Steel frame of AWA building and old Mangovite Belting Ltd building c1938, by Frank Hurley, courtesy National Library of Australia nla.pic-an23478366
The Dictionary of Sydney, like the city, is based on the built environment. From our first commissioned articles (over 600 suburbs each with demographic information), to our essays and entries, some of the most important parts of the Dictionary deal with buildings, spaces, precincts and the themes of built environment, planning, housing and suburban development.
To understand a city, you need to know how it grew. We have essays on Sydney's roads in general, and on the arteries that lead north, south, south west, east and west. Along these (and along the railways) grew the townships that became suburbs. Along the way, specific streets, like Broadway, Market Row and Martin Place, became sites of commerce, development and change. The Dictionary also includes two quirky and creative takes on city infrastructure and how people interact with it, Reading the roads, and The decorated footpath, by Megan Hicks.
The Dictionary is able to get down to real specifics: individual buildings, both well known ones like Central Station, or the GPO, and some that might be less familiar to many, like the Hero of Waterloo Hotel, or the Baha'i House of Worship. There are references to and articles on individual architects, builders, engineers, developers, and planners.
Norman Selfe's Approaches to bridge and Scheme for remodelling The Rocks 1891, courtesy State Library of NSW a1528551 / SSV/47 - click on the image to zoom in
And it isn't all a story of improvement.
Much was lost in the modernisation and growth of Sydney. Buildings long demolished, such as the Theatre Royal, and the Hotel Australia, live on in the Dictionary of Sydney. We also tell the stories of resistance and activism, with articles on the Green Bans which saved much of historic Sydney, including buildings in Glebe, The Rocks and Woolloomooloo, and its pockets of bush, such as Kelly's Bush.
Eastern Suburbs Railway line viaduct construction in the 1970s, City of Sydney Archives SRC 14517
Along the way, people who came to Sydney brought their ways of building, socialising and living with them, changing the city around them. While most of the early colonists were English, with English tastes and styles of building, later immigrants, such as the Chinese, Italians, Greeks, Croatians, Germans, French, Lebanese and Dutch, as well as the Vietnamese, Cambodians and Lao, brought different styles to the city, with their churches, mosques, schools, clubs and other community buildings. Our entries on cultural groups relate how the city was changed by these new Sydneysiders.
So if you are interested in how the built environment of our city came to be, there's no better place to start than the Dictionary. And as the city continues to grow and change, so will the Dictionary.
