Broadwood Road came into being in 1915, on a ridge overlooking the Happy Valley Racecourse.
Architects and Builders C E Warren and Co Ltd purchased a number of lots on the ridge and building began of an exclusive development of villas which had the wealthy in view. There were a few pre-existing houses on the ridge, but they were small bungalows.
Number 8 was a two-storey villa built of granite, rendered and painted white, with highly polished wooden floors within and at the front, double colonnaded verandahs, fashionably rounded at the corners.
The roof was flat reinforced concrete. Accommodation for domestic servants was at the back of the house.
Front views overlooked the Racecourse, with terrific views north to Kowloon and the mainland.
A path led down from the house to Broadwood Road, which for a long time was single carriageway, so access originally was by rickshaw and sedan chair from town to house.
Prior to WWII Amaro and Rita Reed and their family were living there, possibly along with Margaret Bond.
During the war, European houses were routinely stripped of all wood for use as fuel by the locals and left in a bad way, but House 8 was repaired postwar and looks to have lasted at least into the 1970s.
During the 1980s the site was taken by Block A of the Villa Rocha development.
I was surprised to read that the house my father's Reed family occupied before the war was repaired postwar and still standing into the 1970s. I was told the house had been stripped of its wooden floors, windows and doors when my mother visited the site after returning from Macau. I did note that the 1946 photo showed the house exterior still standing intact.
I remember the Blackwood sideboard and matching long dining table and chairs in the Nathan Road flat and wonder if those might have been retrieved from the house along with any mementos, although somewhat unlikely.
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House 8 overview
Broadwood Road came into being in 1915, on a ridge overlooking the Happy Valley Racecourse.
Architects and Builders C E Warren and Co Ltd purchased a number of lots on the ridge and building began of an exclusive development of villas which had the wealthy in view. There were a few pre-existing houses on the ridge, but they were small bungalows.
Number 8 was a two-storey villa built of granite, rendered and painted white, with highly polished wooden floors within and at the front, double colonnaded verandahs, fashionably rounded at the corners.
The roof was flat reinforced concrete. Accommodation for domestic servants was at the back of the house.
Front views overlooked the Racecourse, with terrific views north to Kowloon and the mainland.
A path led down from the house to Broadwood Road, which for a long time was single carriageway, so access originally was by rickshaw and sedan chair from town to house.
The first owner of this house was Miss Margaret Annie Bond, and the house name was Beaumont.
Prior to WWII Amaro and Rita Reed and their family were living there, possibly along with Margaret Bond.
During the war, European houses were routinely stripped of all wood for use as fuel by the locals and left in a bad way, but House 8 was repaired postwar and looks to have lasted at least into the 1970s.
During the 1980s the site was taken by Block A of the Villa Rocha development.
8 Broadwood Road
I was surprised to read that the house my father's Reed family occupied before the war was repaired postwar and still standing into the 1970s. I was told the house had been stripped of its wooden floors, windows and doors when my mother visited the site after returning from Macau. I did note that the 1946 photo showed the house exterior still standing intact.
I remember the Blackwood sideboard and matching long dining table and chairs in the Nathan Road flat and wonder if those might have been retrieved from the house along with any mementos, although somewhat unlikely.