Ultra-luxury Sirius development on Sydney Harbour underway at last

Moves are underway to take one of Sydney’s best known and most controversial buildings from housing commission to the very top end of town. .

Sirius developer JDH Capital, controlled by former Macquarie Bank executive Jean-Dominque Huynh, plans 76 apartments. Picture: Images by Binyan

Half a decade after the NSW government made the controversial decision to sell Sydney Harbour’s Sirius building, relocating its public housing tenants to the city’s suburbs in the process, its new owner has finally lodged plans for an ultra-luxury revamp at the hands of world-acclaimed designers.

Positioned at the foot of the Harbour Bridge and overlooking Circular Quay and the Opera House, developer JDH Capital, controlled by former Macquarie Bank executive Jean-Dominque Huynh, plans 76 apartments.

Mr Huynh bought the building designed in the brutalist style for $150m in the middle of last year after the state government pitted several private sector developers against each other in a tightly fought contest.

On offer in the former public housing block would be one, two, three and four-bedroom apartments, with some penthouses replete with private swimming pools.

Interiors were designed by architecture firm BVN and leading British interior designer Kelly Hoppen.

The multi-award winning Ms Hoppen is well known for her East meets West style, with the sought after designer working on an eclectic mix of projects around the world, including five-star hotels, superyachts, private homes and exclusive commercial properties.

The Sirius tower’s marketing agents, CBRE’s Ben Stewart and Justin Brown, said some of the existing apartments in the building, designed in the late 1970s in the brutalist fashion, had been amalgamated under the new design, reducing the number of apartments in the tower from 79 to 76.

The apartments include nine super-prime residences with private lap pools and large garden terraces, which Mr Brown said were “unrepeatable in Sydney”.

The vision for Sirius, which sits on some of the best real estate in Australia, includes penthouses with swimming pools. Picture: Images by Binyan

The sale of the apartments will start by the second quarter of next year, once the development application has been approved. Prices are yet to be set in the complex but appetite is apparently already strong with multiple prospective buyers already sourced from CBRE’s database.

“The apartments are spectacular higher up in the building,” Mr Brown, the executive chairman of CBRE Residential Projects, told The Australian on Wednesday.

“Purchasers love the premium boutique nature of the building, which is difficult to achieve in the CBD as well as the tactile nature of Millers Point and The Rocks, which cannot be duplicated in Sydney as it has so much culture, history and charm,’’ Mr Brown said.

“Sirius has long been part of the fabric of The Rocks and Circular Quay … it resonates with both the local Sydney and the global market because of its iconic location, sitting between the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge with uninterrupted views of both and coupled with dramatic harbour views straight through the heads.”