A North Sydney modernist office tower has been recommended for heritage protection after architects and heritage advocates pushed back against plans to demolish it.
The Heritage Council of NSW announced it was considering listing North Sydney MLC Building in September 2020, and has made its recommendation following a period of community engagement.
The Sydney Morning Herald reports that the council has made the recommendation because the building’s owner, Investa, had not demonstrated that they would suffer undue financial hardship should the building be listed.
Heritage minster Don Harwin will now make a decision on whether to honour the recommendation and scuttle the plans for a new building on the site or overrule the heritage body.
Designed by Bates, Smart and McCutcheon and completed in 1956, the North Sydney MLC Building was the first high-rise office block in North Sydney and the largest building of its type in Australia at the time of its construction.
Bates Smart is also the architect of the building’s replacement – a sculptural commercial tower reaching 27 storeys. The firm has noted that it had worked with the building’s owners for more than a decade to find a way to refurbish it, but the plan was eventually deemed unviable because of an “unsympathetic relationship to the heritage of MLC [and] overshadowing of [the adjacent] Brett Whiteley Place.”
In announcing its intention to consider heritage listing the tower, the Heritage Council of NSW said the building was likely to be of state heritage significance due to its association with the evolution of high-rise design in Sydney. It was constructed with construction and structural techniques not previously used in Australia, including “the first use of a curtain wall design, the first use of modular units in Australia, fully rigid steel frame structure combined with ‘light weight’ construction of hollow steel floors resulting in reduced construction loads and time.”
Don Harwin’s office did not respond to ArchitectureAU’s requests for comment by publication.
