Friday, 14 February 2020 - 11:00 am (CET/MEZ) Berlin | Author/Destination: Australia / Australien Category/Kategorie: General, ShoppingReading Time: 5minutes
Sydney Road (in its northernmost part also known as the Hume Highway) is a major urban arterial in the northern suburbs of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Sydney Road starts at the northern end of Royal Parade at the boundary of Parkville and Brunswick and continues north through Brunswick, Coburg, Coburg North, Hadfield, Fawkner, Campbellfield, Somerton and Craigieburn, where it joins the Hume Freeway. The section passing through Brunswick and Coburg, between Park Street at its southern end and Bell Street near the site of the former Pentridge prison, at its northern end, is Melbourne’s longest continuous shopping strip, with an abundance of small businesses and a variety of restaurants and coffee shops, clothing stores, places of worship, and community services. It is well known for its wedding fashion shops, discount shopping and a number of specialist food stores.
Sydney Road contains many historical landmarks. Many of the hotels date from the 1850s, including the Cornish Arms Hotel and the Sarah Sands Hotel on the corner of Brunswick Road. The Bombay Rock at the corner of Phoenix Street, was one of the pre-eminent rock music venues in Melbourne in the 1970s and 80s. Brunswick Town Hall, built in 1876 on the corner of Dawson Street, is an imposing Victorian edifice. It was saved from planned destruction by the municipal council in 1973-1974 when Vic and Vida Little, along with the Brunswick Progress Association, led a successful campaign to preserve it. The building was significantly extended and renovated in the early 1990s to upgrade the library, offices and public assembly spaces. Diagonally opposite from the Town Hall stands the Mechanics Institute, built in 1868, and used for worker education and social activities. A monument to the Free Speech fights of the 1930s stands near the corner. The history of many of the single and double story shop fronts can be seen in the names and years moulded into the upper portions of the building facades. The Mechanics Institute now provides a popular performance space and offices for local arts administrators.
Sydney Road has a number of institutions that are notable for their contribution to the broader cultural life of Melbourne. The Mediterranean wholesalers, between Victoria and Blyth Streets is a long-established, large and well-known source of Italian and other European foodstuffs. The A1 Bakery – Lebanese bakery and Middle Eastern grocer, at the top of Brunswick Hill is the most high-profile of a number of such bakeries in the area, well known for products such as flat bread that are supplied across Melbourne. A tour of these bakeries forms part of Melbourne’s annual Food and Wine Festival. Savers is a very popular supermarket-sized second-hand clothing store, located between Albert Street and Glenlyon Road. Well known for its bridal shops, a recent arrival in Sydney Road is Mariana Hardwick’s Emporium Avenue in the eponymously (re)named building between Sparta Place and Ballarat Street.
Each year the City of Moreland Council organises the Sydney Road Street Party, usually on a Sunday at the end of February, running from midday to 7pm. Sydney Road is closed to traffic from Union Street to Victoria Street in Brunswick. The Street Party launches the annual Brunswick Music Festival. Several stages are erected for a variety of ethnic, folk and rock music to be performed live. Hundreds of community groups and local businesses set up stalls on the road. Street theatre and kids shows, and a wide variety of tasty food from many cuisines is there to be sampled. Tens of thousands of people enjoy a day of festivities taking over Sydney Road.
