Royal Exhibition Building Dome Promenade view in 1880 and now

The city has come a long way since the view from the Royal Exhibition Building Dome Promenade first wowed visitors. See how it looked then compared to now.

The Exhibition Building, now the Royal Exhibition Building, shortly after it was completed in 1880.

It’s a view that hasn’t been seen for 100 years, though this time you’ll see more skyscrapers, taller trees, fewer horse-drawn carriages – and fewer cavorting couples in the gardens below.

As the Royal Exhibition Building reopens its Dome Promenade from October 29 to offer a view unseen for 100 years, a flick through the newspaper archives offers a titillating glimpse into times past.

More than 4000 people paid threepence to visit the Exhibition Building Dome Promenade on Melbourne Cup Day in 1880, shortly after the grand edifice was built for the Melbourne International Exhibition.

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East view from the Dome Promenade of the Exhibition Building in 1880.

The outlook today. Picture: Mark Stewart

In the early days, you could also hire a telescope, or take a peek into a “camera obscura” on the deck, which projected an image via a prism of everything happening in the gardens below.

Naturally enough, that led to some unintended, but amusing, consequences.

As an article published in several newspapers nationwide reported in March 1881, some visitors to the Dome Promenade were copping an unexpected eyeful.

It noted that crowds were flocking to the Dome Promenade to enjoy fabulous views of Melbourne, Hobsons Bay and the surrounding landscape.

“Amusing things sometimes happen also,” the report added.

“By some mysterious impulse … young couples stray about the grounds, and seek the quiet and retired spots which boast those rustic seats, ‘for whispering lovers made’, thoughtfully placed there by the commissioners doubtless!

“These lovebirds are all the while in blissful ignorance that their little comedy is being thrown by the recording angle of the camera obscura on the concave table above the roof of the Exhibition for the delectation – expressed in loud guffaws – of a limited audience at 3d each.”

The view from another angle.

While we’ll spare our readers the salacious details, newspapers at the time had no such reservations, describing in detail exactly what was caught on camera.

As the article noted, the situation became all the more comical when one of the cavorting couples below ascended to the Dome Promenade themselves.

“A pair of these culprits strolled into the camera obscura the other day, and it so happened that another pair in the grounds below were at that moment engaged in rehearsing the same interesting overture,” the report said.

“They looked at the picture, and they looked at each other with an expression that is unpaintable in words, blushed to the roots of their hair, but said never a word.”

Tickets for the Dome Promenade are on sale at museumsvictoria.com.au and include a tour and an exhibition showcasing the Royal Exhibition Building’s history.

For photos and stories from our newspaper archives, follow us on Instagram: heraldsunphoto_retro