What sits on Malvern's roofs
A sea of red roofs
eMelbourne quotes a description of early 20th-century Malvern as 'a quiet, solid and leafy sea of red-roofed brick villas'. Villas went up around the railway in the 1880s, then farms and estates were cut into curving streets of substantial houses, many by well-known architects.
Brick, by council rule
Malvern Council restricted wooden buildings to particular streets and set minimum blocks of 557 m2 with 15 m frontages, and it promoted street trees. The result is masonry houses on generous blocks, big roofs, and gutters that fill fast.
Terracotta, iron or slate, by era
Federation houses (about 1890 to 1915) generally have steep roofs of terracotta tile or galvanised iron. Older Victorian roofs were often slate.
Plenty of flats too
At the 2021 Census, 45.8% of occupied dwellings were separate houses and 30.8% flats or apartments. On a block of flats, roof work normally goes through the owners corporation.
Heritage permits
Stonnington lists replacing roof materials as an external alteration that needs a planning permit in a Heritage Overlay. Routine repairs generally don't, unless the overlay says otherwise. The higher your building's grading, the fewer changes council will accept.
The jobs that come up on Malvern villas
Ridges and broken tiles on terracotta. The tiles often outlast the mortar holding the ridge caps. Terracotta's colour is fired in and doesn't fade, so salvaged tiles usually blend in. See rebedding and repointing in Melbourne.
Slipped or cracked slates. The NSW Government's heritage inspection schedule gives slate a life expectancy of 50 years or more, with an inspection every 7 years. Most slate roofs need a slater to replace individual pieces, not a new roof. Our page on slate and heritage restoration explains the work.
Check it's really slate first. Asbestos cement 'slates' about 4 mm thick were made in Australia from the late 1800s to the 1980s, often to copy real slate. Only a NATA accredited lab test can confirm asbestos, so don't let anyone cut, drill or water-blast them until that's answered.
Gutters full of leaves. Monier's maintenance advice is a yearly clean of valleys, gutters and downpipes as the minimum, with extra visits where branches hang over.
What to ask a roofer about a Malvern villa
- Is my house in a Heritage Overlay, and what's its grading?
- Where will matching tiles or slates come from?
- Could any of the 'slates' be asbestos cement, and will you test before touching them?
- Is scaffolding priced as its own line?
If it were our villa
We'd repair like for like. Rebed the ridges, swap broken tiles or slates for matching ones and keep the gutters clear under the street trees. We'd only talk about a new material once a roofer has shown the old one is finished, and we'd ring Stonnington before signing anything that changes how the roof looks.
Want a roofer to take a look?
Tell us the job and your postcode. We match it with a Find My Roofer certified roofer who specialises in that kind of work, and they call you to quote. Your number goes to them alone.
