” says practice director Matthew Crawford of his team’s approach to this beautifully nuanced adaptive re-use project. “We wanted to turn the cottages back, to create an immersive quality where you actually feel like you’ve gone back to the 1850s, but then we’ve given you some luxuries to enjoy it.”

The row of terrace houses is registered on the National Heritage List.

The row of terrace houses is registered on the National Heritage List.

Image: Dion Robeson

The six double-storey cottages of mass limestone construction in a Victorian-Georgian style now house the guest rooms, as well as a reception and Gimlet, a small aperitivo bar facing Henderson Street that takes its name from the mid-century gin-and-lime-based cocktail. Conceived as the cabin of a ship, the cosy reception space sets the palette of natural, local materials that goes on to permeate the hotel and restaurant spaces. It also establishes a craft mentality that is fundamental to the architect’s own sensibilities and a nod to Fremantle’s roots in making and maritime. The room’s original jarrah ceiling and floor have been relieved of paint and oiled, their deep hue serving to cocoon the space, while the Austral dream reception desk, with red veins speaking of its Pilbara origin, marks the first of many custom furniture elements designed by the architects for the hotel.

The cottages’ original staircases, though unfit for modern use, have been preserved and encapsulated in cabinetwork. An open-air walkway now services the hotel rooms, while offering both breathing space and connectivity between the hotel and restaurant. Here, there are yet more traces of the site’s past iterations, including once-copper-lined washing basins and the circumference of an old well, demarcated in brickwork underfoot. On the restaurant side, a wall built from limestone retained from the site contains openings that offer glimpses and breezes to and from the restaurant’s north-facing garden, which is itself a major move to retain a necessary visual connection to the Fremantle prison building and the broader convict establishment context. The openings’ operable timber shutters can respond to seasonal requirements, hunkering down in winter to temper the coastal chill.

The restaurant’s structure strongly references the trussed warehouses that held goods. Mural: Tessa MacKay.

The restaurant’s structure strongly references the trussed warehouses that held goods. Mural: Tessa MacKay.

Image: Dion Robeson

Inside each hotel room, the original features are revered and complemented by the architect’s custom furniture, including clever joinery that forms kitchenettes and wardrobes, and that, in ground-floor rooms, reveals itself to be bunks. Beautifully placed brass accents – built-in soda water dispensers and 1930s-style intercom speaker plates – will surely weather with use and time, and the exposed copper conduit that snakes along the walls is not only a solution to heritage requirements, but also an aesthetic feature in its own right. New external door and window units are layered with the originals, rectifying their acoustic and insulation failings while revealing and celebrating their character and craftsmanship. Presiding over each room is a portrait of a different woman, each an imagined 1850s character whose historical account might have been overlooked, expressively painted by 2019 Archibald finalist and Packing Room Prize-winner Tessa MacKay.

The hotel is housed in an historic 1851 building that housed the warders serving at the Fremantle Prison. Artwork: Tessa MacKay.

The hotel is housed in an historic 1851 building that housed the warders serving at the Fremantle Prison. Artwork: Tessa MacKay.

Image: Dion Robeson

MacKay’s work features again in the restaurant–bar, Emily Taylor, where an expansive mural depicts the woman behind the name. The venue’s name refers to Robert Taylor’s spice-trade ship, which ventured back and forth from England to Fremantle via Asia many times before wrecking off Western Australia’s coast. The ship itself, however, was named for Robert’s wife, Emily, of whom history speaks little. The identity for Emily Taylor expounds on the idea of history’s forgotten female characters, and also on Australia’s rich and complex relationship with Chinese immigration over the past two centuries. The Emily Taylor space echoes the sawtooth warehouses typical to Fremantle in its form, but its detailing speaks to Chinese materiality, with jade-green stone and ceramics, and imported Chinese brickwork. Those materials are paired with Western Australian local timbers, as in the vernacular red brick and the jarrah floor inlays that demarcate the site’s old fence lines.

The keenly observant Matthew Crawford Architects has, with shrewd poeticism, re-imagined this important, nationally-recognized heritage building as an energizing place in which to gather, mingle, dine, rest and simply bask in the good stuff. Here, the architect has researched and appreciated a sprawling and entangled history, one of sacrifice and of joy, and has distilled it into a building that now plays a new, enduring role in the story of Fremantle.

Products and materials

Walls and ceilings
Warders Hotel: Original limestone walls. Original timber shingle roof material, covered with heritage galvanized corrugated steel roofing. Walls painted in Volvox Clay paint in ‘Mont Blanc.’ Timber trims painted in Dulux ‘Bright White.’ Emily Taylor: Raw precast concrete. Light and dark grey and terracotta brick imported from China. Traditional brick in mixed Flemish and English bond painted in ‘Aalto White.’ Tiles from Muldoon Tiles.
Flooring
Warders Hotel: Jarrah floorboards. Baltic pine floorboards. Emily Taylor: Burnished concrete with jarrah inlay.
Lighting
Bespoke Field of Light by MCA. Lighting supply by Alti and Emotion Lighting.
Joinery
Emily Taylor: Bar top is Anahita Green honed marble. Bar front is bespoke profiled Tasmanian oak with China Black stain.
Furniture
Supplied by Mobilia with bespoke designs by Matthew Crawford Architects.
Other
Mural and portraits by Tessa MacKay. Bamboo-embossed in-situ concrete awnings.

Credits

Project
Warders Hotel and Emily Taylor by Matthew Crawford Architects
Design practice
Matthew Crawford Architects
Project Team
Matthew Crawford, Jake Gethin, Chelsea Walker, Michael Loubser, Trevor Osbourne
Consultants
Acoustic engineer Herring Storer Acoustics
Archaeology Gavin Jackson Cultural Resource Management
Builder McCorkell Constructions
Certifier ICS Building
ESD Cadd
Electrical, fire and hydraulic engineers EMP Consulting
Graphic design Studio Field
Heritage consultant Griffiths Architects
Landscape Tim Davies Landscape
Mechanical engineer Forth
Quantity surveyor Rider Levett Bucknall (RLB)
Structural engineer Peritas
Aboriginal Nation
Built on the land of the Whadjuk people of the Nyoongar nation.
Site Details
Location Fremantle,  Perth,  WA,  Australia
Site type Urban
Project Details
Status Built
Completion date 2021
Design, documentation 10 months
Construction 11 months
Category Hospitality
Type Hotels / accommodation, Restaurants

Source

Project

Published online: 3 Nov 2021
Words: Stephanie McGann
Images: Dion Robeson

Issue

Artichoke, June 2021

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