sojourn
House of Prime
Transport House was part of this movement, originally built in 1938 for the New South Wales Department of Motor Transport. Built by the architects Henry E. Budden and Mackey, Transport House’s design was considered remarkable even then, winning the architects the Sulman Award in 1936 and in 1939, the building was awarded the Royal Institute of British Architects medal. When Transport House was first conceptualised, the designers envisioned a large, imposing office tower that would extend along York Street from Margaret to Erskine Street. The building would also have horizontally aligned wings each side of the central vertical tower. When the building was finally completed, only the south wing and the tower were built. This, however, would work towards the building’s advantage, giving it a modern aesthetic appeal for an art deco design of that era. Transport House in fact is an outstanding example of Modernistic architecture reflecting the Inter War Stripped Classical and Art Deco styles. After the boom of the 1920s, there was a heightened confidence and embracing of emerging modernist ideals in design and architecture. The building had distinctive green terracotta tiles, an art deco interior, air conditioned throughout with escalators – a concept new in Sydney at that time – that ran down to Wynyard station below.
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