Historical notes: | By the early 1950s, the Mutual Life & Citizens Assurance Company Limited (MLC) had recognised that their existing 1938 headquarters on Martin Place was insufficient to their needs and in 1954 announced a new head office in North Sydney. North Sydney Council later approved the application from MLC to consolidate a site of 31 shops in the town centre of North Sydney at the Victoria Cross intersection to construct their new office complex. On the occasion of the approval the General Manager of MLC, Milton Cromwell Alder, noted the future division of MLC offices in Sydney as a result: "the position in the city is becoming intolerable because of traffic congestion, as well as the need to accommodate an expanding staff. The new building [at North Sydney] will become the head office, and will house most of the clerks. Most administrative and records work will be done there. The present building [on Martin Place] will be retained for executive headquarters and for dealing direct with the public" (The Newcastle Sun, 12/08/1954, p.5).
MLC commissioned their preferred architects, Bates, Smart & McCutcheon, who had also designed their 1938 head office and with whom MLC would collaborate on the majority of their new office expansion programme, designing buildings in Brisbane (1955), Wollongong (1956), Shepparton (1959), Ballarat (1954), Geelong (1953), Adelaide (1957), Perth (1957), Newcastle (1957), North Sydney (1957), and Canberra (1959). The North Sydney MLC Building design, a 59 metre-high tower complex in the Post-war International style, was the result, with noted inspiration coming from Skidmore, Owings & Merrill's (SOM) 1952 Lever House in New York and coming at the same time as the firm's design of ICI House in Melbourne, which is listed on the Victorian State Heritage Register and the Australian National Heritage List. McCutcheon spent time with SOM’s offices immediately after the end of the war, and was greatly influenced by the work of the American modernists embodied in the United Nations Headquarters building completed in 1952 (Goad 2016, p.368).
In the 1950s Bates, Smart & McCutcheon, led by Principal Partner Osborn McCutcheon until 1977, was one of Australia’s largest architectural firms and the firm's designs often reflected McCutcheon's desire to link architecture with the broader arts, often including major works of art like painting, tapestry and sculpture. This is demonstrated in the design for the MLC Building with a treated-aluminium bas-relief of the MLC 'unity in strength' symbol (derived from a fable attributed to Aesop, it depicts a man unsuccessfully trying to break a bundle of sticks) sculpted by Andor Mészáros, a prominent Hungarian-Australian artist known for his public sulpture commissions, and the front garden on either side of the main entrance with seven shaped rocks designed by sculptor and engineer, Gerald Lewers. Other works designed by the firm at this time included Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) buildings in Sydney (1956; demolished 1996) and Melbourne (1955-58), the Monash University masterplan (1960-61), and the Australian Embassy, Washington DC (1964). The project builders, Concrete Constructions Pty Ltd, were a prominent Sydney building and engineering firm that was established in 1916, and examples of their work include MLC Building Martin Place (1938), King George Memorial Hospital (1939), Royal Canberra Hospital (1942), Qantas House (1957) and Centrepoint Tower (1970). The consulting engineers were Julius, Poole & Gibson and W. E. Bassett & Associates.
It was noted on the approval of the design in 1954 that the MLC Building marked the change of North Sydney as a second CBD of metropolitan Sydney. The Mayor of North Sydney, William Henry Brothers, commented that "The northern side of the harbour will eventually develop into the commercial centre of Sydney", while MLC General Manager Milton Alder agreed: "I am of the opinion that in years to come Sydney will be a twin city - like Buda and Pest and Brooklyn and New York" (Construction, 21/07/1954, p.1). The construction of the MLC Building in North Sydney began just as the smaller modernist AMP Building on Miller Street, North Sydney, designed by Stephenson & Turner and built by Concrete Constructions Pty Ltd, was completed. In January 1955, preparations of the site began and the demolition of all the buildings on the site was completed by November 1955. Excavation works removed more than 50,000 tonnes of of soil and rock, which was used by the Municipality of North Sydney for improvements to parks and gardens.
The MLC Building's modernist design was noted for its first use of a curtain wall design, the first use of modular units in Australia and was the first high-rise building in Australia to have a public plaza. The design was one of the first commercial development to include extensive staff facilities such as a staff canteen, lounge, billiards room, theatrette, squash courts and roof gardens (Rodrigo 2016, p.89). Other elements of the design were no less impressive: 3000 occupants, 3,556 tonnes of steel, 9,775m² of curtain walls, a gross floor space of 41,806m², and ten 23-passenger lifts. As the first building in Sydney with a fully rigid steel frame and hollow steel floors, the steel framing, providing maximum width and the first-use of steel pan flooring, allowed natural light to permeate to even the centre of the building. The glass too was a innovative inclusion, with the use of a double layer of anti-actinic glass to the curtain walls that filtered light but prevented heat transfer, and was supplied by F. W. Gissing Pty Ltd of Newtown. 'Glass in Australia' praised the building's design as "an outstanding example of Australia's trend towards greater utilisation of glass in modern constructions" (Glass in Australia, June-August 1957, pp.6-7) and by any account, the new building "exemplified slick corporate America transplanted to Sydney" (HeriCon, 2013, p. 87). As a mark of its position as the tallest building in North Sydney, a weather beacon was installed on the roof by Standard Telephones and Cables, which remained in place until 1987 when the building was no longer the tallest tower in North Sydney. Construction work was stopped temporarily in February 1957 when an electrician fell to his death from the 14th floor, and his fellow workers later presented his widow and children with a cheque for £1,200.
