Recorded for the future: documenting NSW homes
How do we better understand the history of the homes we live in?
For over three decades we have answered this question both by collecting historic materials connected to the home and also by commissioning photographic recordings of present-day houses and gardens in New South Wales.
We have photographically recorded homes since 1989. These recordings were often made at a point of change in the life of a house – for example, when it was about to be renovated or sold, sometimes after a long period of single family ownership. Some of the houses we have recorded were designed by well-known architects, others are simple suburban homes that represent a particular period or style and often just part of the house or even only one room or space has been photographed.
Many of the original recordings were done in the pre-digital age and a selection has subsequently been digitised. All of the photographs together with supporting documentation and research are held in the Caroline Simpson Library.
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![48 Edward Street, Woollahra [house documentation ring-binder]](https://api.mhnsw.au/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mhnsw.au%2Ffotoweb%2Fembed%2F2025%2F09%2F9c76ee265b5b4459992ea3de6b053333.jpg&w=1920&h=400&fit=inside&format=webp)
![Evansdale, Queens Park NSW [house documentation ring-binder]](https://api.mhnsw.au/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mhnsw.au%2Ffotoweb%2Fembed%2F2025%2F03%2Feb36f59ba27e4a5a99b9b4c02ad1d355.jpg&w=1920&h=400&fit=inside&format=webp)
Photo collections
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House photo albums
These specially produced photograph albums (some in published form and others consisting of photographs pasted into an album) comprise images of one or more domestic dwellings and depict exteriors, interiors and gardens in NSW mostly from the late 19th to the early 20th centuries
Richard Stringer’s architectural photographs, 1968–2003
This portfolio contains 55 photo prints taken by architectural photographer Richard Stringer, dating from 1968 to 2003, documenting significant Australian domestic buildings
Barry Wollaston: historic buildings in the county of Cumberland (NSW), 1954
This collection consists of 232 photo negatives by architect and photographer Barry Wollaston of buildings in the Sydney region considered by the Royal Australian Institute of Architects in the early 1950s to be of architectural and historical value
A pictorial guide to identifying Australian architecture – photo collection
This collection of over 700 black and white photo prints was used to illustrate the book 'A pictorial guide to identifying Australian architecture' by Richard Apperly, Robert Irving and Peter Reynolds, first published in Sydney in 1989