Royal Mail Hotel

The Royal Mail Hotel at 288-290 Albert Street, Sebastopol, originally built in 1865 and reconstructed in 1924. The remnants of the 1865 structure and the extent of the 1924 reconstruction are considered to be significant. The 1924 reconstruction comprises a long red brick clad building, L-shaped in plan, addressing Albert Street. The facade is dominated by a parapet featuring a roughcast rendered reverse arched panel with raised numerals ('1924') above a rendered panel displaying the hotel's name ('Royal Mail Hotel') in raised lettering. A rendered brick residence is attached to the rear of the hotel by a gabled link.

The Royal Mail Hotel is of historic and architectural significance to the City of Ballarat. 

The Royal Mail Hotel is of historic significance as one of the oldest continuously occupied hotels in Sebastopol. It is a rare surving example of a hotel within the township, which had as many as seventy in operation prior to 1900. It was erected in 1864 as a modest weatherboard hotel to provide refreshments and entertainment to the burgeoning population of the local Sebastopol goldfields and continues to operate as a hotel today. It representstwo important periods in Sebastopol - the deep lead mining period (the early fabric) and the prosperity and optimism of theearly 1920s. (Criterion A)

The Royal Mail Hotel is of architectural significance as a handsome interwar hotel on a prominent corner site. It forms a landmark due to its style and placement on the corner site. It is distinguished by a striking parapet along the Albert Street facade which shows the influence of the Federation Free Classical style, updated with a 1920s geometricism. (Criterion E)