The preservation of the Jubilee Hotel could be the start of a new way to merge the old and new

From being labelled the demolition capital of Australia, Brisbane is now trying for more balanced approach to preserving its built heritage with a new inner-city development showing the way.

WHEN it comes to the preservation of historic buildings, Brisbane’s record has been one fraught with controversy and loss.

With the wave of destruction in the mid ‘70s to late ‘80s, Brisbane became known as the “demolition capital of Australia” and the impact of the razing of the Cloudland Dance Hall in Bowen Hills and the historic Bellevue Hotel in the CBD still reverberates.

While court of public opinion may not be unanimous, over the past three decades there has been a reweighting of the balance between heritage preservation and development.

Heritage architect Ivan McDonald said the development boom “ripped the heart” out of the Brisbane CBD prior to the first state heritage legislation in 1990.

“But since heritage legislation, I think there has been a good, balanced approach to heritage conservation at both a local and state level,” he said.

“While there’s always scope for improvement in skills and processes, one of the big moves in the right direction that I’ve seen is the development community’s acceptance of heritage conservation as a normal part of doing business.”

The old Bellevue Hotel in the Brisbane CBD in 1970.

Mr McDonald was the heritage architect for the Jubilee Hotel refurbishment which many believe has set a new standard for the architectural merging of the old and the new.

The task for architects Blight Rayner was to design a $200m plus 14-storey office Jubilee Place tower in the old car park next to the 134-year-old Bowen Hills hotel and yet still ensure the pub remained the focus

Mr McDonald said by world standards Brisbane was a young city, still developing its basic building stock and infrastructure.

“So naturally, we have many more new-build projects than other countries. But as we age, so too does our stock of buildings and it will become more-common for old buildings to be retained and refurbished and for new buildings to need to coexist harmoniously with the old,” he said.

“That is one of the perennial architectural challenges - designing in context.”

Heritage architect Ivan McDonald.

The problem for Blight Rayer director Jayson Blight, when he sought inspiration to achieve this contextual balancing act, was that there were no real examples of what he wanted to do in Brisbane and hardly any in Australia.

Mr Blight was no fan of the lonely facade in front of a gutted heritage building with a towering high-rise behind.

“So we looked at Europe in terms of how significant heritage can be intertwined with new buildings,” he said.

“Melbourne has got a lot right, although there are some disasters where a new building completely swallows the heritage buildings. That was our fear with Jubilee Place. We did not want to do that. We needed to give the heritage building space to breathe.”

Importantly, Mr Blight said it was the recognition by developer JGL Properties of the need to preserve the Jubilee Hotel within the Jubilee Place precinct that kicked started his vision.

“We saw it as a great opportunity to bring the old and the new together as one,” he said.

“The new office tower has allowed money to be poured back to restore the hotel that has given the heritage building a new lease of life for another 100 years.”

Designed by noted hotel architect Richard Gailey, the Jubilee was a quality building in its day – both in terms of its architecture and its facilities.

Back then hotels were as much about providing accommodation as they were about a cold beer. Over time, the accommodation requirement vanished and most hotels’ bar facilities have undergone an almost continuous churn of change.

The Jubilee was no different with a public bar, pokies and a ramshackle beer garden downstairs, while upstairs was unused except for some hotel administration. The verandas were enclosed and while the ornate street facades were intact, the side and rear face brick walls had been painted and repainted.

An artist's impression inside the new look Jubilee Hotel beer garden.

However, when the pub reopens in August, the commercial imperative which saw the BESIX Watpac construction of the office tower, also allowed the revitalisation of the two-storey hotel by creating a 250sq m publicly accessible plaza directly adjacent to St Paul’s Tce with a cantilever canopy, creating a connection to the back of the pub.

New features in the hotel, being built by Rohrig, will include a 300-seat beer garden at the rear and the removal of the old toilet block.

Inside, the renovations included reconstructing the open verandas to original detail; removing the exposed building services and restoring the original face brickwork; and repainting the street facades in their early colour scheme.

While there won’t be much change to the internal planning, the internal finishes will retain and retrieve much of the hotel’s original 19th century character.

Architect Jayson Blight inside the Jubilee Place office tower. Picture: Steve Pohlner

Mr Blight said it was all about “bringing back to life the majesty of what that building was”.

“There are a lot of these buildings that have been given up,” he said. “People were not using their creativity to think about how you can use these old buildings and really reinforce that heritage that Brisbane has and celebrate it.”

Mr McDonald believes that now there was an “inherent maturity” about how Brisbane deals with its heritage buildings.

“Others may see some heritage outcomes in southern capitals or overseas and think that Brisbane is a little conservative in its approach,” he said.

“Yet some others view Queensland as a bit of a red neck state when it comes to development matters and, particularly, heritage conservation. But I have found that a reasoned and reasonable heritage approach usually wins through.”