The school was opened in a house on the corner of Robe and Acland Street in 1862 by James Bonwick (1817-1906), a "tirelessly entrepreneurial figure: teacher, author, historian and anthropologist", who named the school after a famous boys' school in Berne, Switzerland. He then relocated to a Gothic Revival building designed by architects Crouch & Wilson in Barkly Street for the school year of 1866 (or possibly at first to a house built in the grounds, then the grander building in 1867). The plot was a very large one, with the school located at the southern end.
Bonwick met Alexander Gillespie on a return voyage to Australia in 1871 and offered him a job. Gillespie taught from March to October 1871, then purchased the school's goodwill and furniture, and leased the building, which continued to trade as Hofwyl School/House until July 1878. (During this period there was another school established in Hawthorn using the same name). Bonwick went on to various roles both in Australia and England. Gillespie moved on to open his own school virtually next door, by purchasing Dashwood House at 178 Barkly Street, and opening St Kilda Scotch College.
Robert S Bradely then started a new school, Queens College, in the Hofwyl building, which seems to have closed in the 1920s.
By 1924 flats at Queen's Court were being advertised. When it was sold in Dec 1937, it was a a block of eight flats known as Carmel Court, and probably the next year it was obscured by an new Art Deco block of flats and shops occupying the front yard. The house, minus the vernadahs, remains surprisingly intact.
References :
A Place of Sensuous Resort, entry 44 Carmel Court (formerly Hofwyl House Academy) https://www.skhs.org.au/SKHSbuildings/44.htm
Reference: Melbourne Mansions Database entry no. 911
Contempory newspaper reports.