Sydneytecture

Everyday, to and from work, I pass the Emden Gun in Hyde Park; "The four inch gun from the German ship Emden is mounted in the South East corner of Hyde Park, Sydney. The Emden was destroyed by the HMAS Sydney off the Cocos Islands in 1914." "The German cruiser Emden, having escaped from Kiao-Chau before the Japanese and British war vessels had completed their investment, conducted a raiding cruise and destroyed many British trading vessels, and actually bombarded Madras. As is shown in the message of the Secretary of the Admiralty, however, the Emden was hunted down on November 9, at Keeling Cocos Island, and destroyed. The Secretary of the Admiralty made the following announcement on November 11, 1914:- The captain of the Emden (Captain von Muller) and Prince Franz Joseph of Hohenzollern are both prisoners and unwounded. The losses of the Emden in killed are reported unofficially as 200, with 30 wounded; no further details have been received." link This ...

In a long-gone era, ordering a milkshake at a milk bar was the same as grabbing a coke buddy from the drinks fridge today, only ceremonial; steel container, in went milk, ladle of syrup, ice cream scoop, inserted under the beater, poured into cardboard cup, straw, twenty five cents please. Though that price was in the burbs. In the mid seventies, I was once mortified by the fifty cents charged for one at the Angel Arcade. But you had to expect to pay a premium downtown. Like most of Sydney's old shopping arcades, - the Imperial, Royal, Piccadilly, Victoria, Crystal Palace, Her Majesty's, - the Angel was eventually levelled, in its case winding up as Sydney's Recital Hall. I was moved to post this after coming across an image of the original Imperial Arcade in the national archives. It went down in 1965, and all my life I'd never before seen a picture of what it was like. I've had to photoshop these copies to maximise a dearth of detail.   Going by i...

This then and now turned out a bit of fun as Google Earth ended up being deployed to locate the artist's vantage point. It's 1845, not long after 'transportation' had ended, the Gold rush is still years away, and we're on a dirt track that leads past the new gaol to the recently built army barracks at Paddington. One day it will be called Oxford St. The courthouse was expanded in time for the 1888 centenary, but the original building is still in there. This is the full painting, and its accuracy is proven by modern technology. As the view is now built out, Google Earth in 3D showed the alignment matches.

When I found this ancient archive pic of Taylor Square I couldn't resist doing a then and now; - hey. it's my neighborhood. This is horse and buggy, highly colonial 1870. That lovely old Victorian bank in the middle would probably have gone in the major road realignments around World War 1. In case it's not obvious, we're standing outside the courthouse looking up Bourke St. A little photoshoppery follows. [all pics enlarge]

Serendipitously, I came across this picture by chance during an archive search on another topic. It reached out from its now completely alien era, with that glass plate clarity of an anonymous bustling street, and candid faces caught in a stylised moment. It was too evocative to resist. The National Archives original of this picture (which is linked to the big one above if you'd like glorious diorama full-size) was simply titled 'Bride of Frankenstein, 12/7/35' . Fortunately, I recognised that ancient, now very extinct, streetscape in the background. So naturally, I delved.. I think I was most moved by the kindness and innocence on these peoples' faces. It's pre-war and a time that's still pretty much pre-mass production, so really not that much removed from the Victorians' civility and propriety. The reduction of human dignity and march to barbarism is decades away. Here, society is still bonded by trust, dignity, and respect. This was my grandparent...

Pitt St, Sydney, December 1935. Townsfolk watch a fallen tram line being repaired in Sydney's main shopping street. Same place, Jan 2007. Marketing opportunities respond to corporate strategies. (pics enlarge beautifully)

I bet no Sydney readers would have guessed this is how William St looked before the tunnel was put through. This is circa 1966. And this is a perfect match, taken in exactly the same spot today. To get the match right, I found the position of the original median strip from where to take the photo, and aligned the view with the only buildings that remain; there's only three of them which I've blocked in white on the left in the image below. I reduced the old pic to half transparency and laid it over the modern one, then scaled and cropped it until they were perfect twins, only forty years apart. [By the way, most pictures on Sydneytecture enlarge.]

This striking piece of high Art Deco / Bauhaus was a complete mystery when I came across it by chance in the National Archives. For such a knockout it didn't even register a bell among decades of my familiar background buildingscapes, but some googling later showed it to be the Mayfair Hotel in Bayswater Road, Kings Cross, right next door to the old Hampton Court. These pics were taken when it opened in 1937, which probably accounts for the photo-friendly uniformity of the window dressing in this shot, and as far as I can tell these are the full range of images that remain of it. The size of its elaborate brick crest is unique to Sydney buildings of this style. Especially given there's three stories of it on top of a building with only seven floors. In a city where street awnings were usually practical affairs that deserved no more budget than the purpose they served, here it was detailed as decoration to the sleek simplicity above. Shiny chrome, stepping up, down, an...