Broadway Theatre/Jonathan’s Disco/Phoenician Club/Breadtop – Ultimo, NSW
These days, this building on the corner of Mountain Street and Broadway, Ultimo, houses a convenience store, apartments, and our old friend Breadtop, but the inconspicuous facade hides a colourful and tempestuous history.
The Broadway Theatre. Image courtesy Sydney Cinema Flashbacks.
Built in 1911, the building started life as the Broadway Theatre, a cinema. With the advent of TV, this was one of many suburban cinemas that had fallen by the wayside by 1960, when it closed. In 1968, it was acquired by nightclub owner John Spooner and converted into Jonathan’s Disco, where it became well known as one of Sydney’s prime live music venues. Sherbet and Fraternity both got their big break at Jonathan’s, playing residencies involving six hour days for months on end. Imagine the poor disco staff having to listen to six hours of Sherbet a day for months. Perks of the job…
Jonathan’s Disco, post-fire, 1972. Image courtesy City of Sydney Archives.
In May 1972, Jonathan’s Disco was gutted by fire. I can’t help but think it was one of those beleaguered staff members. “HowZAT?” they’d’ve quipped as they flicked their cigarette into the freshly-poured puddle of gasoline. The damage was extensive, and required a complete internal refit before it was opened again in 1976 as a ballroom dancing studio.
Jonathan’s Disco interior, post-fire, 1972. Image courtesy City of Sydney Archives.
The Sydney City Council granted the Maltese community use of the premises as a licensed venue in 1980, when it became the Phoenician Club. Once more, the site became one of Sydney’s most popular live music venues with local bands such as Powderfinger and Ratcat playing gigs there throughout the late 80s and early 90s. Nirvana played their first Sydney show there in 1992 – a far cry from Sherbet. Around this time, the rave scene exploded in Sydney; a development that would lead to the end of the Phoenician Club.
The Phoenician Club, mid-1980s. Image courtesy City of Sydney Archives.
Anna Wood, a 15yo schoolgirl from Belrose, attended an ‘Apache’ dance party at the Phoenician in October 1995, where she took ecstasy. Her resulting death shocked Sydney and enraged then-NSW Premier Bob Carr, who declared war on the Club. A series of fines and restrictions imposed on live venues in the wake of Wood’s death led to the closure of the Club in 1998 and the decline of Sydney’s live music scene which continues today. Good thing Wood wasn’t killed by a pokie machine.
The derelict Phoenician Club, 2000. Image courtesy City of Sydney Archives.
From 1998 the site sat derelict, just in time for the Olympics. Nothing international visitors like seeing more than abandoned, graffiti-tagged buildings. In 2001 it was completely redeveloped internally, and today satisfies Carr’s idea of a venue put to good use.
Demco Machinery/Mao & More – Surry Hills, NSW
Demco Machinery, 1989. Image courtesy City of Sydney Archives, SRC15993.
The Demco Machinery site, on Cleveland Street in Surry Hills, is made up of two separate buildings. The one in the foreground here is the oldest, first used as a tobacco factory in 1911, and then a tea company until the 1920s. Once Demco moved in around 1930, they patiently waited for the St Margarets Hospital for Women Dispensary next door, built in 1906, to fall on hard times. They didn’t have to wait long:
SMH, April 19, 1938.
Strangely, although the building’s address is currently 267-271 Cleveland Street, advertisements prior to 1953 give Demco’s address, as well as that of the hospital and the tobacco factory, as 243-247 Cleveland Street. There must have been a renumbering of Cleveland Street around that time, as to avoid confusion, from 1948 Demco started advertising their address as ‘corner of Cleveland and Buckingham Streets’.
Demco building, 2012.
Demco packed up its city operations in 1989, moving out to Greenacre as part of the industrial migration to Sydney’s west. Since 2002, the older half has been occupied by Mao & More, a Sinophile’s paradise of kitschy Oriental paraphernalia very at home in the increasingly gentrified area. The showroom half of ‘modern design’ Demco were so proud of currently consists of several businesses, including The Gingerbread Man, a film and web production company located in the basement; and a sportswear manufacturer. The only evidence of Demco’s time here is the art deco Demco sign still sitting atop the building.
Yasmar – Ashfield, NSW
As you crawl along Parramatta Road, past the Vita Weat building, the Strathfield Burwood Evening College, the Homebush Racecourse, the Midnight Star, the Silk Road, the Brescia showroom and Chevy’s Ribs, you might notice these forbidding gates peeking out from behind a near-impenetrable wall of bushes. On a road full of head-turners and eye-catchers, a true time warp awaits the hand of progress to seize it by the overgrown scruff of its neck and haul it into the 21st century.
It can wait a little longer while we take a look. After all, it’s only existed in its present state for over 150 years.
