House, 146 Khandallah Road, Wellington was designed in 1893 by the firm of Clere and Richmond and is among the earliest houses in New Zealand with features common to the Californian Bungalow style. It was built for Mr Stuart Pollen, who was in the Colonial Secretary’s Office.

When built the house had three bedrooms, two living rooms, kitchen, bathroom, scullery, pantry, and also an attached greenhouse. A separate building housed a wood shed, wash house and toilet. One of the living rooms had a bay window which extended halfway onto the veranda. The house incorporated some characteristics of the bungalow style (low pitched roofs, veranda, plain decoration, a greenhouse, and wooden shingles in the gable ends). The interior timber panelling with exposed cross braces suggested an ecclesiastical influence from Clere’s many church designs. The plan was also unusual for the time with a T-shaped corridor rather than the central hall typical of the Victorian villa.

Alterations were made in 1945 and the 1950s from designs by Hubert Morton. Further changes were made in the mid-2000s. Most of the changes have been to the internal layout – the most externally visible change is the 1950s enlargement to the front bay window to make it project the full depth of the veranda. The nearby house of ‘Puketiro’ (Register No. 1418) was also designed by Clere in the 1890s and there are similarities in the designs and in particular features.

The house’s architectural significance comes from its well-known architect (Frederick de Jersey Clere (1856–1952)) and for being among the earliest houses in New Zealand with features of the Californian Bungalow style. Jeremy Ashford lists architects George Goldsbro and Samuel Hurst Seager as the designers of the first New Zealand bungalows – Goldsbro’s ‘Rothesay’ in Mt Eden Road, Auckland built in 1897 and Seager’s bungalow in the Cashmere hills, Christchurch, built in 1898 for John MacMillan Brown, university professor (Register No. 3674, Category 1). House at 146 Khandallah Road was built four or five years earlier than these houses, and while it has double-hung sash windows rather than casement windows (a typical bungalow feature) it nevertheless has other elements of the bungalow style.