Completed at a final cost of £4.5 million, the MLC Building was officially opened by Prime Minister Robert Menzies on 22 August 1957, who expressed that "The view [from the top floor] gives me such a new conception of Sydney that quite frankly I'm beginning to like the place" (The Cumberland Argus, 11/09/1957, p.15). The deocrative finishings echoed the prestige of the building when it opened, with the use of marble, granite, glazed terra cotta tiles, mosaic feature murals, and indoor tropical gardens, all being used to "add to the attractive resentation of Australia's concept of a modern building in keeping with world standards" (MLC, 1957). The treated-aluminium bas-relief of the MLC 'unity in strength' symbol by Andor Mészáros, was placed high on the southern blue-grey tiled wall, with a yellow-tiled background helping it to stand out against the blue grey tiles (MLC 1957). At the time of its opening, the eastern section of the building was also leased by Commonwealth Oil Refineries Limited, while MLC occupied the top five floors of the west block. The eighth floor was completely taken up (1,300m²) by office machinery and an innovative computer, the whole plant being described as "the biggest single plant of its kind in Australia" (MLC, 1957). With the ground level occupied by 13 shops, the southernmost section was occupied by the North Sydney Branch of the Commercial Banking Company of Sydney from 1957 to 1977. The frontage of the west block along Miller Street was setback to allow for landscaping, consisting of six plane trees, New Zealand Browntop grass (Agrostis tenuous) lawns, and a decorative sculpted sandstone and river rock garden on either side of the central entrance ramp designed by Gerald Lewers.
In 2000, the facade was restored by Bates Smart (as it was known from 1995) following a conservation management plan prepared by Peter McKenzie alongside extensive interior renovations for a project termed "Campsus MLC" by Bligh Voller Nield, which were completed in 2001.
REFERENCES
"New Head Office For M.L.C.", The Sydney Morning Herald, 26 March 1954, p.9. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article18416563
"New Building For M.L.C. Company", The Newcastle Sun, 12 August 1954, p.5. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article163291569
"Bates Smart Timeline - MLC Building, North Sydney", Journal Bates Smart, March–April 2012. URL: https://www.batessmart.com/2012/mar-apr/bates-smart-timeline/
Goad, Philip (2016), 'Importing Expertise: Australian-US Architects and the Large-scale, 1945–1990', Fabrications, Vol. 26, No.3, pp. 357-391.
Willis, Julie (2012), 'McCutcheon, Sir Walter Paul Osborn (1899–1983)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. URL: http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/mccutcheon-sir-walter-paul-osborn-15066/text26265
"The M.L.C. Building, North Sydney", Architecture in Australia, July/September 1957, Vol. 46, pp. 40-46.
M.L.C, 'The MLC Head Office Building - Nth Sydney', Adelaide: Griffin Press, 1957.
Hickey, Denise (1982), Gerald and Margo Lewers, their lives and their work, Mosman: Grasstree Press, p. 124.
"Twin Cities On The Harbour?", Construction, 31 March 1954, p.4. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article224515260
"North Sydney Expansion Continues", Construction, 21 July 1954, p.1. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article224516728
"Big Office Block In North Sydney", The Sydney Morning Herald, 20 April 1954, p.7. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article18421429
Rodrigo, Russell (2016), 'Banking on Modernism: Dr H.C. (Nugget) Coombs and the Institutional Architecture of the Reserve Bank of Australia', Fabrications, Vol. 26, No. 1, pp. 72-101.
"Glass at Work: Gigantic New Building", Glass In Australia (Special Journal of the Federated Glass Merchants' Association of Australia), June-August 1957, Vol 1, No. 1, pp. 6-7.
HeriCon Consulting; Morris, Colleen and Spearritt, Peter (August 2013), The Modern Movement in New South Wales: A Thematic Study and Survey of Places, Heritage Council of New South Wales, p. 87.
"WEATHER BEACON", The Canberra Times, 13 March 1957, p.1. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article91236418
"Workers Stop When Electrician Falls To Death", The Canberra Times, 22 February 1957, p.1. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article91234965
"NATIONAL ROUND-UP", Tribune, 3 April 1957, p.11. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article236326278
"Mr. Menzies To Open New M.L.C. Building", The Canberra Times, 22 August 1957, p.5. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article91596557
"P.M. Sees New View of Sydney", The Cumberland Argus, 11 September 1957, p.15. URL: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article132135579 |