A mansion awakened: Hide and Reveal at Labassa

Labassa is one of Melbourne’s most distinctive historic homes – a grand Victorian home full of dramatic detail and a colourful past. Built in 1862 for businessman Richard Annesley Billing, it was later redesigned in 1889 by architect John A. B. Koch in the French Second Empire style, becoming a sprawling thirty-five-room estate with a tower overlooking Port Phillip Bay.

From opulent family residence to bohemian boarding house, Labassa has lived many lives. Over the years, it has housed more than 700 residents – among them silent film stars, Jewish refugees, and eccentric long-term tenants. One, known only as Boris or Rasputin, became something of a cult figure in the 1960s, haunting the halls in lace shirts and a top hat.

Despite all its changes, the mansion retains much of its original grandeur. It’s full of decorative detail: stained glass, elaborate cornices, lavish Japanese wallpapers and a rare trompe l’oeil ceiling. Every room hints at another story, another life lived under its roof.

Through the post-war years, Labassa became a haven for artists, writers and other figures. It was a place where creativity thrived. 

Today, Labassa is both a heritage site and a living time capsule – a little worn around the edges, undeniably beautiful, and still full of secrets. Now, its crumbling plasterwork and gilded ceilings set the stage for a new kind of spectacle: a transformative experience hosted by Lexus and the VRC.

The VRC Art Series Event proudly presented by Lexus: Hide and Reveal explores the intersection of tradition and technology, bringing together art, fashion, and performance in a fast-moving digital age. Set against the backdrop of a grand old mansion, the event contrasts past and present, stillness and movement.

Guests are invited not just to observe but to wander. The house becomes a map of unfolding experiences, each room revealing its mood and story. Behind a draped doorway, an immersive world emerges: a dancer glides across a balcony, projections light up crumbling walls, and a shapeshifting installation drifts through the crowd.

This art isn’t behind glass but moves and breathes. The music rises and falls with the action while the roaming waitstaff offers canapés and cocktails that are as elegant as they are unexpected.

Labassa makes a fitting stage. Its faded grandeur has always invited reinvention – and just as generations of residents left their mark on the house, so too will Hide and Reveal.

VRC Art Series presented by Lexus is on sale now. 

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Labassa’s hidden racing history

There is racing history deeply associated with the Caulfield mansion Labassa, rescued by the National Trust (Victoria) from the prospect of demolition in the 1980s. One hundred years earlier, it was in its prime, made magnificent by the wealth and cosmopolitan taste of Canadian-born Alexander Robertson. He called the house ‘Ontario’ and remade it internally and externally: money was no object. He had made his first fortune with fellow countryman Jack Warner by buying the stagecoach business Cobb and Co. and a second fortune in pastoral and mining investments. Robertson and Wagner raced horses in partnership. He was a member of the VRC committee for years and had family and business connections with Richard Goldsborough, a VRC committee man from the club’s foundation. Alexander was a splendid horseman, famously taking the reins to drive his family in a coach-and-four to the Melbourne Cup carnival in 1892. His eldest daughter married Harry, son of the original VRC Secretary, Robert Cooper Bagot.

After Robertson died, and during the depression of the 1890s, Labassa was leased to George Gray, variously described as a Western Australian mining millionaire and as ‘Labassa’s Greatest Rogue’. He went briefly into racing in a big way before facing bankruptcy and selling all his horses in 1899. His best horse, Chesney, later sent overseas, was a brother of Melbourne Cup winner Malvolio.  Among the most intriguing racing characters associated with Labassa were Hal and Alan Cooper, sons of the gardener at Ontario in Robertson’s day. At the brief peak of his career, Alan owned stud farms and racing stables, including Newmarket, Randwick and some of the most valuable racehorses in Australia. Hal Cooper, more steady, tasted his most significant success as trainer of the 1950 Caulfield Cup winner, Grey Boots.