An improbable building in Young’s countryside

It stands about 27 kilometres north of Young, where the little hills and valleys of our local area are broadening into lower profiles, large skies and distant blue ranges in view. This is ideal country for cropping, and cropping on a vast scale brought about the fortune that built this great house

Iandra church, standing among its churchyard graves, the first sign that the traveller is nearing the house. The eye is caught immediately by tall chimneys, and then the Tudor-style tower, battlements and steep roofs of the huge homestead appear among the trees further down the hill. 

An old iron cottage and some farm sheds are seen and, next, the overseer’s dwelling with wide verandahs and attic windows. A belt of trees clears to reveal the east wing of the house with the kitchen wing beyond. 

The front faces north, over sloping lawns where the driveway curves up from the main gate to the arched porte cochère below the tower. 

Arcades (with pillared balconies above) connect to large circular ‘oriels’ at the corners of the façade. 

In every English castle, the great hall had its oriel where Milady could sit warmed in England’s cold summers; here they provide light and warmth for the ladies downstairs to sit doing needlework and for a plant conservatory above. 

The window mullions are square-headed in a Jacobean way, rather than Gothic.

Strangely, the homestead here was always called Mount Oriel, a family name that came with the Greenes from Ireland. 

During the 20th century the name Iandra Castle became more common, because that is the official name of this section, part of the ‘Parish of Tyagong’ since the early government surveys. 

The local post office and a nearby school were called Iandra, and the village of Greenethorpe (11kms north on the railway line) was first known as Iandra Siding.

In many ways Iandra is improbable. An improbable building to discover so deep in country NSW, far from the lushness of the coastal hinterland. 

Improbable in its perfect expression of Edwardian confidence and swagger, which came to an end as the Empire came to an end with World War I. 

Improbable in the way that such an English building can incorporate homestead verandahs in the Aussie way. 

Improbable in the impression it makes on us of sheer size (57 rooms) and enormous chimneys. 

Improbable as we discover close-up that the ‘stone surfaces’ are nearly all cement. 

The entire building is formed of concrete: walls built of concrete poured into formwork, level by level; floors made of concrete slabs like a modern sky-scraper; roofs tiled with cement slates.

Improbably romantic, yet entirely of the modern era.

Much more can be said of Iandra, and I will attempt to say more in a further article. 

Meanwhile look for Judith Langfield’s book, Iandra – Sharing the Land (2003) about “Mr George Greene and the Iandra Sharefarmers, on sale at Iandra open days.