Boomerang is a heritage-listed private house and garden located at 42 Billyard Avenue in the inner eastern Sydney suburb of Elizabeth Bay, New South Wales, Australia. The house was designed by Neville Hampson and the gardens and grounds by Max Shelley (and possibly Hampson and A. J. Doust), and built from 1926 to 1928.
The first owner was Frank Albert, a music publisher, who resided at Boomerang until his death in 1962. The house remained closed with a caretaker until 1978. From 1978-96 a range of owners bought and subdivided it, creating lots to the east on Ithaca Gardens, and part was acquired by Sydney City Council to extend Beare Park to avert an unsympathetic proposed block of flats to its north-east.
Boomerang was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999. The house has been ranked as one of the most expensive houses in Sydney.
The house was used as a set for the film Mission: Impossible 2. In 2011 the garden was redesigned by Myles Baldwin.Macquarie Visions Ambassadors
History History of the suburb Elizabeth Bay had been the site of a fishing village established by Governor Macquarie (1810–21) in for a composite group of Cadigal people – the indigenous inhabitants of the area surrounding Sydney Harbour – under the leadership of Bungaree (d.1830). Elizabeth Bay was named in honour of Elizabeth Macquarie. Bungaree's group continued their nomadic life around the harbour foreshores. Sir Thomas Brisbane, Governor 1821–25, designated Elizabeth Bay as the site of an asylum for the insane. A pen sketch by Edward Mason from 1822–23 shows a series of bark huts for the natives' in the locality.HHT, 2000, p.38
Governor Darling granted Colonial Secretary Alexander Macleay at Elizabeth Bay in 1826. From 1826–1926 the subject land was part of the Macleay family's Elizabeth Bay estate garden, in which Alexander built his mansion in the 1830s to the west. Built well before the house, the estate was widely considered at the time (1820s onward) as "the finest house and garden in the colony" and had a number of areas, in gardenesque style. Its walled "orchard /orangery" was the harbour-side part in which Boomerang was later constructed.
After Alexander's bankruptcy, son George subdivided and sold leaseholds between 1865–82. Billyard Avenue was formed to access some of the earliest allotments. In 1875 his cousin, William John Macleay, acquired the lease of blocks on the corner of Ithaca Road and Billyard Avenue. This allowed him to build his Macleayan Museum for his natural history collections, which had been previously stored in Elizabeth Bay House. These collections were transferred to the Macleayan Museum at the University of Sydney in 1888. William John Macleay constructed a building for the Linnean Society of NSW on an adjacent block in 1885. Several trees possibly from the grounds of the Linnean Hall remain today - some on Boomerang include an old avocado (Persea gratissima) and a large mango (Mangifera indica) on the external southern (street-side) front wall on the south-east side of the entry gate. These trees are difficult to discern in photographs of the front garden of 1926 & 1929.
Also possibly from this time/Macleay ownership period is a large camellia (C.japonica) in front garden on W side of carriage drive near gate (this tree/shrub is at least 1920s, possibly older, and the Macleays were noted camellia enthusiasts/hybridisers at Camden Park Estate). Outside Boomerang remnants of the Linnean Hall grounds include a remnant black bean tree (Castanospermum australe) and Moreton Bay fig (Ficus macrophylla) line the southern street boundary of adjacent Billyard Avenue properties to the west. Other estate remains elsewhere include a grotto (part natural sandstone cliff overhang, part carved niche and details, and sections of an elaborate sandstone steps and a retaining wall and balustrade, behind (south) of Art Deco flats across (south of) Billyard Avenue.
Boomerang
Albert family The house was constructed in 1926 for Frank Albert, a music publisher; its architect was Neville Hampson; its garden was designed by M. R. (Max) Shelley, possibly in conjunction with Hampson. It was built on the site of an earlier house called Boomerang, being one of a row of Edwardian homes built on an 1875 subdivision of Elizabeth Bay estate. Frank Albert himself had married and built a two-storey brick house in 1902, which he demolished to make way for the newer homestead, also called Boomerang. Albert Music began importing and selling a wide range of musical instruments including a Boomerang mouth organ. The company trademarked the word 'boomerang' and stamped it on German manufactured mouth organs. The distinctive instruments were a run away success selling at a rate of 800 a week by 1897.Albert J. (2009) 'House of Hits ', Hardie Grant
Mr A. J. Doust, a landscape gardener active in the Eastern Suburbs in the late 1920s and 1930s is also known to have worked on Boomerangs grounds, perhaps on its maintenance or adaptations as plantings matured.
The private cinema is one of few in Australia and appears a miniature version of the State or the Regent Theatres. It was hailed as one of the wonders of the cinematic world, when it opened in 1928. It was never open to the public and few but the privileged guests at Sunday evening screenings, knew of its existence. Programmes were given out to guests attending sessions. It had burgundy velvet curtains, over 400 concealed lights (both curtains and lights could be centrally controlled by one person from the projection booth), sat 200 (in 1980 the seats had been removed) and was meticulously detailed, with a suite of film processing laboratories and dark rooms behind the projection room. A contemporary film magazine, commenting at the time of its opening, described the set up as the most extravagant in Australia and went on to call it "the best motion picture outfit in the world".Read, Stuart, pers.comm., 24 December 2007.
