Aeolia House

In 1856 Edwin Daintrey purchased a large area of land encircled by St Paul's street to the south, Perouse Road to the west, and Coogee Bay Road (Then Belmore Road) to the north. Aeolia was constructed in 1859 ontop of a hill overlooking Coogee Bay. Possibly designed by Edmund Thomas Blackett, it is a good representative of a suburban house and residence of the mid-19th century perfessional and mercantile class. It retains the original nineteenth century carriage drive off of Coogee Bay Road and the turning circle in front of the house. Daintrey lived in the residence until his death in 1887. In 1889, the Aeolia estate was subdivided, where small allotments were then developed as buisnesses and began to form The Spot. In 1902, a large part of the subdivision was purchased by the Brigidine Sisters and the premises was renamed Mount Brigid. The sisters used Aeolia for their convent, novitiate and a Kindy to 12 boarding school for girls with boys allowed as day students in the primary school. While the novitiate was transferred to St Ives in 1954, the sisters continued to teach at Randwick until the early 1970s, and still reside in the Convent nursing home today.