Friday 11 May 2012

Rampant fertility

This bay window is atop the rise of Bourke Street, just down from Taylor Square and adjacent to the newly refurbished Beresford Hotel. The motif, here, strikes me as bordering on the pagan. Maybe this was a witches coven during the latter decades of the nineteenth century. See that metal ring on the right-hand-side? That was for holding the electrical cabling for the tramway cars. Could it be that the window is made from lead? If so, how come it is still there after all these years and not crow-barred off in the dead of night by some Surry Hills Steptoe figure?

5 comments:

MargaretP said...

It is surprising that something that pretty is still there, it looks like an Art Nouveau design, which I think was somewhere in 20"s to 30"s.
I just loved the metro entrances in Paris and the Lalique exhibits in the Louvre.

Jim said...

I actually thought the flowers suggested it was Federation style. The bay windows were very popular with Federation design too.

Julie said...

Ah ... now both Art Nouveau and Federation Style overlap. This building is not very far away so I will document it more. It is the corner of Bourke & Hill St.

AN was about 1890 to about 1914.

I thought they were more like pea-pods ...

Davine said...

Love the way you look at things. Great window - when I see work like this it just makes me think of the person that created it and wondering what there life was like at the time.

Joan Elizabeth said...

Ooo you are so good at noticing. I really love the simplicity of the decoration here. It would make a great tapestry or patchwork or something.