Greenoaks - Darling Point

Greenoaks (later Bishopscourt) – 11–21 Greenoaks Avenue – Darling Point – NSW

Built from 1841 cottage / 1846–49 mansion works · Architects J. F. Hilly (1846+); Edmund Blacket (1859–60); Leslie Wilkinson (1935) · Standing — private residence (Anglican Archbishop’s house 1911–2015)

Thomas Woolley’s Percyville cottage became Thomas Sutcliffe Mort’s Gothic showplace — armour, picture gallery, Guilfoyle garden — then, from 1911, Bishopscourt for Sydney’s Anglican archbishops. Blacket’s academic Gothic and Wilkinson’s 1935 wing still read from Greenoaks Avenue. Sold out of church hands in December 2015.

At a glance

• Address: 11–21 / 11A Greenoaks Avenue, Darling Point NSW 2027 (Woollahra)
• Built: Woolley cottage Percyville 1841 (Hilly); Mort lease 1845 / purchase 1846 (£2,500); mansion transformation from 1846; SHR construction years 1846–1849; Blacket additions from 1859–60
• Architects: J. F. Hilly; Edmund Blacket; Leslie Wilkinson (1935 western wing / remodelling)
• Style: Victorian Academic / Picturesque Gothic Revival sandstone mansion; Guilfoyle romantic garden remnant
• Original owners: Thomas Woolley (ironmonger); then Thomas Sutcliffe Mort (1816–1878)
• Estate: Originally ~11 acres; Mort core ~2.8 ha; major subdivisions 1892 (Langtree) and 1911 (Greenoaks Avenue)
• Heritage: NSW SHR #00362 (2 Apr 1999); former PCO 26 Apr 1988; RNE; National Trust; Woollahra LEP
• Fate / current use: Standing — private residence after Anglican sale December 2015 (~$18 million; DoS / SMH Domain reporting on SHR)

Site & setting

Yarranabbee / Darling Point — Gadigal and neighbouring clan Country; heavily timbered until New South Head Road and 1830s grants. Mort’s Greenoaks sat among Darling Point villas (Swifts, Carthona, Lindesay). Michael Guilfoyle landscaped from 1849 — SHR: “leading and model private garden of NSW.” Double Bay “Exotic Nursery” on Mort land supplied plants. Much garden lost to Greenoaks Avenue subdivision (1911); remnant trees and romantic slope survive around the house (SHR).

Timeline

• 1841 – Thomas Woolley buys ~11 acres; Percyville two-storey stone cottage (Hilly) (SHR / DoS).
• 1845–46 – Mort leases then purchases cottage + ~2.8 ha for £2,500; renames Greenoaks; Hilly enlargements (DoS / SHR).
• 1849+ – Guilfoyle garden; Mort horticultural prizes and society roles (SHR / ADB Mort).
• 1857–59 – Mort in England; Alton Towers purchases (armour, pictures, oak furniture) (SHR).
• 1859–60 – Blacket: picture gallery, porte-cochère, stables/kitchens, stair hall stained glass (SHR / DoS).
• 1878 – Mort dies at Bodalla; widow Marianne remains into 1890s (DoS / SHR).
• 1892 – Sold to grazier Michael Campbell Langtree; subdivision begins (DoS).
• 1910 – Part sold to Church of England for £6,750; renamed Bishopscourt; dedicated Oct 1910; Archbishop Wright from 1911 (DoS).
• 1911 – Greenoaks Avenue / residue subdivision (~8–9 acres) (SHR).
• 1935 – Leslie Wilkinson remodelling / western wing; chapel works in same era.
• 1960s–2012 – Repeated sale debates; Synod votes to sell (DoS).
• Dec 2015 – Sold ~$18m to private buyer; ends 105 years of church ownership (DoS / SHR citations).
• Today – Private residence; State Heritage listed; not open as a museum.

Architecture & interiors

Dressed sandstone, steep slate roofs, stepped gables, Victorian Tudor windows and carved doors; Mort arms carved in stone (SHR / RNE notes). Blacket porte-cochère in Gothic chapel form (1860); grand stair with stained glass; panelled library; picture gallery once showing ~200 works and armour, open monthly to the public (SHR). Wilkinson’s 1935 wing extended over former stables.

