Welcome to Wollongong Conservatorium
Positive Change Through Music

Our Site & Gleniffer Brae

WollCon is located in the beautiful surrounds of Wollongong’s Botanical Gardens.

The historic homestead of Gleniffer Brae provides a focus for our campus which nestles in the southwest corner of the Botanical Gardens. It’s an inspiring place to make music overlooked by the Escarpment to the west and sweeping lawns and views to the ocean to the east.

Download Map with Room names and numbers

Gleniffer
Brae

Gleniffer Brae is a beautiful Tudor Manor-style house. Built in 1938, it was originally the family home of Arthur Sidney Hoskins, who established the steel making industry in Wollongong.

The garden around the house was designed by renowned 20th Century landscaper Paul Sorensen.

In the early 1950s, the Hoskins family dedicated a large part of their estate (which did not include the house) to Wollongong City Council to be used to develop a Botanic Garden for the city.

In 1954, the manor house and some land surrounding it was sold to Sydney Church of England Girls Grammar School (SCEGGS). The school added various classroom buildings around the manor house from the 1950s to 1970s.

In the late 1970s, the school closed, and the house and its surrounds were acquired by Council and became part of the Botanic Garden. Wollongong Conservatorium was granted a lease to operate from the Gleniffer Brae site in 1980.