The unusual name of Yasmar originated in 1856, when Haberfield landowner Alexander Learmonth erected his home on the estate, which he had inherited through marriage to the granddaughter of ubiquitous Sydney property tycoon Simeon Lord. Learmonth named the house Yasmar after his father-in-law, a Dr. David Ramsay. Surrounding Yasmar House was a magnificent garden, designed in the Georgian fashion to gradually reveal and present the house.
Very gradually, clearly.
In 1904, the property was leased by Grace Brother Joseph Grace, and became his Xanadu. Fittingly, Citizen Grace died in the house in 1911. The estate fell into the hands of the NSW Government in 1944, who promptly proceeded to establish a centre for juvenile justice on site.
When it dawned on the powers-that-be that years of horticultural neglect had created the Alcatraz-style escape proof prison seen today, the estate was turned into a juvenile detention centre, which lasted from 1981 to 1994, when the Department for Juvenile Justice relocated, presumably using machetes. From then until 2006, the grounds housed NSW’s only female juvenile justice centre, and since that time, politicians have argued back and forth to have Yasmar made available to the public.
These days, it appears that Yasmar is used as a government training facility. The entrance is around the side in Chandos Street, giving visitors a sense of the sheer scale of the site.
Seeing as the gate was open, I went right in, ignoring the deterrent magpies perched threateningly in nearby trees.
Yasmar’s gardens are huge, but much is now taken up by the training and detention facilities. The open day held in late July allowed visitors a rare look around the grounds and inside the house. What’s that? You didn’t make it? Lucky for you I was there. Read on…
It’s believed that this may have been Australia’s first ever swimming pool, but a more common theory is that it acted as a sunken garden. Either way, it had long since fallen into dereliction by the time I got to have a look.
The view from the inside. There have only been a handful of open days held here since the early 90s, and this year’s was the first since 2007, so this isn’t a view many people get. It’s…great.
Through the thick foliage you can see the various detention and training facilities located around the grounds.
A better view of the house itself. It’s not all that impressive on the outside. I was expecting something grander. Inside, however…
…it’s still just an old house. No, it’s actually fascinating in its own ancient way, and the weight of history here is pretty hefty. Many of those visiting for the open day were former inmates. One hadn’t lost his rebellious nature at all over the years, ducking under the ‘do not cross’ tape to venture deeper into the house before being shouted at by the supervisor. The system doesn’t work.
You wonder just how much they cared about child welfare back then.
Out in the courtyard it’s pretty bleak. Though they did have one great feature I’m consistently a sucker for:
Yes, that’s right. The door to nowhere.
What’s also notable is the nearby Yasmar Avenue, further adding to the sense of entrenchment of the estate within the Ashfield area.
Although neglected and misunderstood like so many of its inmates, Yasmar, Sydney’s Mayerling, exists as a unique example of a 19th century estate virtually unchanged since its establishment. While governments and councils have fooled around for decades over Yasmar’s fate, the estate itself has become an integral part of the Parramatta Road experience. In its current state, it is to Parramatta Road what that ancient expired carton of milk is to your fridge – an indicator of just how bad a housekeeper you are.
For more on the illustrious history of Yasmar, check out Sue Jackson-Stepowski’s excellent write-up here.
Kiwi International Airlines/DJ School – Sydney, NSW
Someone get that annoying track-like structure in the foreground out of the way.
Ewan Wilson was just an ordinary guy when he founded Kiwi International Airlines in 1994. By April 1995, he was just an ordinary CEO of an ordinary small budget airline, providing cheap airfares for trans-Tasman flights and battling with rival Freedom Air. In late 1995, Wilson was just an ordinary moronic fraudster, making false claims about his personal financial situation as he applied for a loan for Kiwi Air. This led to Wilson becoming an ordinary stupid prisoner for the next three months for having acted ‘without moral regard’. Funnily enough, Kiwi Air never got that loan, and in September 1996 became just another airline going into voluntary liquidation, leaving hundreds of passengers stranded on either side of the Tasman. Around the same time, this building ceased to be Kiwi Airlines’ Sydney office, but didn’t cease to look like it.
These days, Ewan Wilson is just your ordinary disgraced former businessman, current Hamilton city councillor, and cancer patient.
Meanwhile, DJ School and DJ Gear have gone into business as liquidators. I had no idea the DJ game was so tough.
Sydney Dance School/Chinois Cuisine/Pure Platinum – Sydney, NSW
The Pure Platinum strip joint isn’t exactly known for virgin talent, and the signage is no exception:
I really hope that’s not a euphemism. Anyway, the most notable previous tenant of this location was another kind of dance studio, opened by Irene Vera Young in 1937. Young had won gold in the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games for dancing, and was the only non-German to do so. When establishing her Sydney studio, she claimed her goal was to make it ‘a centre of dance culture’. 75 years later, mission accomplished.
Past/Lives of the Near Future 