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Majorca Building, 258-260 Flinders Lane, Melbourne

Butler, Graeme1985

Record details

Title:

Creator:

Butler, Graeme (Name details)

Date of work:

1985

Reference number:

BIF-CITY 101788

Level of description:

Item from Collection: Heritage Collection (HC)

Type of materials:

Graphic materialsTextual material

Part of:

Series: Central City (BIF-CITY)

Access restrictions:

UnrestrictedOpen access.

Use restrictions:

UnrestrictedPlease contact City of Melbourne Libraries about obtaining permission to reproduce images.

General notes:

Period: Inter-WarConstruction date: 1928-1930Architect: Harry NorrisNotable features: 1. Early use of full pallet of terracotta facing and exotic design. 2. Elegant glazing details.ASSOCIATED RESEARCH ADDED BY GRAEME BUTLER:.GRAEME BUTLER 1985 MELBOURNE CENTRAL ACTIVITIES DISTRICT CONSERVATION STUDYStatement of SignificanceHistoryWilliam Dogshun and Sons, warehousemen of Melbourne, Geelong and Ballarat, occupied George Meane's stone warehouse on this site around 1900. A building permit application in October 1928 signalled its replacement with the Majorca Building by 1930. The owners were the discretely named Majorca Buildings Pty. Ltd. who more recently were known also as Majorca Investments. The Sharpe family have been involved with this company for a long period.Harry A Norris was the architect and Clive S Steele the structural engineer. Six upper floors, a mezzanine, ground and basement floors accommodated offices and retail at street level, both facing Flinders Lane and fronting a lane on the east. Otis direct current electric lifts were provided and still operate in the building. Majorca, Spanish-owned island in the Mediterranean Sea, may well have been the inspiration for this exotic facade, given the Moorish influence evident in this building.DescriptionA corbel-table and deep giant archways set the period as Medieval and the blue terracotta facing and gold ornamentation set the culture as Moorish or Spanish. Folliated ornament in panels and a frieze complement the rope moulding to archways and string moulds. At the parapet the mood turns to Neo-Grec with a shallow pediment, flanking urns and a central cartouche. Embossed copper spandrels are a more subtle ornament form, possibly intended by weathering to blend with the dark glass. Bronze framed shopfronts fronting the lane are intact as is the lift halls at each level and the main side entry. More impressive perhaps than the facade's exotica and colour is the way it is framed by the walls of Desgraves Street. Norris's former Kellow House (Spanish Mission) St. Kilda Road and G J Coles Store, Bourke Street (Neo-Gothic) are contemporary and equally ornamented with moulded terracotta. His more sober Nicholas Building was earlier than this group and predated his tour of Southern California in the late 1920s in search of cafeteria recipes for the new Coles' building. The tour also yielded a taste for the exotica seen on this facade. Public reaction to the Coles Store was to congratulate the new use of colour in city buildings; Majorca being no exception.IntegrityThe Flinders Lane shopfront has been altered and a number of signs added: the upper facade is original except for an added air unit.StreetscapeSubject of a vista down Desgraves Street and contributive to a streetscape of early 20th and 19th century offices and warehouses which share eclectic details, siting and scale.SignificanceThe Majorca Building epitomises a distinctive arm of the exotic revival of the late 1920s, provides an impressive termination to a vista and supports a streetscape along Flinders Lane..GRAEME BUTLER 1985 MELBOURNE CENTRAL ACTIVITIES DISTRICT CONSERVATION STUDYBUILDING IDENTIFICATION FORM cites 20th C. RegisterRAY TONKIN, ND, REPORT TO HISTORIC BUILDINGS PRESERVATION COUNCILRecommendation to add to heritage register.HERITAGE BRANCH, MINISTRY FOR PLANNING & ENVIRONMENT 1987 CITY OF MELBOURNE CENTRAL CITY NOTABLE BUILDINGS CITATIONSNOTABLE BUILDING CITATION (AM425)Deriving its name from the island that gave inspiration to the detailing of its facade, the Majorca building was constructed as a seven storey office building in 1928-30. Designed by the architect Harry Norris, the Moorish influence in its terracotta facade places it firmly within the Melbourne tradition of exotic architecture in the late 1920s (the "jazz age"), much of it executed by Norris himself.MELBOURNE BACKLOG STUDY. PREPARED FOR THE AUSTRALIAN HERITAGE COMMISSION. JANUARY 1997.The Majorca building, built in 1928-29, is significant as the architect Harry Norris' best work in terracotta, and with Alkira house, the most inventive and highly developed use of the material in Melbourne. (Criterion F.1) it is a rare example of the use of the Romanesque revival style for reinterpretation in the revivalistic 1930s. it is a prominent landmark in Degraves street and flinders lane, which continues the dominant form and style of this street, developed in the 1900 to 1910 period, into the 1930s. it is a rare adaptation of a local style form which indicates the strength of character which flinders lane had developed. (Criterion B.2).FELS, M., LAVELLE, S. & MIDER, D. 1993, MELBOURNE CENTRAL ACTIVITIES DISTRICT: ARCHAEOLOGICAL MANAGEMENT PLANVictorian Heritage Inventory H7822-1810 -First land sale 1837, Block 5, Allotment 15, John Gunn. 1839 - 2 buildings.1877, 1888 & 1905 - 3 storey warehouse, James Dodgsun & Co. Current building: 8 storeys, constructed 1930..HERMES 64925National Trust of Australia (Vic)Designed by Harry A. Norris and built in 1928/29, this office building has an unusual facade with tall arched openings with blue terracotta and copper panels beneath the windows.The ground floor has been altered several times in a most unsympathetic manner in relation to the upper floors.Classified: 14/07/1977.Newspapers:The Brisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864 - 1933) Tue 3 Sep 1929 Page 3`MELBOURNE'S CIVIC BEAUTY CHANGING.The change in the beauty of Melbourne's architecture is becoming conspicuous in the ornate designs of the facades of many newly erected buildings. An important improvement to Flinders-lane will be manifest when the Majorca buildings, now being erected at the corner of the Centreway and Flinders-lane, is completed.The facade of this building will be of blue ten-a cotta texture, spotted with green and the high lights wiped off to a buff shade. The enrichments and trim will be in buff spotted with green, and the spaces between floors are to be copper panelled. The building will contain large basement and seven upper floors, ten shops occupying the ground floor. As the Centreway is closed at night at both Collins-street and Flinders-lane entrances, the architect, Mr. Harry A. Norris, has been enabled to treat the rear of the building in a manner not hitherto at- tempted in Melbourne. Instead of a blank wall, with the usual iron stair case fixed to it, an artistic marble finished stairway will greet the eye of pedestrians approaching from Collins street. This will be built within the building line and abut on the Centre way, and the design provides places for ferns and other plants on the balustrade. The site of this building was formally occupied by Dodgshun's warehouse, the area being 29 x 159. The Purchase price of the old building was £60,000, equal to £2069 per foot. Messrs. Shillabeer and Son are the contractors for the new building, the contract price of Which Is £60,000.'

Names:

City of MelbourneNorris, Harry Albert, 1888-1966

Topics:

Central Activities District Conservation Study 1985Conservation studiesInterwar periodOffices1920-1929Spanish Mission style

Places:

Melbourne (Vic.)

Form/Genre:

Building Identification Forms (BIFs)

Record types:

Research and reports

Record number:

1191050