This is another case of how #ArtDeco was turning into #Modernist just before WW2, though in this case, being a back street #warehouse from 1939, extra flourishes weren’t warranted. Architects #AandHPeck. In #LittleBourkeStreet, this is opposite the 1920s Melbourne House for which there’s a permit to replace with 25 floors meaning no sunlight here for … Continue reading Art Deco Warehouse, Hardware Lane precinct. →

17 February 2019 The very bijou ex-#BrightonCourtHouse - here’s what I said last time I posted it in 2017 : Brighton Court House, 1936, by the versatile #PercyEverett who had been appointed #ChiefArchitect of the #PublicWorksDepartment the year before, and wasted no time. Cubic and formally planned, but with decorative touches like the brickwork, a … Continue reading Brighton Court House, Percy Everett, 1936 →

February 2019 Great details on this little #ArtDeco Commonwealth Bank in Hampton - look at those wild square things on the #verandah brackets ! Hmmm actually thanks to @harperandcharlie who pointed this out they’re prob 80s or 90s cos these Comm Banks didn’t have awnings. At lest they left the unexpected delight of the #wroughtiron … Continue reading Art Deco Commonwealth Bank, Hampton style. →

February 2017: #ACABuilding, 1936, designed by the Sydney architects Hennessy and Hennessy, best known for a series of matching Gothicish office blocks for #CML dotted around Australia. Like this one, they're all built in #BenedictStone, a precast pressed cement product incorporating crushed Brisbane Tuff, a business owned by the Catholic Church, as was this building … Continue reading ACA Building Queen Street. →

14 February: The #OsloHostel on its way to becoming #theBlock2019. The cypresses are gone, the Deco extension is next, and the fence is dismantled for future reinstatement when it becomes five huge houses again, as it was in 1861 (but with more rooms !) when it was built as Westbourne Terrace. 13 March 2019: The … Continue reading The Block 2019, transforming the Oslo / Westbourne Terrace →

February 2019 Most unfortunate- the lobby of #HarryNorris’s 1938 #CarlowHouse was given a make-over about 10 years ago, and I happen to have had a photo from just before. The owners obviously wanted something ‘light and bright’ and a bit more upmarket than the dull old #terrazzo floors and walls and #chromiumsteel display cabinets, but … Continue reading Art Deco destruction in Carlow House →

A fine 30s pair, both built to the #132ftheightlimit, one Modernist, the other Classical Deco. I’ve always admired the weave of #HarryNorris’s #CarlowHouse, built 1938, the way the gridded verticals are balanced by the horizontals which take off round the corner, and then turn into strong horizontals thrusting forward. It’s sort of overshadowed #MarshandMichaelson’s 1937 … Continue reading Art Deco pair on Elizabeth Street; Carlow House and ANA. →

28 January 2019, updated: The very nice 1925 Eliza Tinsley building at the end of Bourke Street is an industrial building that goes right through the block, but just the facade will be retained when the approved 67 level #RotheLowman tower goes ahead. Nice stair in the entry. Update 2024: site sold in 2021, and … Continue reading Eliza Tinsley, Bourke Street, 1925 →

I thought this rather large plain thing on the side of #VictoriaBarracks was maybe 1950s but no it’s 1940, and I guess it’s meant to be #Georgian; the #cartouche and the #wroughtiron lamp are very nice but the rest is a bit dull. Probably by #GeorgeHallendal who did all the Army’s Deco/Classical drill halls in … Continue reading George VI Georgian, 1940 →

The former Western Hotel, later Bayview Hotel, 1 Mercer Street Geelong. Built in 1854, prominently located on the road into Geelong from Melbourne, later a school and a guest house, then a hotel again, now apartments. Apparently #sandstone under many layers of paint. Architect John Young, described in an early study as ‘the most accomplished … Continue reading Gold Rush pub in Geelong. →