The Model Store/Residential – Ryde, NSW
It appears that this shop has been absorbed back into its adjoining house now, making it entirely residential. But it’s fun to imagine how this would have been in the day. The big display windows, now boarded up, would have been full of fantastic new models each Saturday morning, strategically placed to catch the wandering eyes of kids as they drove past along Church Street on their way to Putney or Top Ryde Shopping Centre. Later in the afternoon, families might stop in and check out the assortment, and perhaps if they were lucky, the kid’d get a model so they’d have something to do on Sunday. I know what I’d be asking for: “I’ll have a Marisa Miller, two Brooklyn Deckers, a Rosie Huntington-Whiteley…”
Marble City/Corner Coffeehouse – Beverly Hills, NSW
Gee, Corner Coffeehouse, that’s an unusual amount of marble you’ve got happening there. Why–
Oh. They must have taken down the part of the sign advertising ugly brick facades.
Mixed Business/Nothing – Surry Hills, NSW
This place, beside the Norfolk Hotel on Cleveland Street, Surry Hills, has been closed for a good long while. It’s hard to say exactly when it closed from what we can see. There’s a development proposal, so there might not be much time left for it, either. What amazes me is just how much you could get done at a place like this back when it was actually open and functioning. You could get your hair done while waiting for your clothes to be dry cleaned, AND buy a gift for your significant other and toys for the kids. And cigarettes. They all sold cigarettes back then.
Longhurst & Andrew/Pancakes – George Street, Sydney NSW
Established in 1934, Longhurst & Andrew is a security firm specialising in locksmithing, alarm systems and surveillance. This address on George Street, just beside the Event Cinema complex, used to be its registered office. Now, it’s a pancake shop. Do we as a society care more about liqueur pancakes than we do about security? ‘Yes,’ we reply with our mouths full.
D.G.R. Sayburn/Hotel Bottle Shop/Bead Co of Australia/Little Bottler – Hurstville, NSW
Believe it or not, this dump was once D.G.R. Sayburn, an agent of Beale & Co, ‘the largest piano manufacturers in the British Empire’. I guess that’s why the door is extra wide. If I had to speculate (and when don’t I), judging by the Victoria Bitter logo beneath the busted sign it looks to me like this was the bottle shop for the neighbouring Ritz Hotel (which itself has a rich history) sometime in the late 80s-early 90s.
After that, this was the Bead Company of Australia. That’s right – if you were in Broome or Launceston and you needed beads, you had to go through these mugs. These days it’s returned to its bottle shop state (Hurstville City Cellar – mustn’t they be proud), making you wonder if being a nation’s bead supplier was the apex of the building’s life, and will it now continue to regress until it’s once again a piano shop.
Past/Lives of the Near Future 