ApartmentsVanessa CrollTue 26 May 26
Home from 1890’s to Make Way for Kurraba Point Units Scheme
Apartment renewal on Sydney’s Lower North Shore has reached another old Kurraba Point holding, with plans filed to demolish a 132-year-old house beside the suburb’s ferry wharf.
Rahnch Constructions lodged the $8-million proposal for 115 Kurraba Road, where the house—known first as Knollys and later Sorrento—would be replaced by four full-floor apartments.
Kurraba Point is a small harbour suburb about 5km north of Sydney’s CBD, where steep sites, ferry access and older strata blocks have helped turn Kurraba Road into a pocket for boutique apartment renewal.
Marchese Partners’ plans propose a four-storey residential flat building above two basement levels, with one three-bedroom apartment on each floor, seven car spaces, five bicycle spaces, rooftop solar and new landscaping.
The 440sq m block falls about 6m from Kurraba Road towards Neutral Bay and adjoins 115A Kurraba Road, home to the locally listed Once Upon a Time house.
Vehicle access would be via a car lift from Kurraba Road, about where the existing driveway sits.
A turntable would allow cars to enter and leave in a forward direction, while the lift would take 85 seconds to move between street level and the lower basement, according to the traffic report.
Next door, 117 Kurraba Road was marketed in 2014 as an 813sq m waterfront site with approval for four luxury apartments replacing a six-unit strata block. It has since emerged as Norfolk Penthouses, a four-residence harbourfront project.
Further south, 147, 151 and 153 Kurraba Road won Sydney North Planning Panel approval on March 11, 2020, for demolition of existing buildings and a part-four, part-six-storey residential flat building with 25 apartments and basement parking for 41 cars.
Thirdi and Phoenix Property Investors later marketed the SJB-designed project as Kurraba Residences, a $170-million harbourfront scheme of 24 luxury apartments.
At 93 Kurraba Road, HFO Capital secured approval last year for 19 luxury apartments after lodging plans in June, 2024, for a 1737sq m R4 High Density Residential site north of Kurraba Point Wharf.
Its SJB-designed scheme, across two 1970s apartment blocks with 15 units, exceeded the 12m height limit and site coverage controls, and drew 42 objections before approval in less than 12 months.
Rahnch’s site has already been through its own planning steps.
Several earlier filings related mainly to boundary adjustments involving the access handle of neighbouring 115A Kurraba Road.
Rahnch lodged a four-storey, four-apartment scheme in August last year, before withdrawing it in December after North Sydney Council sought more information.
This revised application responds to issues across heritage, views, excavation, setbacks, solar access, trees and car lift design.
Knollys was built in 1894 as a single house for German-born Sydney retailer Leopold Fuerth, who ran a Strand Arcade shop selling fancy goods, toys and trinkets.
Architect Gordon McKinnon designed the house and William Peter Noller built it, with a perspective sketch and description published in The Australasian Builder and Contractor in July, 1894.
Fuerth later returned to Germany after selling the business and the house.
William Sandeman Dickson bought the property in 1923, renamed it Sorrento and converted it into flats in 1937.
It was strata titled in 1977 and now contains three separate flats.
The house is not heritage listed and sits outside the Kurraba Point Heritage Conservation Area, although the heritage report said it retained some late Victorian and Arts and Crafts character.
John Oultram Heritage & Design said later alterations had reduced its intactness, with verandahs infilled, western additions, fireplaces removed and interiors divided into apartments.
The heritage report found the building had limited heritage value and did not reach a level of significance able to prevent demolition.
