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Former Butcher's Shop

Location 745 Nicholson Street,, CARLTON NORTH VIC 3054 - Property No B4489 File Number B4489 Level Local

[1/1] B4489 745 Nicholson Street

Statement of Significance

A small house was erected in 1887 for Stephen Mair and in 1895 he had a single storey shop built immediately in front of his house for Bennet & Woolcock Ltd., butchers, and still occupied by butchers, J A Bechwith & Sons.
The shop is notable for the survival of the original fittings, which include the marble slabs for tables and shop windows, floor to ceiling wall tiles, timber cashier's office and the barley sugar cast iron columns with rails and meat hooks for suspending carcases.
Sawdust is still used to cover the floor and still in position are the brackets formerly used for fixing timber shutters before the glass show windows were installed; these shutter were removed daily so that meat could be served direct to customers on the pavement.
Externally the front facade is mainly as originally designed, with a bluestone base, a slightly off-centre shop entrance door, plasterwork panels of coloured glazed tiles and an elaborate roof parapet with a central arched pediment. The small arched opening at the side of the shop leads to the entrance door of the house at the rear.
The original curved roof and cast iron pavement verandah with a central arched bay (which is echoed by the central arched roof pediment) is one of the very few remaining examples of this design of verandah.
The intactness of the elaborate front facade, the pavement verandah and the original internal fittings make this one of the most notable surviving examples of a ninteeenth century shop in Melbourne.
The house at the rear is not included.
Classified: 19/08/1982



The house at the rear is not included in the Classification.