The Strand Arcade

Between eighteen eighty-one and eighteen ninety-two, Sydney built five covered shopping arcades. The Strand is the only one that survived. Every single one of the other four was demolished. This is the last of its kind.

When it opened in eighteen ninety-two, over six hundred guests attended the opening event, but the real spectacle was not the architecture -- it was the electricity. The Strand was one of the first places in Sydney to be lit by electric light, and suburban families would ride the tram across the city specifically to see the lights. Imagine that. People making a special trip just to stand inside a building and look at electric bulbs. The Strand was basically the Times Square of eighteen-nineties Sydney.

Look up at the ceiling. The original tinted glass roof lets in natural light that changes colour throughout the day. Look at the staircases -- original cedar, over one hundred and thirty years old. The cast iron balusters, the tiled floors, the timber-framed shop fronts -- all original or carefully restored to match the eighteen ninety-two design.

The arcade runs between Pitt Street and George Street, and you can walk through it as a shortcut between the two main shopping strips. Most people do exactly that -- they walk through quickly, eyes on their phones, not noticing that they are passing through a Victorian shopping palace that every other city in Australia lost.

Sydney has a habit of tearing down beautiful things and then feeling bad about it later. The QVB nearly went. Whole neighbourhoods of The Rocks were earmarked for demolition. The fact that the Strand Arcade is still standing is not because someone had the foresight to protect it -- it is because it kept being just useful enough to survive. Sometimes the best preservation strategy is dumb luck and a good location.