Constructed in circa 1878, the worker’s cottage at 6 Shelley Street, Christchurch, has historical and social significance as a small timber residential property associated with the early development of Shelley Street.

When a larger land parcel (Rural Section 238) in Sydenham was divided into small residential allotments, Robert Hamilton Russell Beare, a local labourer, purchased the section in 1877. Beare raised a mortgage on the property on 7 January 1878, indicating a likely year that the house was built.
Standing at the front of the rectangular section, the single storeyed weatherboard cottage at 5 Shelley Street has a symmetrical façade, with a central entrance door flanked by sash windows, a gabled roof of corrugated steel and lean-to at the rear. The form and detailing of the dwelling are simple, with little ornamentation other than the small hood above the central entry. Additions and alterations to the dwelling were made in 1973, 1980 and 1982.

Shelley Street was so-named in 1880 after English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) as part of a programme of naming streets in this area after literary figures. Many worker’s cottages were built here and on surrounding streets. In 1883 Robert Beare sold his house to Peter Grenfell, also a labourer, for £170. After Peter Grenfell’s death in 1893, ownership passed to his widow, Maria. Maria died in 1903 and the house then came into the ownership of Mary Anna Clark. The cottage had a number of owners throughout the twentieth century, and was rented out for much of this time. For a brief period in the early 1980s, it was owned by printmaker and art teacher Michael Reed and his wife Merilyn. The Reeds already owned and lived in the brick cottage opposite at 5 Shelley Street between 1975 and 1984.