Repost 2018:

A good shot ? Yes I think so (straightened but otherwise #unedited). #CenturyBuilding, #MarcusBarlow, 1939, a #Moderne companion to his #ManchesterUnity 7 years earlier other end of the block ! Barlow was the chosen architect for the #HoweyEstate which owned the entire 1/4 of a city block since, well, the beginning, in 1837. He did three more in the block, one demolished. Lovely timber veneered corridors intact too (photo VHD).

Found an old shot, from c1940 – exactly the same angle !

29 April 2018

The Century Building, Swanston Street, then and now, #MarcusBarlow, 1938-40. It was very modern, no extraneous decoration, with white tiles (sadly not best quality, now rather cracked) and aluminium window frames. It was taken over by the Air Force as soon as it was finished in 1940 – my grandmothers best friend worked here as a ‘tracer’ drawing up airplanes. Added to the Heritage Register in 2010. Old photo from Jack Cato, 1949, photo of tower from behind VHD. And no, there’s nothing in the tower, always just for show, and the only way in is via the roof.

Sometimes #ArtDeco was a bit …out there ! A couple of leaping nude spirits was a feature of the very swirly decor of the #newsreeltheatre in the basement. The design is credited to both #MarcusBarlow and cinema specialists #TaylorAndSoilleux (who also did the Rivoli, and other equally wild cinemas now gone, so I’d say it was them). Looks like only something of the ceiling survives in the current nightclub down there. It sat 500, the largest newsreel cinema in the CBD, of which there were 4 or 5 in 1940, and stayed a cinema till 1985. The photos are from a FB group #melbournetheatres, but they often don’t say where from- presumably a theatre magazine. Obviously inspired by the #OdeonLeicesterSquare, completed 1937 (last 2 images). The decoration there was lost and then partly recreated; this is the original.

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