NSWPlanned settlement
Paddington
A barracks builders’ village that grew into streets of terraces.
1839Underwood’s Paddington Estate subdivided
WHAT STARTED IT
The suburb grew along the ridge road to South Head, which Governor Macquarie had made fit for carriages in 1811. In 1839 distiller James Underwood cut up 50 acres of his land as the Paddington Estate, and from 1841 the building of Victoria Barracks on the ridge brought stonemasons, quarrymen and carpenters who settled in cottages nearby.
WHAT SUSTAINED IT
Gentlemen’s villas went up on the slopes above Rushcutters Bay, while tradesmen lived along the main road. Paddington became a municipality in 1860, and horse buses and then steam trams, running through to Bondi from 1884, brought a building boom that covered the hillsides in speculatively built terraces. By the mid-20th century the terraces were dismissed as slums, but in 1964 residents formed the Paddington Society, one of Australia’s first resident action groups.
TURNING POINTS
1839James Underwood subdivides 50 of his 97 acres as the Paddington Estate, named after the London borough.
1841Work begins on Victoria Barracks on the South Head Road.
1860The Municipality of Paddington is proclaimed on 17 April.
1866Paddington Reservoir is completed on the ridge to supply the suburbs below.
1891The Governor, Lord Jersey, opens Paddington Town Hall on 3 October.
1964Residents found the Paddington Society to protect the suburb’s buildings.
WHAT IT DOES NOW
A heritage-listed suburb of restored terraces, divided between the City of Sydney and Woollahra councils, with galleries and shops along Oxford Street.