| Historical notes: | This site forms part of the land of the Gadigal people, the traditional custodians of land within the City of Sydney council boundaries. For information about the Aboriginal history of the local area see the City’s Barani website: http://www.sydneybarani.com.au/
Town Hall House is an integral component of Town Hall Square, which was undertaken jointly by the City Council and the Glebe Administration of the Anglican Church.
The concept of open space around Sydney’s Anglican cathedral dates to the time of Governor Macquarie, but the realisation of the existing precinct began when the Church started to investigate a commercial development to finance a new school and diocesan accommodation in 1961.
The notion of public space in the vicinity of St Andrew’s Cathedral and Sydney Town Hall was integral to the cathedral conceived by Governor Macquarie in 1812, the foundation stone of which was laid in 1819. The intended cathedral was subsequently relocated to its present site along with its foundation stone, which was laid in May 1837. It was located within the block bounded by George, Bathurst, Kent and Druitt Streets, the eastern section of which was a government reserve. The section along Kent Street was granted to various individuals, with the south western corner dedicated to the “Scotch” (Presbyterian) Church.
St Andrew’s Cathedral was consecrated in 1868. The western front of the Cathedral was served by a kind of continuation of Clarence Street, a cul de sac known as St Andrew’s Place from 1914 which in the 1850s was a proposed projection of Clarence Street. By the mid 1860s it extended north from Bathurst Street as far as the Old Burial Ground.
The Old Burial Ground was Sydney's first permanent cemetery, set out in September 1782 by Governor Phillip and the Reverend Richard Johnson. The cemetery was closed in 1820 when the Sandhills or Brickfield cemetery (now the site of part of Central Railway Station) was opened. During the 1850s the land was described as the Old Church Yard. The newly formed City Council unsuccessfully requested the site for a town hall in 1843; it was not vested to it until 1869. The Town Hall was completed in 1889.
By 1910 the subject land had been earmarked for Municipal Offices. A single-storey “electric light” substation was constructed on one allotment during the first decade of the twentieth century, enlarged by several levels that were completed by 1916. An eight-storey addition to the Town Hall was completed in 1925. By the mid-1950s, the western side of the block contained St Andrew’s School, workshops, Council substation, a garage and several buildings occupied by Council.
To the immediate north of St Andrew’s Cathedral was the Deanery, a “domestic Gothic” building originally constructed in 1871. It eventually became the diocesan offices and registry. In 1916-1917, it was enlarged to serve various functions associated with the Cathedral as well as residential accommodation.
In 1961, the firm of Hely Bell & Horne was engaged to prepare a study for the enlargement of the Cathedral’s choir school. This led to studies investigating the commercial potential of redeveloping the entire church site to finance a new school and other diocesan facilities. A development application was lodged in February 1962 for a proposed square and parking station between the Town Hall and the Cathedral. A subsequent proposal included a 45-storey tower, which led to a 27-metre height restriction being imposed over George Street and an alignment separating potential buildings from the west face of the cathedral. In the interim, a new choir school was constructed during the first half of the 1960s to the design of Hely, Bell & Horne, anticipating the construction of a commercial tower. The outcome of the entire process was height and setback restrictions on new development behind the Cathedral imposed by the State government.
In 1970, the Council engaged Ancher Mortlock Murray & Woolley to investigate the potential of office space at the rear of the Town Hall. It was convincingly demonstrated that a positive outcome could be provided by constructing a tower rising above a podium to the rear of the Town Hall, which would provide amenity for the Town Hall and allow views to its western facade. It also provided the possibility of a lower square that, by means of an arcade, linked Kent Street to Town Hall Station and an open square between the Town Hall and the cathedral. The entire scheme, which included a pedestrian plaza, Town Hall House and St Andrew’s House, was designed by Ancher Mortlock Murray & Wooley, working in association with the architects for the Anglican Church, Noel Bell Ridley Smith.
Ancher Mortlock Murray & Woolley had its genesis when pioneering and influential Modernist architect, Sydney Ancher (1904-1979), went into partnership with Bryce Mortlock (1921-2004) and Stuart Murray (b.1926). Initially noted for its hotel and residential work, by the 1960s the firm was undertaking commissions for the University of Sydney and Australian National University. The firm was joined by Ken Woolley (1933-2015) in 1964. Woolley previously worked for the Government Architect’s Branch and was responsible for some of the Branch's finest buildings during the late 1950s and early 1960s, such as the Fisher Library at the University of Sydney and the State Office Block in Macquarie Street (demolished). In the second half of the 1960s, the firm designed a number of significant buildings, including several at the University of Newcastle, the RAIA headquarters in Canberra and a series of townhouses including the influential Penthouses at Darling Point. The 1972 Christie Centre at 3 Spring Street, designed by Ancher Mortlock Murray & Woolley in association with McConnel Smith & Johnson, presaged the use of load-bearing precast concrete facade system at Town Hall House. After Ancher retired in 1968 and Murray resigned in 1976, Woolley was left to manage the practice, as Mortlock was involved with other commitments, and retired in 1982. The practice continued to design outstanding buildings, which in the City of Sydney included the Glass House in the Botanic Gardens (1988), ABC Headquarters in Ultimo (1990) and Hyatt Hotel, Campbell’s Cove (1990). Woolley, who retired from active involvement in 2002, was also involved with the refurbishment of the Queen Victoria Building. The firm has won numerous awards over the years.
