Kent Street 1868

Looking north from Druitt Street.



I'm not clear about the origins of this photo, as it says 1865. I've identified St John's church (now the Genesian Theatre) which was built around 1868, and it looks well-established here. However, the elevation of the photo would put it taken from Town Hall - the site was previously a disused cemetery, and construction on the hall wasn't started until 1868. So let's just put a circa 1868-1870 on this.

One thing I'd like to draw attention to, as in many of my posts, is that until about 1880 most Sydney buildings were small-scale and quite colonial-Georgian. The grand, well-known Victorian buildings that we associate with heritage Sydney that remain today are modern in comparison. The first century of European settlement was simple, frontier (as in raw and cheap), and industrious.

And today -