DESIGN & BUILD
Dive on in
Beloved Petersham pub, The Oxford Tavern, has maintained its dive bar vibe while broadening its appeal, as owner James Thorpe tells Seamus May. IT HAS been nearly a decade since the
just over 800 square metres. So we always
Oxford Tavern, found on a corner plot
wanted to maximise the space.”
in Sydney’s trendy Inner West, last
Opening up that front bar room, the space that visitors first enter, was a priority for Thorpe and the group.
underwent a refurbishment. Since then
Smarter spaces
the venue has changed hands, being
For Odd Culture Group it was clear that a
and Saturdays, so creating a bit more
picked up by Odd Culture Group.
lot of Oxford Tavern’s indoor space was
space for guests was always an outcome,
going to waste, and the redevelopment
and also creating an area where you
sought to make better use of those spaces.
could get good lines of sight to a live
As such, James Thorpe, CEO of the Odd Culture Group, told Australian Hotelier it was high time for a refresh at the Tav, as it is known to locals. “The last sort of major – I want to say
“Old buildings tend to have lots and lots of back of house spaces,” Thorpe states. “The Tav, when we bought it, the
“We were reaching capacity on Fridays
performer,” Thorpe explains. Live music and performance is a significant part of the Oxford Tavern’s
major, but it wasn’t really – renovation was
ground floor alone was nearly 50 per cent
offering, but the current arrangement
undertaken in 2013, so nearly ten years
back-of-house, just rooms and rooms that
meant the space was unsuitable for
ago,” Thorpe says.
weren’t being used for anything, and so in
such attractions.
“We’ve always wanted to do it as it is our biggest property in terms of footprint,
34 | Australian Hotelier
an old pub, they tend to just get filled up with random knick-knacks.”
“We do get the possibility of booking fairly large bands from time to time. When
