5 November 2024

The very fine Royal Melbourne Regiment Drill Hall in Victoria Street near the Queen Vic Market, was built 1937 and designed by George Hallendal. He was Commonwealth architect for work in Victoria at the time, and designed a few other great #drillhalls but this is the grandest. It’s got a stylised classical portico (somewhat hidden by trees), which gives access to facilities for officers, including a mess hall and a bar, all Art Deco ish glazed brick and dark stained timber. Out back it’s got the actual hall, quite large, now a bit altered – by the late 2000s, it was owned by the @cityofmelbourne, and so eligible for federal funds for social housing, so a fairly crazy plan was hatched to take the roof off the hall, put columns in, build housing on top, and use the hall as a multicultural/community venue. It was completed in 2011, when I took these photos, and while it would be better without, the thing is at the rear, and the hall looks ok, though the big lights detract almost more than the columns. I don’t know who got to use the officers rooms in the end. And at some point someone put in a electrics box in the little triangular forecourt, which now seems to be a community garden. I’m still annoyed by the housing bit, I mean it could have gone anywhere rather than on a heritage building, and been much bigger to boot.

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