People & anecdotes

Thomas Sutcliffe Mort — auctioneer, wool sales innovator, refrigeration pioneer, Mort’s Dock, AMP founder, St Mark’s Darling Point benefactor (ADB / SHR). Married Therese Laidley (link to Rosebank’s Laidley world). Michael Guilfoyle — Chelsea-trained nurseryman; Greenoaks made his colonial reputation (SHR). Edmund Blacket — friend and architect. Archbishops from Wright through Davies used the house; DoS lists seven by 2013 before the sale saga.

Sydney Morning Herald “Progress of the Suburbs” (13 Sep 1913) called Greenoaks the show place of Darling Point and finest Elizabethan specimen in the colony (quoted in DoS).

Gallery

Transcription (Auction catalogue cover, James R. Lawson & Little and H. Y. Norton, December 1910)

CATALOGUE

"GREENOAKES"
DARLING POINT
SYDNEY

(THE HISTORIC MANSION OF THE MORT FAMILY)

AUCTION SALE
Tuesday, 6th, and Wednesday, 7th December, 1910
each day at 11 o'clock

JAMES R. LAWSON & LITTLE
H. Y. NORTON
Auctioneers in conjunction

What stands today

Greenoaks / Bishopscourt stands as a private State Heritage house. No public museum access. Pair with St Mark’s Darling Point and (from the street) other Darling Point villas. Related demolished neighbour on this blog: Retford Hall.

From Percyville to Bishopscourt

Bishopscourt, tucked on Greenoaks Avenue at Darling Point, didn’t begin as an archbishop’s pile. It started as Percyville — a two-storey sandstone cottage built about 1841 for ironmonger Thomas Woolley. In 1845–46 Thomas Sutcliffe Mort leased then bought the cottage and its roughly 2.8-hectare estate. With architect John Frederick Hilly he stretched it into a gentleman’s residence and renamed it Greenoaks.

The house people still argue about in heritage circles is Edmund Blacket’s work. From 1859 Blacket — Mort’s friend and the colony’s leading Gothic Revival architect — added the academic Gothic fabric: picture gallery, porte-cochère, the whole romantic silhouette. Mort was wool, shipping, Mort’s Dock, refrigeration, AMP — and a church patron who gave land for nearby St Mark’s. From 1849 Michael Guilfoyle shaped the sloping gardens with plants from his Exotic Nursery at Double Bay; by the 1860s the grounds were being called a model private garden for NSW.

After later private ownership and subdivision, the Anglican Diocese of Sydney bought the house in 1910–11 as the Archbishop’s official residence and renamed it Bishopscourt. Leslie Wilkinson remodelled parts in 1935. It’s State Heritage listed. The Diocese sold it in late 2015; since then it’s been in private hands again — Gothic harbour mansion, no longer a working episcopal HQ.

Bishopscourt

Bishopscourt, also known as Greenoaks, is a historic Gothic Revival mansion at Darling Point in Sydney. Built in the nineteenth century, it reflects the area’s development as an affluent harbourside suburb and has long been associated with the Anglican Church.

Bishops Court At Darling Point Was The Original Site Where Thomas Mort Had His Cottage.

The Original Mansion Was Built In The 1860's And Was Designed By Edmund Blacket.

Sources & further reading

• NSW SHR — Bishopscourt / Greenoaks (SHR 00362): https://apps.environment.nsw.gov.au/dpcheritageapp/ViewHeritageItemDetails.aspx?ID=5045448
• Dictionary of Sydney — Kim Hanna, “Bishopscourt” (2015): https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/bishopscourt
• Dictionary of Sydney — “Mona and Greenoaks”: https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/mona_and_greenoaks
• ADB — Alan Barnard, “Mort, Thomas Sutcliffe (1816–1878)”: https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/mort-thomas-sutcliffe-4258
• Sydney Morning Herald, 13 September 1913, “Progress of the Suburbs” (DoS quotation)
• SLNSW — search Greenoaks / Bishopscourt / Mort Darling Point

Related on this blog

• Retford Hall – Darling Point
• Greenoaks Cottage – Darling Point
• Blacket / Darling Point church posts — search St Mark’s