Skip to main content

The Dictionary of Sydney
Multimedia
Government House, Sydney 1850

Government House, Sydney 1850

By

From the collections of the

State Library of New South Wales

(Mitchell Library)

Search

Browse

Browse
- Artefacts
- Buildings
- Events
- Natural Features
- Organisations
- People
- Places
- Structures
- Entries
- Multimedia
- Subjects
- Roles
- Contributors

Connections

Appears in

The first Government House: building on Phillip’s ‘good foundation’

Subjects

Animals Colonial architecture

Buildings

First Government House

Footer

Home
About
Copyright
Contact

Footer Secondary

Contribute
Donate

Janssen, Jacob

Prussian artist who arrived in Sydney in December 1840.

State Library of New South Wales

The first Government House: building on Phillip’s ‘good foundation’

The first Government House was not a simple singular structure but a complex with a yard, outbuildings, guardhouse, garden and greater domain. It was a home, an office and a venue for public and private entertaining, but also a symbol of British authority, with all that that meant to different people, both then and now.

Colonial architecture

Animals

First Government House

full record »

Residence for the first nine Governors of NSW, which was the first major building in the colony. The first permanent building in the colony, it had two storeys built of bricks and stone comprising six rooms, two cellars and a rear staircase. In front of the house was a garden where many imported plant species were grown and the first orchard planted. The Museum of Sydney, on the corner of Bridge and Phillip Streets, was built on its site.