Apartment 9, 85 Bourke Street, Woolloomooloo is for sale through Luke McDonnell

85 Bourke Street is part of the evolution and renaissance of the area. It is a former vehicle repair and sales workshop now adaptively re-used for offices and 31 apartments.

Woolloomooloo valley was originally drained by the Yurong Creek, which ended in mangroves and mudflats. It was approached via a foot-track around the rim of the valley which later became William Street in 1831. But this road could be impassable when the creek ran high, and was a hangout for gangs of thieves ready to take on the unwary traveller heading out of town.

It was not attractive to early settlers. But it was fertile, and after the colony’s commissary-general (storemaster), John Palmer, was granted land here in 1793, he built a house and made a good farm.

The importance of Woolloomooloo to the indigenous Gadigal people as a hunting ground and living area is referred to in various early records.  Palmer’s farm, close to where number 85 Bourke Street is today, is thought to have been an important Aboriginal ceremonial ground, and though it became a centre of fashionable entertaining for the elite of the Sydney community, local Aboriginal people continued to congregate there.

After 1822 Palmer sold out to Edward Riley, after whom Riley Street is named. He too is said to have accepted Aboriginal people as nightly residents in the areas surrounding the house.

The catalyst for the social decline of Woolloomooloo was the expansion of wharfage. There had been some small-scale maritime activities along the bay since the 1820s, but the mangrove swamps were drained in the 1850s and a new semi-circular wharf was constructed in 1866. Behind the new Cowper Wharf Road there was new space for several new streets and over the next few decades the area became crowded with small houses, pubs, brothels and billiard rooms servicing a maritime-focussed area. Cowper Wharf was used by small coastal shippers, particularly timber traders, and so the adjoining land became dotted with sawmills and timber yards and small-time boatbuilding and light industry. The stories of the middle decades of the 20^th century are stories of not enough work, other than irregular and heavy labour on the wharves. Housing was crowded with too many children and boarders were taken in to supplement the household finances. Sly grog traders and dealers in other drugs thrived in a world where pubs were legally shut from 6 pm. It was a world of street gangs and colourful cops, of a good deal of misery but and a good deal of community cheerfulness and mutual support.

An early survey map of 1881 shows the site at 85 Bourke Street vacant from 1881 to 1920. From 1921-1931 it was occupied by a motor garage known as Buck and Co. Ltd, motor engineers. It was a liver-coloured brick building with a façade in an unusual brick pattern; half Flemish and half English brick bonding patterns. Both patterns are designed to distribute loads throughout the structure to achieve maximum strength and ensure stability, necessary for its light industrial uses and lifting and repairing engines. The design incorporated two curved entrances and very large wooden beams inside allowing an uninterrupted space for vehicle repairs etc. It was immediately and conveniently adjacent to the Star Hotel at number 89.

In 1929 the street was more commercialised with The Sun newspaper’s and Australian Gas Light’s store houses at numbers 22-54, a chocolate factory at 56-64, Thomas Barker’s coal yard at number 70 and Charles Morris, painter, at number 69.

By 1931 number 85 was occupied by Mitchelson, G.K., motor engineer. Nearby at number 89b was Mr B Cacciola, bootmaker and transport carriers at number 97½) and Mr A Frieburg, carpenter at number 93, all creating a hub of light industry.

85 Bourke Street retained it vehicle uses until it was given DA approval for demolition by Sydney Council on 7^th May 2013, except for the façade. The DA allowed construction of a mixed use development containing one commercial premise along Bourke Street, 31 apartments and 16 car parking spaces. The proposal approved two buildings, one facing Bourke Street which is a part two, part three, and part four-storey building and the other adjacent to the Eastern Distributor which is a five-storey building.

The immediately previous occupants were Sable and Argent, bicycle and scooter sales, which also sold helmets and bike gear and incorporated a coffee shop.

Its exterior design incorporated a bold, black and white, eye-catching, modern swirl design which added to the streetscape.

Today, the original entrances are used for an office entrance and a post box and entrance area to apartments. Number 85 reinvigorates the street with residents and their homes and continues the burgeoning gentrification of this village area, and within 10 minutes’ walk to the CBD.

By Andrew Woodhouse, Heritage Solutions