Original post 2 February 2020

Photos 1 October 2019

Eagle House in #BourkeStreet was completed in 1972, and replaced #OxfordChambers of the previous post. Designed by supreme Modernists #YunckenFreeman it’s actually #LateModern, when it was all about slick surfaces, and this is the stand out example, and so it’s on the #VictorianHeritageRegister. I nominated it when i was at the National Trust and from memory they adopted my wording “The green tinted glass and natural finished aluminium curtain wall is delicately detailed, and flush, forming a taut skin over the simple rectangular volume of the projecting front section of the 12 storey office tower. The service core, a simple aluminium clad volume, is located towards the rear of the site, allowing the curtain wall section to appear free-standing.” The other trick to make it look freestanding is windows on the east side right on the boundary where there happens to a setback building – if that ever gets redeveloped….It was very well liked in 1972, winning an Award of Merit (one of three). I nominated it in 1999 because they wanted to destroy the ground floor to make an open shop with a canopy etc which of course they didn’t really need to do, i don’t recall what the foyer was actually like by then, but the lobby aluminium Eagle (I’m told the sculptor was Vincus Jomantas) was still there, then removed before it got registered, and HV let them subdivide the lobby, prob in return for not opposing the registration and not altering the exterior, the owner put it in his office, didn’t want to give it back, no idea where it went after that.

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