Page last updated: September 2008

The House

Manning Clark House, designed by Robin Boyd in 1952, is the house where Manning and Dymphna Clark lived and worked from 1953 until their deaths in 1991 and 2000 respectively.

The house is typical of the post-war Melbourne regional style and Boyd's Peninsula house design, with its low-pitched gable roof, widely projecting eaves and large areas of timber framed glazing.

Manning Clark's roof-top study, where the six volumes of "A History of Australia" and his other works were written, dominates the design of the spread-eagled white house in its large garden.

Inside Manning Clark’s unique library of 10,000 volumes lines many of the walls. Dymphna Clark’s collection of texts in many European languages reminds us of her scholarly translations and linguistic interests.

The piano Manning Clark played stands in one corner of the sitting room, and his records and player line a wall of the small dining room dominated by the 1972 portrait of Manning Clark by Arthur Boyd.

Outside, the tall trees and the lawns  designed for bat and ball tell us of some of the family’s interests. All this will remain as it has for nearly fifty years, the scene of so much significant personal and professional scholarship and activity.

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Further architectural information about the Manning and Dymphna Clark's house and other Robin Boyd designed houses can be found at The Canberra House website specialising in modernist residential architecture in Canberra, ACT.