The Deanery, Perth

The Deanery is located on St Georges Terrace, at the intersection of St Georges Terrace and Pier Street Perth, Western Australia.

It was built in the late 1850s as a residence and office for the first Dean of Perth, Reverend George Pownall. The Deanery is one of the few remaining houses of this period in Western Australia and is now used as offices for the Anglican Church.

In 1855 Pownall succeeded John Burdett Wittenoom as Colonial Chaplain and in 1857, following the Right Reverend Mathew Blagden Hale's consecration as the first Bishop of Perth became the first Dean of the new Saint George's Cathedral in Perth. He initially lived in rented accommodation but Bishop Hale agreed to the urgent need to build Pownall's Parsonage.

The site for The Deanery was formerly the site of the old Perth Gaol but the land was exchanged with the Crown, in July 1858, so that The Deanery could be built close to the Cathedral.

The old Perth Gaol had been used to house Aboriginal prisoners, and on 16 May 1833 Yagan's father, respected aboriginal elder Midgegooroo, who was captured days earlier, was executed on site by a party of soldiers of the 63rd Regiment. It is also thought that the town once stood in the grounds of The Deanery.

Pownall had a keen interest in architecture, and this interest was to substantially influence the design of The Deanery. He was a member of the Ecclesiological Society, and a former member of the Camden Society, which promoted the revival of Gothic architecture and an academic study of the style. The Deanery exhibits a number of the attributes of this style of architecture which have been attributed to Pownall's influence, although the architect responsible for construction was Richard Roach Jewell.

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