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The Marble Bar in Adams Hotel, August 1952

By
Reginald Horner
From the collections of the
State Library of New South Wales
[ON 388/Box 037/Item 053]
(Mitchell Library, Courtesy ACP Magazines Ltd )

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Horner, Reg

Press and commercial photographer in Sydney in the mid 20th century.

State Library of New South Wales

Eating and Drinking

Hotels and Pubs

Interior design

Visual Arts

Marble Bar

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Lavish Victorian bar built in George Adams' Tattersall's Hotel when it was renovated in 1891. The bar was dismantled and reassembled when the hotel was demolished in the late 1960s and reassembled in 1973 in the new Hilton Hotel that was built in its place. Ornately designed to Adams' specifications by Henry Parkes' son, architect Varney Parkes, the bar features sheets of plate glass mirrors, marble walls and pilasters, mosaic floors, cedar timbers, stained glass windows and domed roof, and a series of paintings by Julian Ashton. 

Tattersall's Hotel

Hotel on Pitt Street, on the present site of the Hilton Hotel, that was the headquarters of the Tattersall's gambling club. The club has been meeting at the Mayor Inn run by licensee William John O'Brien when he built a public room for them to meet in 1858 and changed the name of the hotel to Tattersall's. In 1878 the hotel was purchased by friends for George Adams, a keen gambler from Kiama. Subsequently also known as Adams' Hotel, under Adams' management it went on to become the home of Tattersall's betting and lotteries after Adams started holding sweeps in 1881 for members of the public, in addition to those being held by the Tattersall's club. In 1891 the building was substantially renovated to plans by Varney Parkes that included the construction of the Marble Bar and an arcade that ran between George and Pitt Street. The remodelled hotel was reopened in December 1892, described in the press at the time as "an hotel superior in its appointments to any in the city". The hotel ceased trading in February 1969 and was demolished, to be replaced by the Hilton Hotel. The Marble Bar was dismantled and rebuilt in the new hotel.

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