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Chippendale's progress from Gadigal forest and wetland, to farm and nursery, was followed by industrial development that made it a polluted and deprived suburb. Community, charity and religion helped inhabitants, but poor drainage and unplanned development persisted until the…

Founded in 1855, CSR had refineries in Canterbury, Chippendale, Pyrmont and later around Australia. It became a large and influential industrial company, with city offices and diversified business interests.

The National Art School has been at the centre of Sydney's art scene for almost a century, and has nurtured the talents of generations of artists who have studied and worked in studios within the walls of the old Darlinghurst Gaol.

Edith Glanville was a leading Sydney philanthropist and pioneering female Justice of the Peace. She supported Armenians, was involved in the beginnings of the League of Nations, and founded the Quota Club and the Soroptimists Club of Sydney.

Increasing population and industry saw the Cooks River transformed from a pristine natural watercourse into a highly modified and polluted river

Established as a draper in Newtown, Marcus Clark and Co went on to become one of Sydney's best known stores, with numerous buildings at Railway Square, and a wide range of goods.

Prior to European settlement, the waterway we now call the Parramatta River was a shared food source, a highway and a territorial boundary for the Wangal, Wallemudegal, Gammeraygal and Burramattagal peoples. Colonisation dramatically reshaped the ecology of the river; the…

A founder of Sydney's women's suffrage movement, Maybanke Anderson was also a writer and teacher, and a lifelong campaigner for the rights of women and children.

Cadigal and Wangal country that was parcelled out to the Church of England soon after the Europeans arrived, Glebe became a retreat for the gentry and later a gritty working-class enclave. The late twentieth century saw it transformed again into a heritage precinct, saved…

Freed from incarceration in New Caledonia for his revolutionary activities in the Paris Commune, Lucian Henry built a new life in Sydney as an artist, teacher and advocate for native Australian motifs in the decorative arts.

The shocking losses of Australian servicemen and women in the Great War prompted communities across Australia to find ways to memorialise those who died, and honour those who served. As no centralised authority drove or coordinated this task, the form of each memorial…

Built as the library, hall and rooms for the Sydney Mechanics' School of Arts, and long a centre of cultural life in Sydney, the Arthouse Hotel was converted into a pub in the 1990s.

St Barnabas' Anglican Church on Broadway, known to many as Barney's, has a long tradition of ministry to the diverse communities of the inner city. The congregation was boosted by the arrival of Reverend RBS Hammond in 1918 and his energetic ministry to disadvantaged people…

While memorials honouring the dead of the Great War were adapted to mark the sacrifice of those lost in World War II, the losses of a new generation led to innovations in memorialisation. Those who died on active service in Sydney, and those lost in conflicts Malaya, Korea,…

The Metropolitan Goods Lines, which spread throughout the Sydney suburbs from 1916 onwards, have played a key role in the industrialization of the city and the development of many suburbs. While some of these lines have become disused, others have been repurposed as light…

Cammeraygal country until the 1820s, Artarmon became an area of market gardens and orchards, gradually becoming more closely settled. By the end of the nineteenth century, brickmaking was established, and the railway line brought people and commercial development from 1890.…

Called Ta-Ra by its first inhabitants, the Cadigal, Millers Point was named for the windmills that were built on its heights, and their owner, John Leighton, known as Jack the Miller. By the 1850s Millers Point was a maritime enclave, with almost all residents and employers…

Established as a joint enterprise by the Sydney Mechanics' School of Arts, the Trades and Labour Council and the Engineering Association, and run by the School of Arts, Sydney's first technical college opened its doors in 1878. Its immediate success with students,…

Education in Sydney started with Aboriginal society and the everyday learning and formal initiation of young Aboriginal people. Institutionalised education came with the Europeans, who first created schools for convicts' children, and later for the children of the new gentry…

When builders labourers, organised by their union, refused to work on projects they found socially or environmentally undesirable, in Sydney in the 1970s, they started a new form of environmental activism. The Green Bans were to change the way Sydney developed