The garden and Shelley's involvement were featured in an article in magazine The Home of 1 February 1929, with photographs by Harold Cazneaux. Clearly based on Hollywood mansions of the period and well known in Sydney society at the time, Boomerang was the scene of much entertaining (Albert had a private cinema built in the basement for guests) and subsequent to his death, to much land speculation. The garden, by then-popular designer Max Shelley, contained myriad sun loving shrubs and perennials. Due to the growth of shade trees, the return to a sun-loving garden is no longer a possibility. Shelley's original planting plan turned out to be unsuccessful for Boomerang and changes were made soon after the garden's original concept.Baldwin,
Albert also reputedly owned the adjoining 1880s property to the west, today called Berthong, on which the boathouse of Boomerang survives today. A 1936 aerial photograph by J M Leonard shows Boomerang's formal cruciform harbour-front garden, flanked by palms and shrubberies, with Berthongs open lawn to the west, and another house (later demolished) immediately to the east on what is today Beare Park. Albert was well known in Sydney yachting circles, owning the very large yacht, "Boomerang", which he raced, moored at his private jetty, and stowed below the house in a specially designed area. This boat is today part of the Sydney heritage fleet. This vessel, originally named Bona, was designed by naval architect Walter Reeks and built in 1903. After having had several owners in Melbourne and Sydney it was sold to Frank Albert in 1929, who changed its name to Boomerang. It remained in the Albert family until 1987 when it was presented to the Sydney Heritage Fleet, which has restored it.SMH, 2003
Albert resided at Boomerang until his death in 1962, after which the house remained closed with a caretaker until 1978.Alderton, Eileen Home in a Million sells for $1 million The Australian Women's Weekly, 3 January 1979, at Trove
Subsequent ownership In 1978 Boomerang was sold to speculators Tom Hayson and son Ian, who quickly subdivided the estate (creating the lots to the east on Ithaca Road), and part which was acquired by Sydney City Council for an extension of Beare Park. (2008–09 works by the City of Sydney Council have interpreted Boomerang's former tennis court on this part of the park, along with earlier slip ways and accesses to the harbour.Read, Stuart, pers.comm., 3 September 2009.
Also in 1978 the house and with three-car garage and chauffeur's quarters were sold to oil recycler Peter Burnett and wife Astrid, becoming reputedly Sydney's and Australia's first million dollar sale at $1.2 millionNicholl, 2017, 21 (or $1.5m). The Dawsons redecorated at some expense. In 1980 the property was auctioned but was passed in.
Warren Anderson, a property developer from Western Australia, bought Boomerang in 1981 (as well as Glenmore and Fernhill estates in the Mulgoa Valley south of Penrith and Tipperary pastoral stations in the Northern Territory).Davies, 2014, 68
In 1981 it was sold to businessman Peter Fox, then a financier of films. In July 1982 it was sold after Fox's death in a car accident to bookmaker Mark Read, who installed the swimming pool on the northern lawn, relocating the sundial to a garden bed in the north-east corner.
In 1985 it was sold to property developer Warren Anderson, and expansively furnished with Regency antiques, paintings and French empire clocks. In 1991 Boomerang was listed for auction but did not attract a buyer. In September 1993 the Bank of New York took possession, after public legal disputes with Anderson. The property was listed for mortgagee auction. Tense competing teams of security guards had a stand off before the auction, triggering Supreme Court of New South Wales proceedings to evict Anderson. In 1993 telephone pager entrepreneur Nati Stoliar and his wife Miki bought the property.
Malcolm Turnbull was once interested in buying the prestigious pile. Post 1996 it was sold to Hong Kong based expatriate funds manager Duncan Mount and wife Sally for $15m. Major improvements to the property were carried out under their ownership (including the butler's quarters/garage being converted into guest quarters).
In 2000 Boomerang was listed for auction, selling in early 2002 to cleaning contractors, John and Julie Schaeffer.The Sydney Morning Herald, Good Weekend, 9 November 2002: 23 Schaeffer was also the owner of Bellevue Hill mansion, Rona.
Boomerang was sold in March 2005 for $20m to billionaire Melbourne trucking magnate, Lindsay Fox of Linfox, who placed the property in his daughter Katrina's name.
Description House The house is a Spanish Mission mansion, completed in the Inter-war Spanish Mission style ()Apperly, et al, 2002. and Spanish Revival Style.Irving, R., 1986. It exemplifies the Hollywood-derived taste for the Spanish mission style in a pastiche of palms, splashing fountains and "Spanish" architectural details such as perforated screens, rough stucco, colonnades, grilles, loggias and barley twist columns, combining to provide one of the most successful examples of this style (RAIA).
The three-storey masonry structure is rendered on external walls, with either ceramic tiled, timber panelled, fabric wallpapered, or plastered walls within. The house has 25 main rooms, six bathrooms, four kitchens, and covers a total of .Dawson, J., 1980.
The floors on the ground level are limestone paved (entry lobby is travertine), high-quality timber parquetry in the dining room, former library, central lobby (former dining room), and upstairs bedrooms of English oak with black ebony and American walnut borders.