Frontal view from the George Street footpath of all five storeys: cream stucco with maroon panels, gilded capitals on giant pilasters, the name block on the parapet, and the curved entrance hood above the shops. People and seats in front.

The Strand Arcade

412-414 George Street to 195-197 Pitt Street, Sydney

John Spencer. 1890 to 1892, interior largely rebuilt after fires in 1976 and 1980. Brick.

Size
104 m long between George and Pitt Streets. Three storeys inside, five at each street front. About 19 m wide on George Street on OpenStreetMap, with heights estimated from photographs
Material
Stuccoed brick, cast iron roof structure and galleries, carved cedar, tiled floor
Status
State Heritage Register, 2011. Still a shopping arcade

The city’s long streets ran south from Circular Quay with few cross streets, and shops could gain frontage by cutting through the blocks, under cover from sun and rain, before street awnings were in use. Thomas Rowe designed the first two arcades in 1881 and 1882. The Strand, by the English architect John Spencer and the builders Bignell and Clark, was the fifth and last of the Victorian ones, and opened on 1 April 1892 with over 600 guests. It was first known as the City Arcade. The parapet on George Street gives the date as 1891.

It looks like a row of terraces turned inward, with cast iron balconies, fluted columns and galleries on cantilevers, and bridges linking the upper floors. Chandeliers hung from the roof trusses with fifty gas and fifty electric lamps each. The glass in the roof was tinted to cut glare for the photographers’ studios on the upper levels. The tiled floor became a place to promenade. The Nut Shop, which opened in 1939, is still there.

A fire broke out at 3 am on 25 May 1976, and twelve crews fought it for hours. It did most damage at the George Street end. Prudential Assurance had the arcade rebuilt by 1978, and a second fire followed in 1980. Much of what stands inside today is therefore a careful reconstruction. The hydraulic lifts were repaired, and the gilded balustrades and cedar balusters were copied from the originals, with fireproofing concealed under them. Of Sydney’s arcades from before 1960, it’s the only one that survives.

Sources

  1. The Strand Arcade, Wikipedia
  2. Our story, The Strand Arcade