Fairy Tale: Family legacy in a storied Glebe home.

In a leafy pocket of wide streets and storybook facades in Glebe’s Toxteth Estate stands a living archive of family moments. For Chris and Margaret Robson, who first walked through its doors in 2001, this Queen Anne beauty wasn’t a house they set out to find - it found them.

Margaret remembers it clearly. “At the time, I was helping my father downsize closer to the city. With my toddler daughters in tow, we’d stopped by Jubilee Park. Driving along Allen Street, I came upon this house. We weren’t looking to move, but when we stepped inside, our three-year-old turned to me and said, ‘Mum, this is a fairy house.’ I was thinking something similar.”

Built in 1907 by one of the original Toxteth Estate builders - rumoured to have been granted two lots nearby for his work - the home carries a Century-and-counting narrative in its timber and stone. The builder’s own daughters once played piano in the turreted front room, a detail the Robsons unknowingly repeated when their girls placed their own upright piano in that very same nook decades later. “It gave a lovely sense of continuity,” Margaret says. 

Today, preserved character is offset with modern family comfort - a true poolside entertainer on a rare double-width 558sqm parcel. Its Queen Anne façade and stained-glass windows radiate personality, while a northeast rear aspect welcomes light into the interiors. Unfolding across multiple formal and informal living areas, it’s anchored by a large stone kitchen, and connected seamlessly to a glass-framed pool and shaded terrace.

For the owners, spring and summer have always been the heartbeat of the home. “From September we have the first plunge into the pool - oversized floaties, friends after school or sport, everyone munching watermelon on the warm bricks under the pencil pines,” Margaret recalls. “In summer, it’s long lunches, grandparents teaching kids to swim, and faces disappearing under water for the first time. It’s the small things that become part of the home’s rhythm.” 

Chris describes early mornings floating on his back in the 2m-deep pool, watching parakeets dart between the eucalypts. “The blue sky above, greens of the palms and pines - it’s my heaven,” he says.

Further magic lies in the home’s Old World corners, which have a unique ability to shape-shift into each new chapter of modern family life. “The turret in the front bedroom made the most wonderful space for young siblings to grow up together,” Margaret says. “Later it became the piano corner, then a performance space, and finally, a quiet reading nook.” The octagonal turret in the living area, she adds, “was a children’s tented play space, a cubby house, Pokémon den, and later a meditation spot. But most memorably, it’s the most festive place for a Christmas tree you could imagine - under the turret is the magnet for Santa.

Upstairs, the bedrooms open to leafy outlooks and soft light, a comforting space with a bay window nook, under tongue-and-groove ceilings. “From my desk in the front living room, I’d often look northwest to the sunsets through the Allen Street trees,” Margaret says.

The connection between indoor and outdoor spaces defines the home’s atmosphere. The dining setting is designed to feel poolside, with doors open or closed. It’s hosted 38 family members for birthdays and Christmas, with tables spread inside and out, this house clearly capable of absorbing bountiful energy.

 This natural sense of generosity extends beyond architecture or design - it’s embedded in how the home has been lived in, shared, and loved.

 A century after its first family settled in, the house continues to do what it was built to do: hold people, memories, and light - each season, each celebration, each quiet moment.

View the listing: 36 Allen Street, Glebe