Carisbrook Historic House

Carisbrook is a survivor of a time when land around the Lane Cove River was a world away from Sydney Town. Built in the 1880s from locally quarried sandstone, the house sits handsomely overlooking Burns Bay on the east and the Lane Cove River to the west.

The Brooks family built this house on land owned by their family since the 1850s. It remains the oldest surviving house in the area, its fabric largely intact. This wonderfully preserved house transports its visitors back to the foundation days of early Lane Cove. Its asymmetrical facade, large bay window, and low-pitched slate roof are characteristic of the Italianate style, a very fashionable architectural style of the Victorian period.

Carisbrook was retained in the Brooks family until 1904, when the family left Australia to live in South Africa. Since then, it has passed through the hands of several of owners until it was purchased in 1969 by the Lane Cove Council as a gift to the Lane Cove community. A permanent conservation order was placed on the house by the Heritage Council of NSW in 1981. It is now maintained by the Council and curated by the Lane Cove Historical Society Inc.