Construction of Town Hall House commenced in 1971 and was officially opened on 28 June 1977. The end result was an integrated development that included Town Hall House, St Andrews House, and conservation works to the Town Hall and St Andrew’s Cathedral – the public space was a major initiative, which incorporated a shopping arcade underneath linking pedestrian movement between Kent Street and Town Hall Station. Pedestrian movement across the square moved diagonally to Kent Street and the entry to Town Hall House to assist in lively movements and use of the square.
A contemporary analysis explains the philosophy and influences behind the building, and the outcomes:
“The tower’s approaches and external form obviously make the desirable effort to be something more than just another office block; also to provide an affinity for the Town Hall yet an independence from it. Those aims are largely and admirably fulfilled in almost every respect. Links, bridges, materials and shared spaces are genuinely neighbourly, and 23 storeys have risen behind the Hall with very little sense of intrusion, especially when viewed from the Square.
The tower has a three-part form. First, a broad podium with public-contact offices and terraces; its height is similar to the lower floors of the classical neighbour. Second, five storeys of council offices rising to the top of the Hall. Third, 12 more storeys of offices, sharply distinguished by a broadening of the tower. That wider upper tower is seated upon massive cantilever stubs, which protrude two ways and form a double hammerhead, but there are very few vantage points which see both extensions.
That jettying at the 11th level certainly contributes a break from the sheer-tower impression, and along with externalised and curvilinear shafts for lift ducts and stairs constitutes a memorable sculpture...
It is not an unpleasant coincidence that the nature of the cantilevering of those floors reminds architects and travellers of the modern Boston City Hall (Kallmann, McKinnell and Knowles; 1964-69). The impact of the American example was formidable; not just one building was transformed form a plain structure into a bold sculpture, but a significant break from the rule of the rectilinear frame ... a rule which pioneer moderns had called a beautiful discipline, but which citizens of the 60s saw as a boring tyranny.
Another aspect of the same changing of direction is apparent in the fact that Sydney’s Town Hall House has load-bearing wall panels within a nominal structural frame, and that within those wall panels the windows are of a size much reduced from the thermally impractical glass areas of buildings 10 years older. Incidentally, the external columns are stepped gently inwards to form a taper over the building’s height.” (Saunders and Burke)
In 1976, a large stainless steel and glass sculpture by prominent sculptor and artist Mike Kitching was installed on the Marconi Terrace, which connects the rear of Sydney Town Hall to Town Hall House. The sculpture commemorated the centenary of the birth of radio pioneer Guglielmo Marconi who successfully illuminated Sydney Town Hall by radio signal from his yacht moored in Genoa Harbour. Kitching’s work includes major commissions for the Commonwealth and State Law Courts in Macquarie Street, Sydney Olympic Park and Kingsford Smith Airport, Sydney. His work is represented in many public and private collections.
Town Hall Square was designed and constructed against a background of increasing concern over pedestrian amenity in Central Sydney in the wake of unprecedented commercial development during the 1950s and 1960s. Council’s 1958 planning scheme, which was finally exhibited in 1965, was accompanied by a draft ordinance that included a maximum FSR of 10:1 for the central business district to the east of Kent Street. This allowed bonuses such as provisions of open space and pedestrian access to take the maximum FSR up to 12:1.
A spate of buildings set back from street alignments followed. The 1971 City of Sydney Strategic Plan contained 16 major policies that dealt with the economic, social and physical environment of the city. Its long-term objective for Central Sydney included “an equitable balance between the pedestrian and road user.” The plan aimed to make Sydney a more humane and civilised place, in some ways mirroring post-war European planning practice, which embraced car-free spaces and pedestrianisation of shopping and civic places. Apart from Town Hall Square, other Council initiatives included small street closures such as Richard Johnson Square (1971) and the progressive closure of Martin Place (1971-1982).
The private sector was also responding to congestion in the city. Harry Seidler’s Australia Square (1961-1967) constructed by Civil & Civic, was a nationally significant and innovative scheme that involved the transformation of an entire block interwoven by narrow lanes into an ideal Modernist townscape of a sunny pedestrian plaza graced by a fountain and elegant seating areas, sheltered by towers on either side of the site. Other private developments followed this precedent, such as the Qantas International Centre near Lang Park, the MLC Centre extending between Martin Place and King Street,and the T & G development on Elizabeth Street, between Bathurst and Park Streets.
The excellence of the scheme was recognised by several awards made by the NSW Chapter of the RAIA between 1978 and 1983 – Merit Award 1979 (Town Hall Complex), Merit Award for Work of Outstanding Design 1978 and Civic Design Award 1983 (Sydney Square), Merit Award 1979 (St Andrew’s House) and Merit Award 1981 for Civic Design (Wall of Water Fountain).
When City of Sydney consulted Ken Woolley in 2015 about proposed building alterations, Ken Woolley indicated he considered Town Hall House to represent one of his finest works, which he considered worthy of conservation. Town Hall House was one of Ken Woolley's select works featured from his body of work in the 1999 publication, “Ken Woolley and Ancher Mortlock and Woolley: Selected and Current Works". By comparison, Woolley's other high rise building, Farmers and Graziers, undertaken with McConnell Smith and Johnson as architects in association, was not included in the book. |